I'm writing this on a fresh install of Win7. Now I have a new problem, BIOS sees my Mushkin SSD while Win7 does not. ACHI mode enabled in bios, Intel RST driver installed (and the SSD is shown in the RST monitoring program). But when I go to Windows explorer (right click explore), there is no SSD drive. I also deleted all partitions using the Win setup program.I did wiggle the cables but that didn't do anything. It's clearly a Win7 issue...What a great way to start things out!Any ideas?

I had this problem with one of my HD's when I reinstalled W7 last time. HD was showing up in bios, but not in windows explorer. If I remember correctly I went to disk management (type diskmgmt.msc in the search box) and fixed it there. I believe I had to assign it a letter, but I'm not 100% sure. Might look in there anyways to see if you can figure it out.

I'm writing this on a fresh install of Win7. Now I have a new problem, BIOS sees my Mushkin SSD while Win7 does not. ACHI mode enabled in bios, Intel RST driver installed (and the SSD is shown in the RST monitoring program). But when I go to Windows explorer (right click explore), there is no SSD drive. I also deleted all partitions using the Win setup program.I did wiggle the cables but that didn't do anything. It's clearly a Win7 issue...What a great way to start things out!Any ideas?

Is it in the disk manager? can you post a screenshot of it?Start -> right click on Computer -> Manage -> Storage -> Disk ManagementMaybe it lost the partition letterEDIT: if you deleted all the partitions, you need to create one again

Oops just read your edit... yeah it looks like I need to make a new volume... doing so right now.Edit again: Yep, that fixed it! It's now working great - Thanks very much both of you!Tomorrow I'm bringing the whole system over to a coworker's house - he's A+ certified and worked at the repair dept in Microcenter for many years - he's going to run a few diagnostics etc.Hopefully we can get to the bottom of those fatal errors.

My oh my!Not being rude here, no, no way, but maybe you should take a deep honest look in a mirror concerning all your PC problems, and then read the basics on a new install...Good luck, you´ll need it.

Ryan, it looks like your Windows install placed the System Reserved partition containing the boot manager in your SSD. If you ever format your SSD or replace it, Win 7 won't boot anymore. Apart of that I don't see anything so alarming, what do you mean PFL?To solve the boot manager problem you can move that partition to your Spinpoint with Easeus Partition Master for example, or reinstall Win 7 with the SSD unpluged (then delete all partitions in the SSD and format it)

Ryan, it looks like your Windows install placed the System Reserved partition containing the boot manager in your SSD. If you ever format your SSD or replace it, Win 7 won't boot anymore. Apart of that I don't see anything so alarming, what do you mean PFL?To solve the boot manager problem you can move that partition to your Spinpoint with Easeus Partition Master for example, or reinstall Win 7 with the SSD unpluged (then delete all partitions in the SSD and format it)

Yeah I noticed that... when I tried unplugging my SSD earlier and windows said it was missing a file... hmmm... would it put that reserved space there because I plugged the SSD into the first SATA port?Gee thanks PFL :P Considering I didn't have this problem last time I'm sure it was just something I've overlooked. I'm definitly no PC pro but I can do much more than the average joe. It's all a learning experience anyway.

It's all a learning experience anyway.

So no need to start hammering

It's all a learning experience anyway.

And fun. Although it can be a bit frustrating when things don't work the way you want them to. Hopefully between a new windows install and your friend looking at it, you can either get everything working smoothly or figure out where the issue is. Good luck.

Yeah I noticed that... when I tried unplugging my SSD earlier and windows said it was missing a file... hmmm... would it put that reserved space there because I plugged the SSD into the first SATA port?Gee thanks PFL :P Considering I didn't have this problem last time I'm sure it was just something I've overlooked. I'm definitly no PC pro but I can do much more than the average joe. It's all a learning experience anyway.

Have you installed windows in the SSD before? Once there's a boot manager Windows will use that, even if you reinstall in a different drive later on. Don't you need to boot from the SSD in BIOS now?

So no need to start hammering

As Word Not Allowed said: "Put the hammer on the floor and step away!"

Have you installed windows in the SSD before? Once there's a boot manager Windows will use that, even if you reinstall in a different drive later on. Don't you need to boot from the SSD in BIOS now?

