Okay, AMD lovers. 8)

[George Macdonald]

hmmm... hope your install onto the raptor goes ok.... a gigabyte nForce4
board i put together recently simply would not install the OS onto a
sata disk - thanks to a crap bios and silicon image raid. there was no
problem getting the windowsXP install to see the sata disk, but the bios
couldn't boot to sata.

Silicon Image? You mean Gigabyte *added* SATA/Raid ports to the 4 fully
integrated nForce4 SATA ports? They didn't even need to add a PHY for the
2nd pair like they did with the nForce3. That's nuts... or just a sloppy
shoehorn job on their old nForce3 layout... maybe explains why they were
first out the door with an nForce4 board.

From what I see the Chaintech uses the NV SATA2 3.0Gb/s for all 4 ports so
he should be in better shape than you found. With my MSI Neo2 Plat., using
the NV SATA I didn't even have to tell WinXP Install to load a special
driver with the F6 thing - it just used the generic IDE driver until I had
the OS installed and loaded the custon nVidia driver.

 

[Andy Lee]

On Sat, 19 Feb 2005 10:17:33 -0500, George Macdonald

owsXP install to see the sata disk, but the bios

Silicon Image? You mean Gigabyte *added* SATA/Raid ports to the 4 fully
integrated nForce4 SATA ports? They didn't even need to add a PHY for the
2nd pair like they did with the nForce3. That's nuts... or just a sloppy
shoehorn job on their old nForce3 layout... maybe explains why they were
first out the door with an nForce4 board.

From what I see the Chaintech uses the NV SATA2 3.0Gb/s for all 4 ports so
he should be in better shape than you found. With my MSI Neo2 Plat., using
the NV SATA I didn't even have to tell WinXP Install to load a special
driver with the F6 thing - it just used the generic IDE driver until I had
the OS installed and loaded the custon nVidia driver.

George the SI chip adds an extra 4 ports in addition to the 4 on the
NV chipset. These also add a Raid 5 functionality to the board. These
and the 4 NV ports work just fine and like your board they (the NV)
do not require a diver at install unless you require raid functions.

 

[George Macdonald]

On Sat, 19 Feb 2005 10:17:33 -0500, George Macdonald

owsXP install to see the sata disk, but the bios


George the SI chip adds an extra 4 ports in addition to the 4 on the
NV chipset. These also add a Raid 5 functionality to the board. These
and the 4 NV ports work just fine and like your board they (the NV)
do not require a diver at install unless you require raid functions.

If they work "just fine", maybe you can help gimp then.

 

[chrisv]

A64 3200+ (90nm Winchester core, socket 939)
Chaintech VNF4/Ultra (Nforce4 chipset)
512M Geil PC3200 (Don't know how many "ranks" it's got)
MSI NX6600 (Geforce 6600, 128MB, 128b, PCI-Express)
Antec Sonata case/supply (380W should be enough, eh?)
Viewsonic 19" LCD monitor (1280x1024, 16ms response time)
Lite-On DVD/CDRW (Don't think he needs to write DVD's)
74GB 10,000 RPM WD "Raptor" (I was coming-in under-budget, so what
the hey?)

Well, I got it going this weekend. No insurmountable problems. There
was a BIOS bug that is a show-stopper if you're installing Win2k, so
you'll need a floppy-drive to fix that (I always build-in a floppy
drive anyway). I used an adaptor to connect the 20-pin power-supply
to the 24-pin connector on the motherboard. The driver install phase
was much quicker than it is on Intel boards I've done recently - the
Intel boards require mulitple reboots, while the Nforce driver install
went so quick I wondered if it really happened at first! Of course,
you'll want to use the latest drivers off the Internet for something
as new as the Nforce4.

The Viewsonic VP191B appears free of defects, and man is that 10k RPM
HD snappy! All in all, a really slick, fast, quiet machine - the best
I've ever built (as it should be, since it's the newest 8). Now I
want an A64 for myself, darn it!

 

[chrisv]

hmmm... hope your install onto the raptor goes ok.... a gigabyte nForce4
board i put together recently simply would not install the OS onto a
sata disk - thanks to a crap bios and silicon image raid. there was no
problem getting the windowsXP install to see the sata disk, but the bios
couldn't boot to sata.

No problems there at all - it worked just like a "normal" install
using IDE drives.

 

[Keith R. Williams]

Well, I got it going this weekend. No insurmountable problems. There
was a BIOS bug that is a show-stopper if you're installing Win2k, so
you'll need a floppy-drive to fix that (I always build-in a floppy
drive anyway).

I have a similar issue, though the BIOS install wants a Win95 or Win98
emergency repair diskette. I got to the first step; went out and bought
a box of diskettes. The second step is a little more difficult, no
Win9x installed anywhere. Hmm.

I used an adaptor to connect the 20-pin power-supply
to the 24-pin connector on the motherboard.

Why? The 20pin connector should plug right into the 24-pin connector.
They're keyed so they only go in one way, at least without a hammer.

