Remove PERC H310 from Precision T3600 and revert to mobo SATA Drive controllers

Thank you for the info.

Looks like I have an experiment to try.

Since this is a RAID 1 mirror, I imagine the system should see either of the two drives as independently accessible/bootable, so should be pretty straight forward.

Regards,

A.W.D.

When I got my used machine, the H310 was already gone.  I set AHCI in the BIOS, but the ports are still looking for SAS drives and not recognizing the sata drives.  Is there a setting I am missing?  I do not have the option if inserting the card back as it wasn't in the machine.

4 ideas in order:

1. Change the size 2032 MB battery.
2. Reset BIOS.  Use the blue jumper method.  May need to set it back to AHCI afterwards.
3. Did you format the SATA drives in a working PC?
4. Does it work if you set BIOS to ATA or RAID?

@bradthetechnut​ I had replaced the 2032 battery, and had formatted the drive on the SATA0 connection and installed Win10.  I installed the Dell Support Assistant and it did a BIOS update.  There is no RAID option in BIOS, I'm guessing because the H310 is not detected.

I will try a BIOS reset.

Followed the directions, moved the jumper, applied power, moved jumper back.  Machine will not boot at all.  CPU fan runs at idle, light on power supply is on, power button does nothing.

I'll try a different 2032, hoping it isn't bricked.

Make sure it's a new 2032 battery or test it.

@bradthetechnut​ I grabbed a new battery.  Machine only sees drives in SATA0 and SATA1, so it does boot when drive is connected there.  BIOS will see drives connected to the HDD ports, but labels them as SAS, even though there is no raid card.  I tried connecting a drive to HDD0 and then install boot from dvd, but it doesn't see the drive.  Does this machine need a different BIOS in order to treat the HDD ports as SATA ports?

If the OP (original poster) indicated problems without the H310 card, then I might say "reinstall the card."

There isn't a different BIOS for the T3600.  However, it's possible to make sure it has the latest BIOS.  You said Dell Support Assist did a BIOS update.  I'd make sure it's the latest one.  Chances are it is the latest one since the T3600 was introduced in 2012.

It's possible the HDD ports are only meant for SAS drives.  Disappointing that it only sees SATA drives in 2 of the SATA ports.

I attached the T3600 Owner's Manual.  Hopefully it has something I missed.

I'm also attaching the spec sheet.  It stating that it can take two 3.5" drives or four 2.5" drives reminded me of something.  A PCIe card with SATA ports may allow you to use more SATA drives.  That depends on your end goals.  Do you plan on more than 2 SATA drives?  Sounds like it so far.

You might be able to use SAS drives in the HDD ports without them being RAID.

By any chance did you try ATA in BIOS?  Separate from that, first, try toggling Legacy mode in BIOS.  If it's off, turn it on and vice-versa.  The preference is that it be off when loading Windows.  What OS do you use, Win10?

Keep in mind if you try ATA, it's the mode Windows has to be loaded in.  Otherwise, machine will not boot.

@bradthetechnut​ I can try that tomorrow.  I was planning on using one ssd for Win10 and a second traditional drive for bulk storage.  I also wanted the DVD drives working, as this set-up is for a college student.  I think I do have a couple 2.5" sas drives I can try, though I'd really like the OS on a SSD for speed of startup.

SAS is faster than SATA.  You might be hard pressed to tell the difference between a SATA SSD and a SAS HDD.

One of my boot drives is a SATA WD Velociraptor 10,000 RPM HDD.  It rivals my SSD.  I get about 2 waiting circles during boot, and after that, everything is near or is instantaneous.  One waiting circle with the SSD boot drive.

Of course, PCIe NVME SSD's are faster than SATA.  But I don't know if you want to go there with having a hard time getting the T3600 to see certain drives.

In case I got you wondering, from the T3600 Owner's Manual:

So, here is the crazy thing;  I grabbed what I thought to be a 2.5" sas drive that I have waiting for a server.  Used HDD0, installed WIN10, updated many times (as my iso is older) and everything looked fine.  Then a couple days later it stopped recognizing the drive!  I looked closer and the drive is sata, not sas...but it appeared to work fine for the whole install!  I would say that from what you showed those ports are only sas, bit errors must have lined up just right for it to have worked that way!  Ugh!  I'll have to order a sata to sas cable to connect a sas drive, when I find one.