P4C800E-Deluxe - SATA Failure, need recommendations

[bob]

I have a P4C800E-Deluxe, running 2 Western Digital IDE drives as C:
and D, and a mirrored 250Gb drive as my main data partition.

A few months ago, the SATA controller blew out, and fried a drive. I
got the data back, and had to RMA the motherboard...

It just happened again. I heard a light clicking and traced it to one
of the SATA 250's.
i thought the power was loose, b/c i could hear it powering up and
down. I hit the power cable to the drives, and both drives powered
down... OS locked up (Windows XP Pro).

powered on.. neither drive seen by system on controller.

one drive wouldn't power on, the other clicked.
swapped pcb's on the drives. the drive that didn't power on came up...
and clicked.
the drive that WAS clicking now wouldn't power on. that told me both
pcb's likely fried.

got 2 new drives from WD, via RMA.
put the new drive on the SATA RAID (the intel controller)...
nothing... would not see it.

put new drive on promise controller, it came right up.

took pcb off new drive put onto old drives.. both spin and click...
neither seen by system on either SATA controller.
put pcb back on "new" drive... came right up on the promise... nothing
on the Intel.

here's where i need help...
need to get data recovery on the drives. anyone have experience with
any of the companies? Some will maintain the WD warranty.

next thing.. the intel controller seems fried.... again...
it seems the P4C800E-Deluxe is no longer available?? i can't find it
anywhere. would likely just buy a new one...
or is there another current board that does socket 478, sata raid on
intel, and takes the same ram?

data recovery is gonna suck but i have no idea what else to do, i
need the stuff back.
any recommendations on other things to look at is appreciated.

 

[BC]

I have a P4C800E-Deluxe, running 2 Western Digital IDE drives as C:
and D, and a mirrored 250Gb drive as my main data partition.

next thing.. the intel controller seems fried.... again...
it seems the P4C800E-Deluxe is no longer available?? i can't find it
anywhere. would likely just buy a new one...
or is there another current board that does socket 478, sata raid on
intel, and takes the same ram?

Sorry to hear about your nightmare.

From Newegg, boards that have the 875 chipset, and SATA RAID:

SUPERMICRO MBD-P4SCT+II-O Socket 478 Intel 875P ATX Server Motherboard
- Retail $268.99 + $6 shipping.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813182030

ASUS P4P800SE Socket 478 Intel 865PE ATX Intel Motherboard -
Retail $93.50, free shipping

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813131484

183 positive reviews from customers, 5/5 stars


ABIT IS7 Socket 478 Intel 865PE ATX Intel Motherboard -
Retail $94.00 $2.50 ship

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813127155

122 reviews, 4/5 stars (or "eggs")

ASUS P4P800-E DELUXE Socket 478 Intel 865PE ATX Intel Motherboard -
Retail $115.50 $3.50 ship

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813131492

772 reviews--most I have ever seen, actually, 4/5 stars

ABIT IC7-G MAXII Socket 478 Intel 875P ATX Intel Motherboard -
Retail $142.00 $3.50 ship

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813127152

464 reviews 4/5 stars

Note: ABIT having some financial problems from what I have read--and,
have read anecdotal reports that their Quality Control has fallen
off--but, not from any sort of reliable source.

TYAN S5101ANNRF Socket 478 Intel 875P ATX Intel Motherboard -
Retail $165.99 $5 ship

1 review, 5/5 stars

It sounds like you need a super stable reliable motherboard (don't we
all?). Had a CUSL2-M that ran for me nonstop for almost 4 years, so I
am an Asus fan, but, am using a Tyan board now that has been excellent.

But, if you need a sort of a server type board, built to take a bit more
abuse than a regular consumer motherboard, you might want to go to
Newegg's Server Motherboard section at

http://www.newegg.com/ProductSort/SubCategory.asp?SubCategory=302&DEPA=1

If you put in "Socket 478" and "DDR 3200" in the search fields, there
are ten boards--but, only one, the Supermicro, has an AGP slot. (The
Tyan 875P board has one too.)

By the way, your power supply? Based on what I have seen and read, PC
Power and Cooling is the best--built a P5WD2 system with my son, had a
Seasonic power supply that looked good on paper, but, with a pretty
standard configuration (3.2 Ghs Pentium, @ sticks Kingston Ram, 3 Hard
drives, one DVD drive, 6600Gt video card, used onboard sound), it
couldn't hack it--system would crash, not boot up properly at
times--PCPC unit fires it up with ease. No, not cheap, but, if you have
an underpowered power supply, that might account for some of the issues
you have been having. (If it cost less than about $100, with all those
hard drives you have, I would be surprised if it was up to the task).

Best of luck--

 

[Paul]

I have a P4C800E-Deluxe, running 2 Western Digital IDE drives as C:
and D, and a mirrored 250Gb drive as my main data partition.