The driver install phase
was much quicker than it is on Intel boards I've done recently - the
Intel boards require mulitple reboots, while the Nforce driver install
went so quick I wondered if it really happened at first! Of course,
you'll want to use the latest drivers off the Internet for something
as new as the Nforce4.

The Viewsonic VP191B appears free of defects, and man is that 10k RPM
HD snappy! All in all, a really slick, fast, quiet machine - the best
I've ever built (as it should be, since it's the newest 8). Now I
want an A64 for myself, darn it!

Welcome to the dark side of the (N)force. ;-)

 

[Rob Stow]

I have a similar issue, though the BIOS install wants a Win95 or Win98
emergency repair diskette. I got to the first step; went out and bought
a box of diskettes. The second step is a little more difficult, no
Win9x installed anywhere. Hmm.

Lots of disk images can be downloaded from http://www.bootdisk.com/

 

[chrisv]

(e-mail address removed) says...


I have a similar issue, though the BIOS install wants a Win95 or Win98
emergency repair diskette. I got to the first step; went out and bought
a box of diskettes. The second step is a little more difficult, no
Win9x installed anywhere. Hmm.

The BIOS on the Chaintech had a built-in flash utility that does not
require a bootable disk. All you need is the bin file on the floppy.
Worked really nice.

Why? The 20pin connector should plug right into the 24-pin connector.
They're keyed so they only go in one way, at least without a hammer.

Well, now you tell me. 8)

Welcome to the dark side of the (N)force. ;-)

Will the last Intel holdout in this group go AMD, or will The Empire
strike back in time for my next PC build? We'll have to wait for the
next episode, "Attack of the PC clones".

 

[chrisv]

Lots of disk images can be downloaded from http://www.bootdisk.com/

Wow, they even had one for Keith's 5 1/4" drive!

 

[Keith R. Williams]

The BIOS on the Chaintech had a built-in flash utility that does not
require a bootable disk. All you need is the bin file on the floppy.
Worked really nice.

Nice! I wonder why others haven't done this before. All the smarts is
there in the BIOS boot partition to do it.

Rob (thanks Rob) pointed me to a site that seems to have what I need.
I put a couple of different ones on my USB key, so maybe I'll get a
chance to try the update tonight (maybe not).

Well, now you tell me. 8)

You have hammer thumbs? (I've heard of hammer toes, but...;-)
Seriously, I don't see any good the adapter can do. It's another two
connectors in series with the power supply.

Will the last Intel holdout in this group go AMD, or will The Empire
strike back in time for my next PC build? We'll have to wait for the
next episode, "Attack of the PC clones".

Oh, no! That's not the plan, at all! The plan is to first get
everyone away from Intel, then it'll be: "Revenge of the PC clone
killers". Why do you think aapl stock has gone up by 4x in a year-and-
a-half? Someone leaked the plan. ;-)

 

[Keith R. Williams]

Wow, they even had one for Keith's 5 1/4" drive!

Interesting thought; A 5 1/4" drive on my Opteron. I have a couple in
the basement in my 5150 PC. I'd have to get out the dremel and perhaps
borrow your hammer thumbs though.

 

[Scott Alfter]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Interesting thought; A 5 1/4" drive on my Opteron. I have a couple in
the basement in my 5150 PC. I'd have to get out the dremel and perhaps
borrow your hammer thumbs though.

Hmm...looks like my Athlon 64 box at home won't be the only AMD64 box with a
5.25" floppy drive.

(I even modified the cable so that the drive at the end is B: and the drive
in the middle is A:, as the 3.5" drive is mounted underneath the 5.25" drive
and the floppy connector is at the bottom edge of the motherboard. Yes,
there's an option in setup to swap drives, but WinXP gets confused when you
do that.)

_/_
/ v \ Scott Alfter (remove the obvious to send mail)
(IIGS( http://alfter.us/ Top-posting!
\_^_/ rm -rf /bin/laden >What's the most annoying thing on Usenet?

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.4 (Linux)

iD8DBQFCG7KZVgTKos01OwkRAnRIAJ9tJix5zqKNbWg1gIvYhILR044B9ACgwutC
pn0roOO/GeU8+e/zVMf4d8c=
=My0A
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

 

[keith]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1



Hmm...looks like my Athlon 64 box at home won't be the only AMD64 box with a
5.25" floppy drive.

Nah, ChrisV wouldn't lend me his thumbs. ;-)

Why would I want *any* floppy, much less a 5 1/4" one. Ok, they seem to
be necessary for BIOS upgrades, but other than they they're useless.

(I even modified the cable so that the drive at the end is B: and the
drive in the middle is A:, as the 3.5" drive is mounted underneath the
5.25" drive and the floppy connector is at the bottom edge of the
motherboard. Yes, there's an option in setup to swap drives, but WinXP
gets confused when you do that.)

I trashed *every* floppy I had (the 5 1/4" ones went into the landfill
over a decade ago). It pained me no end to have to buy another box of the
crappy things for the BIOS upgrade (not done yet).