The kind of Vista problem MVP's hate to see and can't make excuses for

[Adam Albright]

While some may not think so, I'm actually not a Microsoft basher. I
just expect them to do a better job when I paid $200 for a upgrade.

I'm using the Business version. I previously mentioned in other
threads how I had troubles with my SATA drives not being seen in
Windows in spite of me installing the latest Intel controller drivers
and confirmed by a splash screen in BIOS they are in fact installed
and should be able to perform in AHCI mode. Windows Device Manager
reports "no problems" either.

This post isn't about that. I've resigned myself to run my external
high speed drives in cripple mode, as IDE drives in an external case.
That too was a issue for Vista. It couldn't "see" my SATA drive when
plugged into a SATA channel, not even if the channel is setup to limp
along in IDE mode.

Now I got another issue. I switched the external case to its USB 2.0
port rather then the preferred SATA port. Now Vista won't let me
unmount this drive "safely". No matter what it tells me "in use", I
know it isn't, but Vista isn't as smart as I am about such things. So
I wait a reasonable time to be sure the drive spins down, a couple
minutes which is way overkill, but I wait. I then just shut off its
power supply to use brute force to unmount of this drive.

Now a new problem. Vista hasn't seemed to mind this process until
today. I fire up some of my external drives and Vista brings up the
dreaded need to check disk window. I gulp, now what? Usually when
Windows does this is has detected some fault with the file system. So
it asks can it scan and repair this drive's file system? Well, if I
don't say yes, it will no doubt just keep nagging till I do say yes.
Besides NTFS as a file system is pretty stable and usually Windows can
repair normal issues on the fly so I say ok. It comes back with no
errors so just a false alarm.

The point is being an experienced user I know how to work around these
annoying issues. People with less experience probably don't which
means Vista will scare the crap out of some people in either refusing
to do things it should or worse suggesting something is wrong when it
isn't. This is just one of my several issues, SATA drive support or
more correctly worefully poor support of them.

1. BIOS sees them, so does Windows Device Manager.

2. I HAVE installed the latest drivers.

3. Nowhere does Vista complain anything is wrong with these SATA
drives yet depending on how they are configured either can't see
them in Windows Explorer so I can't access them or refuses to turn
them off and unmount under other conditions.

4. Even disabling features for these SATA drives, Vista still has
issues and even using its own USB controller driver it all by
itself install to run all my USB devices isn't smart enough to be
able to always unmount them so I can safely turn them off without
risking possible file corruption.

5. Now I have 2 external SATA drives both running under USB 2.0 and
Vista lets me shut one down, but not the other. Neither is
accessing anything, no application are open that uses them, Windows
Explorer the usual offender to generating false "open" calls is
closed.

My conclusion is Vista hasn't been tested well enough. Not in real
situations. How it performs in a sterile lab setting I don't know or
really care. It can and does drive you nuts sometimes, always when
you're trying to get your work done. You would think Microsoft would
like to know about these issues. MVP's try to sweep them under the rug
or just call posters that post about them trolls.

 

[Gary]

Works fine on my SATA drives.

While some may not think so, I'm actually not a Microsoft basher. I
just expect them to do a better job when I paid $200 for a upgrade.

I'm using the Business version. I previously mentioned in other
threads how I had troubles with my SATA drives not being seen in
Windows in spite of me installing the latest Intel controller drivers
and confirmed by a splash screen in BIOS they are in fact installed
and should be able to perform in AHCI mode. Windows Device Manager
reports "no problems" either.

This post isn't about that. I've resigned myself to run my external
high speed drives in cripple mode, as IDE drives in an external case.
That too was a issue for Vista. It couldn't "see" my SATA drive when
plugged into a SATA channel, not even if the channel is setup to limp
along in IDE mode.

Now I got another issue. I switched the external case to its USB 2.0
port rather then the preferred SATA port. Now Vista won't let me
unmount this drive "safely". No matter what it tells me "in use", I
know it isn't, but Vista isn't as smart as I am about such things. So
I wait a reasonable time to be sure the drive spins down, a couple
minutes which is way overkill, but I wait. I then just shut off its
power supply to use brute force to unmount of this drive.

Now a new problem. Vista hasn't seemed to mind this process until
today. I fire up some of my external drives and Vista brings up the
dreaded need to check disk window. I gulp, now what? Usually when
Windows does this is has detected some fault with the file system. So
it asks can it scan and repair this drive's file system? Well, if I
don't say yes, it will no doubt just keep nagging till I do say yes.
Besides NTFS as a file system is pretty stable and usually Windows can
repair normal issues on the fly so I say ok. It comes back with no
errors so just a false alarm.

