PCI IDE/RAID cards and Windows XP.

[AJMW]

I am trying to employ an SiL 680 Ultra ATA/133 RAID card in IDE mode to
give me an additional channel for a spare hard disk which I have. The
relevant details of my system are listed below. I am using the latest
driver for the SiL board.

The problem is that, whichever PCI slot I use, the mobo BIOS sees the
board and identifies the drive attached to it. Windows recognises the
board and Device Manager says that it is working properly with no
problems. However, whether the HD is formatted as FAT32 or NTFS,
Windows does not see it.

The relevant hard drive is not faulty as is shown by substituting it
into one of the onboard IDE channels. There is no reason to believe
that the RAID card is faulty.

Does anybody know if this is a known bug? Is there a setting in Windows
which I have overlooked?




Abit KT7 motherboard on which the onboard IDE controller has two hard
disks (120GB and 20GB) and two CD-ROM drives installed.
Windows XP Pro SP2, fully updated.
AMD Athlon 1000MHz.
512KB memory.

 

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

Hi,

What are you using to partition/format the drive? What does the disk manager
(diskmgmt/msc) say about it?

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Associate Expert - WindowsXP Expert Zone

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org

 

[AJMW]

Thanks for your reply to what is my first ever posting!

I originally used the Windows XP diskmanagement tool to format.
Diskmanagement does not see the drive, neither does Windows Explorer,
or Partition Magic 8.0

 

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

Hi,

If they are not seeing the drive, then there is a problem with the
controller card. The drive's not being reported to the system by the card,
recheck/reseat the connections at both ends (the power one too).

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Associate Expert - WindowsXP Expert Zone

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org

 

[AJMW]

Hi,

Yes, of course. I have reseated the card several times and moved it
from slot to slot. I have also checked the power connections to the
drive, but this must be OK because I can feel and hear the drive
spinning. I have also tried both drive sockets on the card but to no
avail. In any case the mobo BIOS sees and identifies the drive so I do
not think the drive and its connections are faulty. It is jumpered as
a master, which is what the instructions say for only one drive.

I may well have to conclude that the card is faulty in a subtle way.
It is very irritating because it used to work properly when I had
Windows 98SE installed.

 

[Yves Leclerc]

Before you "retire" the card, did you correctly install the XP drivers for
it??

 

[AJMW]

Yes I did and Device Manager indicated that the card was installed and
working properly. I looked on the Net for an updated driver but found
that I already had the latest version. I am forced to conclude that,
although the mobo BIOS sees the card and identifies with serial number
and size a drive connected to it, the card is not transferring the same
information into XP.

Many thanks for your interest.

 

[ByTor]

I am trying to employ an SiL 680 Ultra ATA/133 RAID card in IDE mode to
give me an additional channel for a spare hard disk which I have. The
relevant details of my system are listed below. I am using the latest
driver for the SiL board.

The problem is that, whichever PCI slot I use, the mobo BIOS sees the
board and identifies the drive attached to it. Windows recognises the
board and Device Manager says that it is working properly with no
problems. However, whether the HD is formatted as FAT32 or NTFS,
Windows does not see it.

The relevant hard drive is not faulty as is shown by substituting it
into one of the onboard IDE channels. There is no reason to believe
that the RAID card is faulty.

Does anybody know if this is a known bug? Is there a setting in Windows
which I have overlooked?




Abit KT7 motherboard on which the onboard IDE controller has two hard
disks (120GB and 20GB) and two CD-ROM drives installed.
Windows XP Pro SP2, fully updated.
AMD Athlon 1000MHz.
512KB memory.

Okay, I'll take a stab here.........It is "quite" possible that your
system BIOS may be fighting with the Sil BIOS......Reason I state this
is that "Sils," unknowing to the customer when they buy it, is
**notorious** for taking over "disk assignment" when a HD is attached to
it............It does not work well as an extended "IDE" when dealing
with drives......It will work great if all your HD's are attached to it
and no HD's are on the MotherBoard though...
By default a MB BIOS will always assign its disk order starting at
"Disk0" with the first HD attached to it....Anything after becomes
Disk1,2,3 etc.............Your Sil, I would guarantee most likely, is
making the HD attached to it "Disk0".........Now if this is related to
your situation, technically I am not sure.........Maybe one of the more
savvy posters may throw some lite on my theory.....

My suggestion would be is to return the Sil and get you a "Promise"
card, promise technology and their cards, I feel, are much
better.....And they are "actual" IDE extenders........I use one myself
on my machine with HD's attached to it so I know it does not take over
the disk order...It "extends" after the MB's assignments......

