Interesting. In my Lenovo R61 with Squeeze and xfs file system, my laptop-mode.conf file does not have CONTROL_INTEL_SATA_MODE. The only option with "SATA" in it is "ASSUME_SCSI_IS_SATA=1". The explanation for this option is:
# If this is enabled, laptop mode tools will assume that SCSI drives are # really SATA drives that only _look_ like SCSI drives, and will use # hdparm to control them. Set this to 0 if you have /dev/sd devices # and you want laptop mode tools to use the "sdparm" command to control # them.
If I recall correctly, the SATA problems started after a kernel upgrade to 3.* - and changing from squeeze to wheezy. The ugly thing was that it looked like TDE was causing system hangs where in reality laptop-tools sent the harddrive to an agressive powersave mode from where it did not return when TDE tried to start a application. The problem with laptop-tools never vanished sice then on all X6* and T6*, it just changed quality. My latest running gag is not beeing able to shutdown propperly, because the SATA interface has gone to sleep before system halt is complete - and consequently the system waits for the hardrive to complete shutdown till power runs out.
Nik