A few months ago, the SATA controller blew out, and fried a drive. I
got the data back, and had to RMA the motherboard...

It just happened again. I heard a light clicking and traced it to one
of the SATA 250's.
i thought the power was loose, b/c i could hear it powering up and
down. I hit the power cable to the drives, and both drives powered
down... OS locked up (Windows XP Pro).

powered on.. neither drive seen by system on controller.

one drive wouldn't power on, the other clicked.
swapped pcb's on the drives. the drive that didn't power on came up...
and clicked.
the drive that WAS clicking now wouldn't power on. that told me both
pcb's likely fried.

got 2 new drives from WD, via RMA.
put the new drive on the SATA RAID (the intel controller)...
nothing... would not see it.

put new drive on promise controller, it came right up.

took pcb off new drive put onto old drives.. both spin and click...
neither seen by system on either SATA controller.
put pcb back on "new" drive... came right up on the promise... nothing
on the Intel.

here's where i need help...
need to get data recovery on the drives. anyone have experience with
any of the companies? Some will maintain the WD warranty.

next thing.. the intel controller seems fried.... again...
it seems the P4C800E-Deluxe is no longer available?? i can't find it
anywhere. would likely just buy a new one...
or is there another current board that does socket 478, sata raid on
intel, and takes the same ram?

data recovery is gonna suck but i have no idea what else to do, i
need the stuff back.
any recommendations on other things to look at is appreciated.

First of all, look for this burn mark on the Southbridge.

http://www.abxzone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=84122&highlight=usb+port

There are some replacements here. One is not S478, so look at the
specs carefully before buying. Intel branded motherboards are not
intended for overclocking, so that is one feature you'll be losing.

http://www.pricewatch.com/prc.aspx?i=2&a=5813

As for the chipset, recent press announcements show that Intel is
not able to meet demand for new chipsets. AFAIK, the production
of ICH5(R) has stopped, so once any inventory of those chips at
Asus is exhausted, they'll stop making the motherboards. They'll
keep inventory for RMA purposes, and also keep a supply of
chips for doing RMA repair (like soldering a new chip in place of
the one depicted in the Abxzone article).

When you get your new system set up, buy a separate controller
card and plug it into the PCI bus. You'll want to keep a respectful
distance away from any ICH5 disk controller interfaces.

There was one other poster here, who had an inordinate number of
burned boards (I think he said five failures). I'd like to know
what factors you and that poster have in common, as there has got
to be some component in the computer, or some prevalent bad
environmental condition, to suffer so many failures.

Whatever that factor happens to be, whether it is the "ESD/latchup"
theory or some other, I would find a way to avoid using interfaces
on the Southbridge, especially if the Southbridge can kill disk
drives.

Another option would be to try a different Southbridge.
Boards like P4GPL-X and P4GD1 use 915 chipsets (PCI Express),
with ICH6 Southbridge. You'll need a different video card
to use one of them, but would get to keep using the S478
processor. These boards are not available in all markets,
so you may not see them at a local computer store.

http://nl.asus.com/products/mb/socket478/p4gd1/overview.htm
http://nl.asus.com/products/mb/socket478/p4gpl-x/overview.htm

Other options would be to look for an ATI chipset with your
S478 socket on it (which I wouldn't do). There could well be
some SIS or Via solutions, where the main concern might be
how well the AGP video card gets along with the motherboard.

As for data recovery, there seem to be firms all over the
place who do that stuff. I think there might be two small
ones where I live. The only way they could keep a warranty,
is if they just do board swapping of the controller on the
drive. If the HDA has to be opened, I cannot imagine that
being approved by a disk manufacturer (imagine the expense
of sending a company representative to review practices
at every little mom-and-pop data recovery firm, trying to
figure out if their air quality is class 100 in the
disassembly room). Maybe they can hide their handywork well
enough to fool the RMA people, and that is what
"maintaining the warranty" means If they can "maintain
the warranty", then that means the drive must be permanently
repaired ?

Paul

 

[BobMarley]

I have a Thermaltake case... the 1420
so it has a 420W PS and 7 fans
i added some neon lights to it for flair

am an asus fan also... how is the P4P800SE? Is it reliable?
is it as fast as the 875P chipset?
i thought the 875P was required to do the intel raid.. which i recall
being preferred over promise

 

[BobMarley]

not sure what the cause was... i don't overclock, and have little
running in it that would pull a lot of power...

likely just bad luck

WD has a list of certified recovery places, that maintain warranty
with any work they do...

 

[bob]

no burn mark on the southbridge... must be something else..

 

[bob]

went ahead and bought the P4P800SE...
will likely just do a replacement of the system board.. at least that
way nothing is burned out or dead. maybe will rma the p4c800e-deluxe
after the other arrives...

now i just need to do data recovery on the drives... that's gonna suck