On Mon, 2021-02-08 at 22:59 +0000, Bernard McNeill wrote: > > On 08/02/2021 22:44, Lou Poppler wrote: > > On Mon, 2021-02-08 at 22:26 +0000, Bernard McNeill wrote: > > [...] > > > I have one SSD (which has Win-10 on it), there is no other disk > > > (spinning or otherwise) on the machine. > > > The BIOS System Information says 'M.2. SATA =(none)' > > > and 'M.2. PCIe SSD-0=87NB51ASK5HS'. > > > However: Under BIOS System Configuration, 'SATA Operation' is set to > > > 'RAID On', [other options are 'Disabled' and 'AHCI' ]. > > > > > > > Interesting that Dell is making a distinction here between SATA and PCIe > > mass > > storage, but calling its RAID foolishness "SATA Operation - RAID On". > > Does this imply maybe that the SSD connected via PCIe and not via the SATA > > wiring/controller, is exempt from the RAID interference? I don't know. > > > > It sure would be nice if that is what they mean though. > > Maybe you can carefully test how this really works. > > (Make the backup first though) > > > > > > Is it even possible to RAID an SDD? > With software RAID, you can combine all manner of storage devices into a "managed device" even different physical types of storage. What this built-in factory RAID might be is unclear to me. From the misbehavior of the system regarding your sometimes attached external USB disk (with the attempted debian install on it) it seems likely that the factory/BIOS RAID thing might be interposing itself between disks as seen by running programs (like the debian installer) and the actual hardware storage itself.
> But, as I think I mentioned earlier, I am very reluctant indeed to mess > around with Windows itself. > I have backed up the user data, but I am not at all sure how to > re-install Windows itself. If the machine failed I suspect I would take > it to a specialist with a copy of the user data.
