My computer is relatively new. I have determined that a reproducible problem occurs when I set the SATA mode in the BIOS to RAID (from AHCI). With RAID set, all kinds of boot and shutdown are slow. After shutdown and sleep has shut off the graphics card (monitor in stand by), the fans and power light stay on for 3-7 minutes. Attempting to wake used to be protracted but worked eventually (albeit slower than a cold boot) but more recently the wake attempt seems to be aborted and the PC resets or restarts instead.
During boot, the computer spends a prolongued period of time in the phase prior to handover to Windows. The animation, in case it helps, is shown in the video below with a noisy electronic music track that I cannot protect you from.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otw9ONYJLkk
Is there any way around this other than using a software RAID? Is there any way to tell whether the cause is on ASUS' side or Intel's? I have the latest chipset driver: Intel Chipset Driver V10.1.1.13. I have the second-most recent BIOS update. The latest simply adds support for CPUs I don't have so is not a potential solution.
The HDD-based RAID 0 is seen as an SSD by the OS which is apparently not an uncommon problem for at least one other Intel chipset (X79).
Further, one SATA drive would fail to wake/disappear from Windows when waking and could only be restored by restart or scanning for new hardware in Windows Device Manager. I side-stepped that problem by transferring it to a PCI-E SATA expansion card.
OS: Win 10 Pro 64-bit
Mainboard: ASUS Z170 Pro Gaming, BIOS v1904
CPU: Intel i7 6700 (6th gen), Stock HSF, Undervolt Offset -0.15 V, LLC 4
RAM: Corsair LPX Vengeance 2x8GB DDR4-3000 (CMK16GX4M2B3000C15)
Graphics: Gigabyte NVIDIA GeForce GTX 950
Sys Drive: Samsung Evo 750 SSD, 250 GB
Data Drives: OCZ Vertex 2 SSD, 60 GB; WDC WD1002FAEX-00Y9A0, ~1 TB; WDC WD2003FZEX-00Z4SA0, ~2 TB; WDC WD2002FAEX-00MJRA0, ~2 TB; RAID 0, ~300 GB [Maxtor 6B160MO x 2]
PSU: XFX TS 750W (P1-750S-NLB9)
Bluetooth: Parani UD100 Bluetooth USB Adapter
Monitor: LG 21.5" W2246S-BF 16:9 Wide LCD Monitor 1920x1080 5ms
Logitech G500 mouse, K120 keyboard.
UEFI BIOS divergence from optimised default settings
AI Overclock Tuner [Auto]->[XMP]
DRAM Frequency [Auto]->[DDR4-2933 MHz]
Min. CPU Cache Ratio [Auto]->[40]
Max CPU Cache Ratio [Auto]->[40]
CPU Core/Cache Voltage [Auto]->[Offset Mode]
DRAM Voltage [Auto]->[1.350]
DRAM CAS# Latency [Auto]->[15]
DRAM RAS# to CAS# Delay [Auto]->[17]
DRAM RAS# ACT Time [Auto]->[35]
CPU Load-line Calibration [Auto]->[Level 4]
SATA Mode Selection [AHCI]->[RAID]
Model Name LED Lighting [Breathing Mode]->[Disabled]
SupremeFX LED Lighting [Breathing Mode]->[Disabled]
CPU Q-Fan Control [Auto]->[PWM Mode]