TRIM update hosed my Windows 7 install

[idata]

Just did the firmware update and it hosed my Windows 7 installation. The updater showed a successful firware update. Initially the computer booted just fine, but once I was within Windows it installed some drivers and asked for a reboot. That's when the trouble started. Now the drive won't boot Windows 7 anymore. I don't know if it's a Dell problem or Intel problem. The Dell BIOS claims a SMART error. I have a Dell XPS 8000.

[idata]

Hi,

I had the same problem as everyone else.

I Successfully installed the firmware. I then did a hdderase to ensure my drive was empty before installing windows 7.

In order to allow hdderase to work i had to change to eide compatibilty in the bios, i did the erase and then pressed reset booted into bios and changed back to ahci mode. I then saved settings, and allowed the computer to restart and boot fromm Windows 7 dvd.

After a couple of restarts i couldnt boot from the ssd anymore, the drive wasnt recognised as a boot drive. I then tried to reinstall windows but the program wouldnt detect my ssd.

So again ran hdderase again, the same as before (setset bios back yo ahci), this time when i booted from dvd, windows installer recognised my ssd. I installed again. This time after one restart as windows told me to restart, i came up with the same "insert bootable media/drive message".

So today, i thought i would give it one last go. I did exact same steps as the previous two times, However, this time, every time i had to restart (whether it be to change to eide compatibilty, and back to ahci, to saving bios settings etc) i turned the computer off, and restarted from cold, instead of allowing it to boot automaically. I have now started 7 times over the last 3 hours, 2 auto restarts, the rest cold. I am pleased to say that my drive seems to be back from the dead. Fingers crossed this is fixed. I have ran the intel toolbar diagnostics and everything is working.

Maybe someone could try this method of cold restarts and see if it works for them? I will report back tomorrow and let you all know if my system is still restarting from the ssd.

[idata]

I also had the same problems after the Firmware update, initially no problems Update went smoothly and the Tool box worked

great all test Okay.

best since yesterday I had the same problems "boot mgr missing" operation system missing, unable to repair with the Windows 7

64 bits disc.

so yesterday I re-installed with 32bits W7 evalutation and everything was okay.

This morning I did the following.:

1 hdderase 3.3

2 bios startup ide

3 install W7

4 let windows make 100mb and remaning partition

5 installed the latest intel 9.11.1020 drivers

BUT DO NOT USE the Tool Box, once I install the Toolbox my old problems resurface eventhough

all test were Okay.

so in my case with the following configuration 64 bits with the new Firmware upgrade seems stable

for the time being.

even swithed my PC from the 220v power source (this would normally certainly result is failure to

restart W7) now my pc started okay.

i must further mention that I first installed W7 64 bits on a normal Hitachi Hdd, so I'm not

sure if the dual boot is the Positive factor but since I did not us the Tool Box I have

had no problems.

pc configuration:

gigabyte p55 ud6

intel i7 860

corsair 2 x 2gb (1333) memory

Intel Ssd postville 8o gb

Hitachi 500gb

WD 1 tb hd

Trust Intel will release a good working Upgrade ensuring everythings works perfectly.

[idata]

In all of these 11 pages of responses... Did anyone realize that Intel took the firmware off the site days ago? You can't download it anymore.

I would DEFINATELY not use the firmware update since Intel is definately aware there in an issue - that is why they pulled it off the download section. Let's wait until Intel releases a better version of the firmware that is problem free - it is not worth any perfomance gain if you brick your drive.

[idata]

One of the things that struct me as ironic/stupid about the Intel firmware installer is the following combination of facts:

• The SSDs are all SATA
• AHCI mode rather than IDE emulation is required for some features for better performance such as NCQ, so I would think the vast majority of X25 users would have their BIOS set for AHCI.
• The CD-ROM drivers on the firmware ISOs require either a PATA CD-ROM or IDE emulation rather than AHCI.
• I wasn't able to flash the firmware from CD on my new machine because of having a SATA CD-ROM, and it wouldn't recognize my X25-M as an Intel drive with the BIOS set for emulation, so in order to flash it I made myself a bootable SD card with the flasher .exe on it.

After noting this oddity of an SATA drive flasher ISO that requires a PATA CD-ROM, I should also note the following:

• Many places recommend against switching the BIOS between AHCI and IDE emulation without reformatting because the LBA mapping can be different, causing data corruption.
• Windows 7 is the first OS to reserve a bunch of space at the beginning of the drive before the first partition by default, so the partition map is different from what you would see in other OSes.

This brings me to my theory: The reason you guys aren't able to reinstall Windows on your drive after the data corruption occurs is because your partition map itself is getting corrupted after booting Windows 7 in IDE emulation mode and Windows doesn't know what to make of it. If this is the problem, HDDERASE will fix it.

[idata]

This is weird, since I was able to flash mine with the disc in AHCI mode with a Samsung SATA CD-ROM. The flash was an success or so it said, and yeah the rest is not a pleasant experiance; 1 bricked SSD and 1 lost OS install.