0

I have a friend with a desktop PC who wishes to upgrade it from Windows 7 to Windows 10. The older OS is installed on a hardware RAID-10 array on the motherboard's built in Intel Rapid Storage card (the BIOS has it set to "RAID" mode).

When I tried upgrading using the Windows 10 Upgrade Assistant, everything went smoothly until the first reboot. Upon reaching the new Windows boot screen, the rotating icon froze and there was no more activity from that point. I forced another reboot and the same problem occurred. Forcing one more restart caused the installer to revert back to Windows 7.

Are there any special steps I need to perform in order to upgrade his PC?

Improve this question
2
  • If the hardware is supported under Windows 10, it should 'just work'. Are you certain this problem has anything to do with the RAID, and isn't some other compatibility problem? Hopefully you started by making a backup first.
    – Zoredache
    Commented Sep 29, 2016 at 23:54
  • @Zoredache Yes, absolutely I cloned the system volume to spare disk. Not sure if this issue is related to RAID or not. Perhaps it's something else.
    – user201262
    Commented Sep 30, 2016 at 0:30

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
0

Your question intrigued me, as the fact that you say it is a hardware RAID should not affect the upgrade of Windows. As a hardware based RAID, the OS is only presented with the logical volume created by the RAID controller and everything behind that volume is abstracted from the OS. Windows should not know about, or even care about the Intel Rapid Storage RAID.

As I said, the problem piqued my curiosity and I did some Googling. The root of the problem may be the Intel Rapid Storage driver. The driver allows Windows to interact with the abstracted hardware. First thing to do is make sure you are running the latest version of the driver and related software. Upgrade to the latest version if you are not and try upgrading Windows again. Also make sure the BIOS for the motherboard is up to date. In addition to that, make sure any other firmware or BIOS for the Intel Rapid Storage is also up to date. It could be as simple as that, hopefully.

I do want to note that in my Googling, I found that some older Intel Rapid Storage controllers do not have drivers that are compatible with Windows 10. If this is the case with yours, uninstall the driver and related software. And try upgrading to Windows 10. For some people having this issue, this is a solution. Again, since the hardware is abstracted from Windows, you do not need the driver. You will not be able to interact with the RAID settings from within Windows, however you would still be able to to from the RAID controller's BIOS.

Improve this answer
1
  • Prior to performing the upgrade, I upgraded that driver to the latest to resolve a separate issue involving mounting another standalone HDD for doing a backup prior to moving on. However that latest driver does say it's compatible with Win 10, but I'll give it a go and uninstall it before trying again.
    – user201262
    Commented Sep 30, 2016 at 0:32

You must log in to answer this question.