IDE problems Asus A7V8X

[Nathan]

I have an Asus A7V8X with an AMD AthlonXP Proc.
My secondary IDE controller is giving me some problems. Its got a
Panasonic DVD-ROM and a Plextor burner on it. In the past its had a Zip
100 on it, and at one time it even had my secondary HDD on it (of course
only 2 at a time).

It seems that sometimes at random the whole secondary controller
disables. Usually a reboot will bring it back, sometimes that doesn't
work, and i need to power down completely and leave it off for a few
minutes. One time i disconnected one of the drives that was connected
to it (the DVD) and it worked afterward, so i left it off thinking that
it was some sort of drive failure, or conflict. And it was good for a
few weeks and then out of the blue it happened again. Basically what
happens is Windows (win2k) pops up with the "Unsafe removal of hardware"
warning, as though i had un-plugged one of the drives, and it displays
anything that i have on the second controller in the list.

I have tried swapping the 2 drives between primary and secondary, and in
fact i have only one drive connected to it at the moment, so i don't
think its something between the 2 drives. and like i said, I've had
other devices connected to this in the past and they've done the same
thing.

So the first question i guess should be, am i dealing with a win2k
problem? Or is this a motherboard hardware issue? I had another Asus
board before this one (cant remember the model) and it was doing the
same thing. Im wondering what i must be doing wrong here, for it to
span 2 different motherboards now.

Thanks.

 

[Doug Ramage]

I have an Asus A7V8X with an AMD AthlonXP Proc.
My secondary IDE controller is giving me some problems. Its got a
Panasonic DVD-ROM and a Plextor burner on it. In the past its had a Zip
100 on it, and at one time it even had my secondary HDD on it (of course
only 2 at a time).

It seems that sometimes at random the whole secondary controller
disables. Usually a reboot will bring it back, sometimes that doesn't
work, and i need to power down completely and leave it off for a few
minutes. One time i disconnected one of the drives that was connected
to it (the DVD) and it worked afterward, so i left it off thinking that
it was some sort of drive failure, or conflict. And it was good for a
few weeks and then out of the blue it happened again. Basically what
happens is Windows (win2k) pops up with the "Unsafe removal of hardware"
warning, as though i had un-plugged one of the drives, and it displays
anything that i have on the second controller in the list.

I have tried swapping the 2 drives between primary and secondary, and in
fact i have only one drive connected to it at the moment, so i don't
think its something between the 2 drives. and like i said, I've had
other devices connected to this in the past and they've done the same
thing.

So the first question i guess should be, am i dealing with a win2k
problem? Or is this a motherboard hardware issue? I had another Asus
board before this one (cant remember the model) and it was doing the
same thing. Im wondering what i must be doing wrong here, for it to
span 2 different motherboards now.

Thanks.

If you are using the Nvdia IDE drivers, have you tried sapping them with
the standard MS ones?

My system cannot get on the with the Nvidia ones.

 

[Nathan]

I believe theyre already the MS drivers. I can check when i get home.
(at work, bah!)

 

[Nathan]

A little more info.
Got home today to find that it did it again, checked the drivers, they
are in fact microsoft.
And i checked the event viewer. found these:

Received a device interface REMOVAL notification for device:

\\?\IDE#CdRomPLEXTOR_CD-R___PX-W5224A________________1.03____#5&14576fb3&1&0.0.0#{53f56308-b6bf-11d0-94f2-00a0c91efb8b}


And then 20 seconds later

Received a device interface ARRIVAL notification for device:

\\?\IDE#CdRomPLEXTOR_CD-R___PX-W5224A________________1.03____#5&14576fb3&1&0.0.0#{53f56308-b6bf-11d0-94f2-00a0c91efb8b}


But yet the Burner still isnt useable, not in my computer, and probably
wont be until i reboot.

 

[Doug Ramage]

Have you tried the Via drivers already?

 

[Nathan]

I havent, but i dont think its a driver issue.
I dual boot linux on that PC and just last night the same problem
occurred in Linux.

Do you think it could be possible that its a power issue? I reconnected
my second drive last night and shortly thereafter it happened again, and
then again after rebooting (maybe 15 min after a reboot). Much more
frequent than when i had it connected to just the one drive.

Also, for some reason (and i dont remember why...) i had a splitter on
the plug coming from the PS for these 2 drives. I removed that as i did
have another free plug. We'll see if it helps.

 

[Doug Ramage]

Probably not IDE drivers then.

Could be PSU. Are you drawing a lot from the 12v rail? Individual rails are
more important than the overall power rating.

Or cable(s)?

 

[Nathan]

Seems like the power idea has fixed it.
I removed the Y connector on my PS and its been working solid for a few
days now. So i hate to say it (because now itll probably fail when i
get home) but it seems to be fixed!