The point is being an experienced user I know how to work around these
annoying issues. People with less experience probably don't which
means Vista will scare the crap out of some people in either refusing
to do things it should or worse suggesting something is wrong when it
isn't. This is just one of my several issues, SATA drive support or
more correctly worefully poor support of them.

1. BIOS sees them, so does Windows Device Manager.

2. I HAVE installed the latest drivers.

3. Nowhere does Vista complain anything is wrong with these SATA
drives yet depending on how they are configured either can't see
them in Windows Explorer so I can't access them or refuses to turn
them off and unmount under other conditions.

4. Even disabling features for these SATA drives, Vista still has
issues and even using its own USB controller driver it all by
itself install to run all my USB devices isn't smart enough to be
able to always unmount them so I can safely turn them off without
risking possible file corruption.

5. Now I have 2 external SATA drives both running under USB 2.0 and
Vista lets me shut one down, but not the other. Neither is
accessing anything, no application are open that uses them, Windows
Explorer the usual offender to generating false "open" calls is
closed.

My conclusion is Vista hasn't been tested well enough. Not in real
situations. How it performs in a sterile lab setting I don't know or
really care. It can and does drive you nuts sometimes, always when
you're trying to get your work done. You would think Microsoft would
like to know about these issues. MVP's try to sweep them under the rug
or just call posters that post about them trolls.

 

[Carl G]

My Sata Drives work fine from my Intel board .
Vista set them all up ok. But I am not running a raid setup. And don't have
any regular IDE hard drives either. And these are Internal drives.

 

[Adam Albright]

Works fine on my SATA drives.

Which is the rub. Windows doesn't work "fine" in every system. As I
said. This thread is really about Vista messing up a SATA drive
running as a USB device, which was necessary only because Windows was
too dumb to see the SATA interface this drive can support. It will see
it on a USB interface but then fails to be able to unmount it
sometimes. Again, other people may get different mileage. I can only
report what I observed.

Lets look under the hood for a minute to see how deceiving Microsoft
and their partners can be with marketing claims. Microsoft and their
vendors like to make a BIG DEAL over logos that appear on hardware and
software. These logos are suppose to convey some assurance that the
product will work with Vista, and I'm guessing this of course will
influence a person's buying decision. The reality is it can be totally
bogus as I'm about to detail.

Knowing Vista would go public soon, last October I build a new system.
I made DAMN SURE everything was Vista ready. The main element is your
motherboard. Right now on the Gigaybyte web site they proudly proclaim
the MB I purchased as "Vista Certified". As some MVP's like to gloat,
that is suppose to mean that the hardware vendor PAID Microsoft to
test their hardware and only if it passed extensive testing does it
get the "Vista Certifed" logo.

Well, I got a question, if my MB is "certified" why did the Vista
Upgrade Advisor tell me it may have a problem with both my Intel
created SATA controller, and also said it didn't like the build-in USB
controller? Both these components are hardwired into the motherboard.

So before installing Vista, I downloaded a new beta version of the
SATA controller, the latest available and I disabled the USB
controller since it isn't needed to install Vista. Because I had some
issues running these drives in SATA mode even in XP, but finally after
playing around in BIOS stumbled on a stable setting, I none the less
downgraded the settings of the SATA ports to run as plain IDE devices
which you can do on this MB from within BIOS. We'll just skip over how
this board got "Vista Certified" because the focus of this thread is
how Vista is messing up under USB.

Remember I disabled the USB controller that was part of the "certifed
Vista Ready" MB and proceeded to install Vista. After a successful
install I checked Device Manager, no complaining there and I noticed
that Vista went ahead and installed a Microsoft generic USB
controller. So to me at least its laughable that the Vista Advisor
nagged about a USB controller that's part of a board that's suppose to
be "Vista Certifed", then on its own installs a generic one Microsoft
wrote, yet it can't unmount my drive running as a USB device half the
time.

I tend to write detailed posts. If people prefer to put blinders on
and believe Vista is wonderful, everything works great, so be it.
I'll just keep writing what I find until I get tired of doing it.

 

[Lang Murphy]

The only other person, other than yourself, I've seen in this NG running
external SATA drives is Colin Barnhorst... if he doesn't respond... well,
too bad, I guess. I don't recall ever seeing that he had the types of
problems you're having with Vista and external SATA drives.

I can only assume that you both are using different SATA controllers into
which you attach your external SATA drives...

Lang