P4P800 - No raidROM ctrl+i option during boot.

[mietde]

I have tried and tried but i can't seem to get the raidRom bootoption to
show it's Ctrl+i option.

I have bought an 250gig Maxtor which i want to setup as a single drive in a
Raid0 config so i could easily add another drive without losing the data
already on the first drive.
Anyway, the drive is fine and in the past i have seen the Ctrl+i prompt but
now i need it, it won't show anymore.
Furthermore i think the raidROM Ctrl+i should be shown anyway, even if there
is no harddrive at all.

quote:
Intel chipset RAID, which only does RAID 0, under
BIOS Setup | MAIN tab | IDE Configuration [Enhanced Mode] | Enhanced Mode
Support On [S_ATA] | Configure S-ATA as RAID [YES]

Offcourse i have done this, tried the bioses 1009, 1012 and 1014,
made sure the pci bus ran @ 33mhz, cleared the CMOS etc etc but i just can't
seem to get the Ctrl+i prompt.

What the heck is going on here?
Any ideas anyone?

Tia!!
mietde

 

[Paul]

I have tried and tried but i can't seem to get the raidRom bootoption to
show it's Ctrl+i option.

I have bought an 250gig Maxtor which i want to setup as a single drive in a
Raid0 config so i could easily add another drive without losing the data
already on the first drive.
Anyway, the drive is fine and in the past i have seen the Ctrl+i prompt but
now i need it, it won't show anymore.
Furthermore i think the raidROM Ctrl+i should be shown anyway, even if there
is no harddrive at all.

quote:
Intel chipset RAID, which only does RAID 0, under
BIOS Setup | MAIN tab | IDE Configuration [Enhanced Mode] | Enhanced Mode
Support On [S_ATA] | Configure S-ATA as RAID [YES]

Offcourse i have done this, tried the bioses 1009, 1012 and 1014,
made sure the pci bus ran @ 33mhz, cleared the CMOS etc etc but i just can't
seem to get the Ctrl+i prompt.

What the heck is going on here?
Any ideas anyone?

Tia!!
mietde

"Serial ATA BootROM" [Enabled] ? It is supposed to appear in the
menu when "Configure S-ATA as RAID" [Yes] is selected.

Otherwise, it could be that the chip is not being detected or
something.

Have you tried clearing the CMOS (follow the procedure in the manual
and pull the plug on the computer before doing it) ? Do you always
do a "Load Setup Defaults" in the BIOS, after flashing the
BIOS chip ?

That is all that comes to mind.

Paul

 

[mietde]

I have tried and tried but i can't seem to get the raidRom bootoption to
show it's Ctrl+i option.

I have bought an 250gig Maxtor which i want to setup as a single drive in a
Raid0 config so i could easily add another drive without losing the data
already on the first drive.
Anyway, the drive is fine and in the past i have seen the Ctrl+i prompt but
now i need it, it won't show anymore.
Furthermore i think the raidROM Ctrl+i should be shown anyway, even if there
is no harddrive at all.

quote:
Intel chipset RAID, which only does RAID 0, under
BIOS Setup | MAIN tab | IDE Configuration [Enhanced Mode] | Enhanced Mode
Support On [S_ATA] | Configure S-ATA as RAID [YES]

Offcourse i have done this, tried the bioses 1009, 1012 and 1014,
made sure the pci bus ran @ 33mhz, cleared the CMOS etc etc but i just can't
seem to get the Ctrl+i prompt.

What the heck is going on here?
Any ideas anyone?

Tia!!
mietde

"Serial ATA BootROM" [Enabled] ? It is supposed to appear in the
menu when "Configure S-ATA as RAID" [Yes] is selected.

Otherwise, it could be that the chip is not being detected or
something.

Have you tried clearing the CMOS (follow the procedure in the manual
and pull the plug on the computer before doing it) ? Do you always
do a "Load Setup Defaults" in the BIOS, after flashing the
BIOS chip ?

That is all that comes to mind.

Paul

I already have done those things several times,
the Ctrl+i prompt simply doesn't show anymore.

It could be the board isn't 100%,
i have had a board once that seemed ok but the multipliersettings didn't
concur with the manual and i got another board then.
Perhaps this is also a freak problem, dunno.

Am i right for assuming that the raidROM should show up even with no
harddisk connected at all and for as long as the ide settings are correctly
setup?

 

[Paul]

I have tried and tried but i can't seem to get the raidRom bootoption to
show it's Ctrl+i option.

I have bought an 250gig Maxtor which i want to setup as a single drive in a
Raid0 config so i could easily add another drive without losing the data
already on the first drive.
Anyway, the drive is fine and in the past i have seen the Ctrl+i prompt but
now i need it, it won't show anymore.
Furthermore i think the raidROM Ctrl+i should be shown anyway, even if there
is no harddrive at all.

quote:
Intel chipset RAID, which only does RAID 0, under
BIOS Setup | MAIN tab | IDE Configuration [Enhanced Mode] | Enhanced Mode
Support On [S_ATA] | Configure S-ATA as RAID [YES]

Offcourse i have done this, tried the bioses 1009, 1012 and 1014,
made sure the pci bus ran @ 33mhz, cleared the CMOS etc etc but i just can't
seem to get the Ctrl+i prompt.

What the heck is going on here?
Any ideas anyone?

Tia!!
mietde

"Serial ATA BootROM" [Enabled] ? It is supposed to appear in the
menu when "Configure S-ATA as RAID" [Yes] is selected.

Otherwise, it could be that the chip is not being detected or
something.

Have you tried clearing the CMOS (follow the procedure in the manual
and pull the plug on the computer before doing it) ? Do you always
do a "Load Setup Defaults" in the BIOS, after flashing the
BIOS chip ?

That is all that comes to mind.

Paul

I already have done those things several times,
the Ctrl+i prompt simply doesn't show anymore.

It could be the board isn't 100%,
i have had a board once that seemed ok but the multipliersettings didn't
concur with the manual and i got another board then.
Perhaps this is also a freak problem, dunno.

Am i right for assuming that the raidROM should show up even with no
harddisk connected at all and for as long as the ide settings are correctly
setup?

For storage devices that need programming support in order to allow
the OS to boot (i.e. to support the BIOS calls necessary to bootstrap
the loading of data off the disk), Asus puts firmware modules into
the BIOS code. If you used, say, a SCSI PCI card, there would be a ROM
on the PCI card, that gets loaded at boot time. I would think the
"Serial ATA BootROM" setting would be doing the same thing, loading a
module that has the necessary BIOS calls to allow booting from the
Serial ATA device. I think if the BIOS module is missing, it is
still possible for an OS to install a driver at runtime, in order
to use it as a data disk, but not a boot disk (due to the inability
to bootstrap from it).

When a bootROM code runs, it will search for devices to communicate
with. If it doesn't manage to enumerate any devices, the bootROM
code generally disables itself, and will print something on the
BIOS screen to that effect.

The raidROM should be showing up, at least for as long as it takes
to determine whether any drives are present. Since the resetting
of drives and spinup times are long, compared to the execution speed
of instructions, there should be a visible delay while the raidROM
searches for the drive.

HTH,
Paul