SATA installation

[TalkShowHost]

been searching on the net but still can't seem to get it to work.
bought a maxtor 300 GB SAAT hard drive (6B300S0).

i am trying to install windows XP on it i have unhooked all my other drives. and do the setup form the disk. hit f6 to install SCSI or RAID drivers. it finds them on the floppy disk (i got these drivers from the ASUS site) and then it says it will install the drivers for the silicon drivers. then when it gets to the setup XP screen it says i don't have any hard drives installed. the wires are all hooked up properly and the drive starts to get warm when i am just running windows (i.e when i hook my other hard drive back up and boot from C: please help im confused know. thanks in advance

[alex666]

Setting up a single sata drive can be confusing. But it actually is fairly simple. You probably (or should) have a setting in your bios that activates "sata" and/or "raid". The default sometimes is "off" (check your mobo manual, though it's not always helpful). If the default setting is "off" on your mobo, you will need to activate it, and then reboot. When rebooting, you may then have to deal with a setup screen that asks you to set up your raid drives. Now I have two mobos, each with single sata drives installed. On one (Albatron kt-600 board), I first had to activate sata in the bios, and also choose whether I wanted a single or raid system. I checked off single (ide), rebooted, and that was that. XP installation went without a hitch. On the other mobo (Albatron nForce2 400 ultra), I had to activate raid (it did not say sata, it said raid), exit, reboot, and then I was faced with a raid setup screen. Since I did not have two sata drives in a raid setup, I simply exited the screen, rebooted, and then XP installation proceeded normally.

Probably you'll have a situation similar to one or the other above. Again, you'll want to read your mobo manual. However, I have found it true in my own experience and have read postings on various forums that the instructions for setting up a single sata drive are usually lacking. It's weird, I guess the mobo manufacturers think that everyone intends to set up raid systems.

I hope this helps. Post back if you have problems. Good luck.

marty

[deddard]

Hi
I've not dealt with SATA yet, but this seems to be a fairly common problem. A quick search dug this up at techspot - check to see if your inf files are in folders or not:
http://www.techspot.com/vb/archive/index/t-18293.html
start from scratch
load WXP and don't use the F6 key
let's see if xp finds the HDD if not
do a fresh download of the drivers for your sata controller
don't put the inf files in a folder on CD when viewing CD inf file will be visable
in first tree
hope I'm getting you right as problem occurs when after you hit the F6 key and try to install drivers?
still can't read cdrom you may want to think about building a new XP disc with
SATA drivers installed on it ,there are lots of sites out there that talk you through making a new self installing OS

------------
don't know if this will help, but it's worth a shot

.........some more info

http://forums.viaarena.com/messageview.aspx?catid=12&threadid=64364&enterthread=y

[TalkShowHost]

thanks for the help unfortunately it is still not working. i have since used the drivers from the motherboard cd. there is definitely no option in the BIOS for SATA or RAID had a thorough look through the manual and the BIOS 9 (there is an option for serial controller but both are set to auto which is on) have also switched the wire around to see if that was the problem but still when the windows setup screen comes up it says that there is no hard disk installed.

EDIT: have also just updated the BIOS successfully (phew!!) but still no luck.

[alex666]

There are several versions of the A7N8X mobo. Only one that I can find, the E-deluxe, comes with sata and raid, but there are two other A7N8X mobos that do not have sata. Are you sure your mobo has a sata controller on it? If it does, then there has to be a setting in your bios to control it. You cannot run a sata drive without a sata controller, and it has to be accessible through your bios. If it's not part of your mobo, then you'll need to get a pci card with a sata controller on it.

marty

[Paul Komski]

The two main areas of importance are likely to be (1) does your bios support drives as large as 320GB and (2) do you need to setup an array (even for a single disk) before attempting to intall an operating system.

When the system is starting do you see a screen that says -
Sil 3112a SATAraid Version 4.2.47
Copyright silicon image
Press ctrl+s or F4 to enter raid setup ???

If so when you enter the raid setup is the SATA drive listed there? If it is then at least the BIOS is recogising the drive.

You could then try to set the drive up as a single drive RAID 0 (stripe) array. On some systems this is the only way to utilise a single SATA HDD. Once you have created such an array there may now be something for Windows setup to see after you install the drivers as per the F6 option.

On some mobos you can boot directly to a SATA drive - on others (my own biostar included) you must use an array - even if it is a singe disk array!!.

[TalkShowHost]

first off i apologize to everyone for being an idiot :D

it seems i did not have a jumper set on my mobo to enable SATA even though this is the default setting. i must have changed it way back before i even decided to buy a SATA drive and it is now recognised and can install windows.

you may now all mock me for my stupidity :D

thanks again for everyone that helped.

[alex666]

If I had a dollar for every time I missed stuff like that . . . . Plus, I just recalled, on kt-600 mobo, there is no jumper on the mobo to enable sata, but there is a jumper on the nf2 board, I should have mentioned that. It's not just bios settings. Anway, glad you've got it up and running. Have fun.

marty