Intel Rapid Storage refuses to work (no button in SRT utility)

Solution 1:

I have found the answer myself. In order to enable acceleration there must be NO PARTITIONS on the SSD even if there is still enough unallocated space.

So the Rapid Start Technology partition my laptop came with was preventing Rapid Storage from accelerating.

After I have removed all the partitions from the drive, it worked.

If you still need the partition for Rapid Start or for other purposes you can specify less space for acceleration when setting it up and create your partition afterwards.

Solution 2:

Try this brilliant walkthrough, it helped me:

http://caspan.com/2013/07/setting-up-new-machine-with-intel-smart-response-technology-and-rapid-start-technology/