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Hey all,

So, I am planning on installing a SSD as a primary boot drive in my system, but I had a few questions that I'd like to clear up before I start. I plan on doing a clean install of Windows 7 , and I've been reading that enabling AHCI mode in the BIOS needs to be done before you install the OS. I have a Gigabyte EP45-UD3P motherboard. In the manual, it says that I have to add the AHCI drivers to the windows installation so that the OS will recognize the hard drives correctly (after I enable AHCI in the BIOS). I know that this had to be done for XP, but is this still necessary with Windows 7? I guess my question is, what is the chance that Windows recognize my hard drives in AHCI mode if I just enable it in BIOS and then install the OS normally?

Thanks guys!

Erazor GTX wrote:

Hey all,

So, I am planning on installing a SSD as a primary boot drive in my system, but I had a few questions that I'd like to clear up before I start. I plan on doing a clean install of Windows 7 , and I've been reading that enabling AHCI mode in the BIOS needs to be done before you install the OS. I have a Gigabyte EP45-UD3P motherboard. In the manual, it says that I have to add the AHCI drivers to the windows installation so that the OS will recognize the hard drives correctly (after I enable AHCI in the BIOS). I know that this had to be done for XP, but is this still necessary with Windows 7? I guess my question is, what is the chance that Windows recognize my hard drives in AHCI mode if I just enable it in BIOS and then install the OS normally?

Thanks guys!

Fairly good - AHCI support is fairly rampart now - if it's not working you'll know very early in the process as it wont be able to see your drives, but I believe the installer would still give you a driver setup option anyway

If your drive has a driver disk, Win7 has an option to install the driver (like XP did) before it starts the actual install.

Or you can install Win7 in IDE mode and then enable AHCI later by making THIS registry change.

Just enable AHCI in your BIOS and have at it. No drivers needed.