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Change ATA/IDE mode to SATA/AHCI on existing Windows installs

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byDaan Berg
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Windows 10

Source: lonewolf7 / Tom’s Hardware, 12th September 2015

Change ATA/IDE mode to SATA/AHCI on Windows 10:

  1. Start REGEDIT.

    Press Windows+R on your keyboard, type regedit, press OK and accept the UAC prompt.

  2. Look for this line:

    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\storahci\StartOverride

  3. Change the 0 DWORD value from 3 to 0.

  4. Reboot your PC and enter your BIOS.

  5. Set the SATA mode to AHCI in your BIOS.

  6. Reboot back into Windows.

    If all went well, this will happen without issues!

Windows 8 / 8.1

Source: Sergey Tkachenko / Winaero, 22nd June 2014

Option 1: Safe Mode

  1. Power down or restart the computer and enter the system BIOS.
  2. Change the ATA Drive setting back to ATA Mode, press enter to accept the change and restart the computer.
  3. Click Yes to the Warning about the detected mode change on the embedded ATA controller.
  4. The system will boot normally to the Start screen. NOTE: Be sure you know the Local Admin account and password and are able to boot successfully before proceeding.
  5. Open an elevated command prompt and run the following command to enable Safe Mode boot:bcdedit /set {current} safeboot minimal
  6. Restart the computer and boot to the system BIOS.
  7. Change the ATA Drive setting from ATA/IDE Mode to AHCI Mode, press enter to accept the change.
  8. Click Yes to the Warning about the detected mode change on the embedded ATA controller.
  9. The system will boot normally to the Start screen in Safe Mode.
  10. Open an elevated command prompt and run the following command to remove the Safe Mode boot option:bcdedit /deletevalue {current} safeboot
  11. Restart the computer and boot normally, the system will boot successfully to the Start screen.

Option 2: Registry

  1. Open REGEDIT.
  2. Navigate to the following key:
    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\storahci
  3. Change the Start DWORD value from 3 to 0.
  4. Reboot your PC and set the SATA mode to AHCI.

Windows 7

Source: Sergey Tkachenko / Winaero, 22nd June 2014

  1. Open the Registry editor.
  2. Navigate to the following key:
    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\msahci
  3. Change the Start DWORD value from 3 to 0.
  4. Reboot your PC and set the SATA mode to AHCI.
  5. You are done. Now Windows 7 will boot successfully.
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