Allows the Windows installer to communicate with SATA AHCI or RAID controllers that aren't natively supported by the generic Windows installation media. Why You Might Need It

Temporarily disable Secure Boot in BIOS, load the driver, then re-enable Secure Boot after Windows installation.

You are installing Windows 10/11 on a machine with a . The Windows installer shows an empty list of drives.

Look for the Load driver button (usually in the bottom-left).

When installing Windows 10 or Windows 11 on a modern PC, you might encounter a frustrating problem: the installer displays a blank screen and states, "We couldn't find any drives. To get a storage driver, click Load driver."

Are you setting up a or a multi-drive RAID configuration ?

: For 11th through 15th Gen Intel systems, you typically need the version of the driver instead. Official Sources : Intel has recently moved toward an installer (SetupRST.exe). If you cannot find the version, you can extract the drivers from the using the command ./SetupRST.exe -extractdrivers in a terminal. Manufacturer Drivers

: Ensure you extracted the files. The installer looks for .inf files, not .zip or .exe files.

This is a historical nod to older Windows installations. Back in the days of Windows XP, users had to press the "F6" key to load third-party storage drivers from a floppy disk. Today, it denotes a text-setup driver package meant to be loaded during OS installation.

It is vital to choose the correct version based on your BIOS settings:

Supported OS and compatibility (general guidance)