I am also mentioning this because I have the "SAME" Sil card and it gave
me one HELL of an issue with my multiple boots....This is how I came to
find out about the disk order..........Sil tech support were morons( I
really hate to say that, pardon me) & said they could not give me tech
details on the hardware itself so that I could figure out the pin
modes........But I will tell ya this, IT works incredibly effecient when
I attached 3 burners & a DVD player to it.......I can burn 3 CD's at
once and my system will not flinch......Won't even know I'm
burning......

 

[AJMW]

Many thanks indeed. What you say makes sense, although SiL clearly have
not been helpful. I must say that their website was a touch obscure.

From what you say it would make sense for me to transfer my CD-ROM

drives to the card and put the hard disk on the liberated mobo IDE
slot. I hope that my TDK CD writer works properly when I do this.

I will make the changes when I get a minute over the next few days and
report my experience here in case someone else can benefit from it.

Okay, I'll take a stab here.........It is "quite" possible that your
system BIOS may be fighting with the Sil BIOS......Reason I state this
is that "Sils," unknowing to the customer when they buy it, is
**notorious** for taking over "disk assignment" when a HD is attached to
it............It does not work well as an extended "IDE" when dealing

 

[ByTor]

Many thanks indeed. What you say makes sense, although SiL clearly have
not been helpful. I must say that their website was a touch obscure.
From what you say it would make sense for me to transfer my CD-ROM
drives to the card and put the hard disk on the liberated mobo IDE
slot. I hope that my TDK CD writer works properly when I do this.

I will make the changes when I get a minute over the next few days and
report my experience here in case someone else can benefit from it.

(Forgive the bottom posting, I'm not much of a top poster)

Okay, but remember, I am only **ONE** person stating this now.....It's
possible that I may not be right if it relates to your situation
though... ;0)
If you move the burner make sure your ASPI drivers don't become corrupt
in the transition.....I have Nero installed & the "info" tool is what I
check periodically to make sure they're okay, not sure of another way to
check them though for corruption....."ASPI checker" will check to see if
they're even installed but I don't think it will report corruption......

Yes, let me know how ya make out, I'd be interested to know....

 

[AJMW]

I have now done what you suggested and it has been a complete success.
I can see the CD-ROM drive on the card and everything is behaving
normally. I now have to resolve a space problem in the case and a
tangle of ribbon cables. Once again many thanks for your help.

 

[AJMW]

Further to my last post I have now found the the IDE card cannot cope
with my TDK CD-RW drive to the extent that my C: drive is interfered
with and the machine does not boot. I have now reverted to 3 HDs and
the TDK on the main board and the "ordinary" CD-ROM drive on the SiL
card. Since I may well want to upgrade the mobo in the next year this
is an acceptable compromise.

I wish you well.

 

[ByTor]

Further to my last post I have now found the the IDE card cannot cope
with my TDK CD-RW drive to the extent that my C: drive is interfered
with and the machine does not boot. I have now reverted to 3 HDs and
the TDK on the main board and the "ordinary" CD-ROM drive on the SiL
card. Since I may well want to upgrade the mobo in the next year this
is an acceptable compromise.

I wish you well.

Hmmmm interesting, I wonder why that is?

Anyways, glad it's working out for ya though...... ;0)

 

[ByTor]

I have now done what you suggested and it has been a complete success.
I can see the CD-ROM drive on the card and everything is behaving
normally. I now have to resolve a space problem in the case and a
tangle of ribbon cables. Once again many thanks for your help.

Sorry I did not see this post....my newsserver is really starting to P
me off.....this showed up on my other machine.....

Good, glad it's working......I'd still am curious about your TDK though.
Tangle of ribbons? You should see my machine....yikes!

 

[AJMW]

Yes, so am I but I see no way of sensibly investigating because I
cannot boot the machine when the TDK is on the IDE card and when it is
not on the card there is no problem. One of these philosophical loop
things. I did notice in the Ultra manual that if you put the hard
drives onto the IDE card and expect to boot from them you have to set
the mobo BIOS to boot SCSI device first. however since I do not need
the extra channels it is not worthwhile my taking it further.

 

[ByTor]

Yes, so am I but I see no way of sensibly investigating because I
cannot boot the machine when the TDK is on the IDE card and when it is
not on the card there is no problem. One of these philosophical loop
things. I did notice in the Ultra manual that if you put the hard
drives onto the IDE card and expect to boot from them you have to set
the mobo BIOS to boot SCSI device first. however since I do not need
the extra channels it is not worthwhile my taking it further.

I see your point.....:0)

Good Luck, glad I at least had one success in helping someone. ;0)

Am I ready for MVP'ism yet..........?