Arch Linux

geo909

Member

Registered: 2008-09-07

Posts: 309

[RESOLVD] adding 2nd hdd on laptop with a HDD caddy in the optical bay

Hi all,

I have a 6-year old Dell inspiron 1525. I wanted to put a second hdd so I bought this but I ran in a couple of problems.

First, I tried a couple of disks (1TB and 500GB) in the caddy, and they did not even get recognized from the bios. Then I changed my bios from ahci mode to ata mode,
and, although the bios then recognizes the hdd in the caddy, then arch doesn't see it. My questions are the following:

1. Αny suggestions about how to make arch see the hdd in the caddy when I have the bios in ATA mode? It does not appear as /dev/sdb, /dev/hda,
    or /dev/sr0 (previously my cdrom)

2. Does the fact that the hdd caddy is "SATA to PATA/IDE" has anything to do with the problem? Should I have a caddy with different connections?

3. I read that today AHCI is preferred over ATA mode. I was also planning to buy an SSD to put as the primary hd. and have the caddy hdd for space.
    If there is a way to make arch see the 2nd hdd in the bay in ATA mode (see first question), are there any serious drawbacks working in ATA mode,
    given that I will also have a SSD?

Thanks a lot in advance.

Last edited by geo909 (2014-06-02 02:39:29)

headkase

Member

Registered: 2011-12-06

Posts: 1,977

Re: [RESOLVD] adding 2nd hdd on laptop with a HDD caddy in the optical bay

You want AHCI mode for a SSD because that mode, if the drive also supports it, enables Native Command Queuing.  That significantly improves performance with SSDs.  Also with SSDs make sure your sectors are aligned and that TRIM is enabled for best results.

geo909

Member

Registered: 2008-09-07

Posts: 309

Re: [RESOLVD] adding 2nd hdd on laptop with a HDD caddy in the optical bay

You want AHCI mode for a SSD because that mode, if the drive also supports it, enables Native Command Queuing.  That significantly improves performance with SSDs.  Also with SSDs make sure your sectors are aligned and that TRIM is enabled for best results.

Thanks. So that means I should abandon the idea of a 2nd hdd on the laptop if I want an SSD? Any chance that a different
caddy would do the work? (see question 2)

EDIT: Googling around, it seems that TRIM in ATA mode is not a problem. It also seems that I won't get the full speed of a SSD in ATA mode, but it will still be considerably faster than a traditional HDD, right?

Last edited by geo909 (2014-05-29 23:58:44)

headkase

Member

Registered: 2011-12-06

Posts: 1,977

Re: [RESOLVD] adding 2nd hdd on laptop with a HDD caddy in the optical bay

See here to answer some of your questions: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/SSD

The wiki should be the first place to start on all queries.  I'm not sure how to resolve your caddy issues, don't know enough about that hardware.  Perhaps someone else can chime in.

geo909

Member

Registered: 2008-09-07

Posts: 309

Re: [RESOLVD] adding 2nd hdd on laptop with a HDD caddy in the optical bay

See here to answer some of your questions: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/SSD

The wiki should be the first place to start on all queries.  I'm not sure how to resolve your caddy issues, don't know enough about that hardware.  Perhaps someone else can chime in.

Thanks..

geo909

Member

Registered: 2008-09-07

Posts: 309

Re: [RESOLVD] adding 2nd hdd on laptop with a HDD caddy in the optical bay

Ah well, I decided to skip this setup and use a normal hdd instead. My connector for the optical bay is PATA
and it seems this doesn't play well with AHCI.

WonderWoofy

Member

From: Los Gatos, CA

Registered: 2012-05-19

Posts: 8,414

Re: [RESOLVD] adding 2nd hdd on laptop with a HDD caddy in the optical bay

[Closed] is what the moderators use to lock a thread.  You should use either [Solved] or [Resolved] or something else besides [Closed].

geo909

Member

Registered: 2008-09-07

Posts: 309

Re: [RESOLVD] adding 2nd hdd on laptop with a HDD caddy in the optical bay

[Closed] is what the moderators use to lock a thread.  You should use either [Solved] or [Resolved] or something else besides [Closed].

Ah, good to know. I changed it now.