Ahhhhhhh!!! This makes perfect sense... it's all becoming clear.Lemme take you all back to the beginning of this build.March 31, 2011 - I received my parts for the build, which consited of a Blu ray burner for my main drive. (At the time I didn't have my dvd rw burner). Since I'm not a guru like PFL, I was unaware that some blue ray burners don't have the neccesary drivers unless they are installed after a windows installation. Anyway I was unable to install windows with that BR drive so at the time I decided to try to install Windows on my SSD using that drive. I was trying to see if the HDD or the burner was faulty. So I started to install Windows on the SSD but it failed, and then erased the install (but not all of it I guess!). I didn't think anything of it and thought it must be the BR drive - then confirmed by my coworker (who's going to look at the PC this week) that normally you need to install the driver first for newer BR players. Anyway, I bought a new non BR drive at Best Buy - just a basic DVD RW etc. Worked great for installing Windows. I never thought to repartition my SSD, and then proceeded to install FSX on it.Over the next few days I setup the rest of my software, all the tweaking stuff, disabling UAC, setting high perf power options, following Nick N's guide, etc etc. Then I went back to BIOS to change the boot order, and found BIOS was booting first off my Mushkin drive. Well I changed it to boot off my 7200rpm drive and something bad happened I think. BIOS had a red box stating something about previous boot settings being unstable etc etc. This would make sense that it wouldn't boot from the 7200rpm drive first because it needed to boot from the SSD because that's where the boot sector info was. Anyway, I changed it back so it would boot off the SSD first. I haven't touched it since but failed to realize why it would not boot from the 7200rpm.Went about my business OCing to 4.5 GHz - then 2 weeks later those BSOD's started happening - but they weren't the same as these Fatal Errors. They were just codes about needing more vcore/qpi/vtt etc - confirmed by a few web sites describing similar situations. I knew that my 4.5 wasn't stable, so I then went to 4GHz with minimal tweaking, and that's where I tested the stability for hours, and where Ive ended up. (I also tested stability with stock settings earlier just to confirm basic was stable).So back to the present, I started encountering those Fatal Errors just three days ago. I believe they are separate from the OCing and may be corrupt Windows files. Oh man, I just thought of something!! There was a Windows related folder on my SSD that I thought was trash and I believe I deleted it on my previous install! That's probably what was causing the errors... Or hopefully it was.This would be awesome if it were the case - I'll keep everyone aprised!

Ahhhhhhh!!! This makes perfect sense... it's all becoming clear.Lemme take you all back to the beginning of this build.March 31, 2011 - I received my parts for the build, which consited of a Blu ray burner for my main drive. (At the time I didn't have my dvd rw burner). Since I'm not a guru like PFL, I was unaware that some blue ray burners don't have the neccesary drivers unless they are installed after a windows installation. Anyway I was unable to install windows with that BR drive so at the time I decided to try to install Windows on my SSD using that drive. I was trying to see if the HDD or the burner was faulty. So I started to install Windows on the SSD but it failed, and then erased the install (but not all of it I guess!). I didn't think anything of it and thought it must be the BR drive - then confirmed by my coworker (who's going to look at the PC this week) that normally you need to install the driver first for newer BR players. Anyway, I bought a new non BR drive at Best Buy - just a basic DVD RW etc. Worked great for installing Windows. I never thought to repartition my SSD, and then proceeded to install FSX on it.Over the next few days I setup the rest of my software, all the tweaking stuff, disabling UAC, setting high perf power options, following Nick N's guide, etc etc. Then I went back to BIOS to change the boot order, and found BIOS was booting first off my Mushkin drive. Well I changed it to boot off my 7200rpm drive and something bad happened I think. BIOS had a red box stating something about previous boot settings being unstable etc etc. This would make sense that it wouldn't boot from the 7200rpm drive first because it needed to boot from the SSD because that's where the boot sector info was. Anyway, I changed it back so it would boot off the SSD first. I haven't touched it since but failed to realize why it would not boot from the 7200rpm.Went about my business OCing to 4.5 GHz - then 2 weeks later those BSOD's started happening - but they weren't the same as these Fatal Errors. They were just codes about needing more vcore/qpi/vtt etc - confirmed by a few web sites describing similar situations. I knew that my 4.5 wasn't stable, so I then went to 4GHz with minimal tweaking, and that's where I tested the stability for hours, and where Ive ended up. (I also tested stability with stock settings earlier just to confirm basic was stable).So back to the present, I started encountering those Fatal Errors just three days ago. I believe they are separate from the OCing and may be corrupt Windows files. Oh man, I just thought of something!! There was a Windows related folder on my SSD that I thought was trash and I believe I deleted it on my previous install! That's probably what was causing the errors... Or hopefully it was.This would be awesome if it were the case - I'll keep everyone aprised!

Do you have a backup image of your previous install? if you do you may be able to fix it without reinstalling everything

No I turned all that stuff off - maybe I misread it, but I think Nick N's guide says to disable restore points...Don't worry I backed up all my stuff though.Do you think it's possible that I hosed my installation by simply deleting that folder from the SSD? I can't even remember what the folder contained, or the title of it. But I believe I just recently deleted it.

No I turned all that stuff off - maybe I misread it, but I think Nick N's guide says to disable restore points...Don't worry I backed up all my stuff though.Do you think it's possible that I hosed my installation by simply deleting that folder from the SSD? I can't even remember what the folder contained, or the title of it. But I believe I just recently deleted it.

where was it? could you actually see the windows partition with the boot manager in the SSD? It's posible yes, I guess it isFirst thing I thought is that Win 7 SP1 could have not installed properly, but who knows. Let's hope it was all related and you can overclock back to 4.5GHz after the reinstall