SATA hub doesn't work

Hi,

I bought a SATA HUB 5-Port Multiplier using Sil 3176 Chip. On start-up, my computer shows that I have SiI 3124 SATARaid BIOS ver 6.3.18. The SATA hub doesn't work. I bought new cables and connected SATA I and SATA II ext hdds to it and switched things around but these things haven't helped. I'm wondering if the problem lies in the fact that the hub is SiI 3176 and my computer has SiI 3124. Does anyone know if that could be the problem?

 

Anyone?

 

Denise, can you post a link to the hub you bought?

E

 

Sure Fred . . .

http://cooldrives.com/sahub5muussi.html

Before I bought it, I was told that all I would have to do was to download and install the "3124_x64_11130" driver. I did that and my ext hdds work great when I connected them to my controller card. When I connected the hub to it, none of the green led lights came on, not even the one that shows that it's working. Only the power led came on. When I e-mailed them, I was told:

Isn't my controller card my port multiplier in this case, for the hub?

I'm wondering if the problem lies in the fact that the hub is SiI 3176 and my computer has SiI 3124 and if I need to download the 3176 firmware. There's no 3176 drivers, only firmware. The site says:

I'm not sure if SiI3726 is compatible with my pc and I don't know how to find out whether it is or not.

This is the Silicon Image site for the 3726 firmware. http://www.siliconimage.com/support/supportsearchresults.aspx?pid=26&cid=23&ctid=2&osid=0&

Connecting this hub got very confusing.

Thanks for answering, Fred :hyper

 

P.S. This is what my pc has:

- ASUS A8V-VM SE Socket 939 Micro ATX Motherboard - UDMA133, SATA (RAID)
---- VIA K8M890 + VT8237A
---- 2000/1600 HT/s
---- Dual-channel DDR400, Max 2GB
---- VIA Integrated Gfx in North Bridge K8M890
---- 1 x PCI-E X16, 1 X PCI-E X 1, 2X PCI
---- 2 *ATA133 ,2 x SATA
---- 10/100 LAN
---- 6-Channel audio
- Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 SATA 3.0 Gb/s 320Gb hard drive (RAID array not set up)
- AMD Athlon Gforce 8400 64 X2 4200+ Toledo 2.2GHz 2 x 512KB L2 Cache Socket 939 Processor
- ARCTIC COOLING Freezer 64 Pro 92mm CPU Cooler
- Corsair 620W PSU
- Ballistix 2x1G RAM, 184-pin DIMM, 128MX64 DDR PC3200, Unbuffered
- NORCO-4618 PCI-X / PCI eSATA / SATA II / SATA I Controller Card RAID 0/1/5/10/JBOD
- Windows XP Pro X64, SP2
- NetFramework 2.0 Redistributable Pack for X64

 

PUL-LEAZE :banghead EVEN A HINT WOULD BE GOOD.

 

Sorry Denise, I am not familiar with the SIL stuff. I did a little googling on it and well, am still confrused. Hopefully some one else here has some experience with it. :confused

E

 

That's ok, Fred. Thanks for trying.

 

With the SIL hub connected and an eSATA drive connected to the hub, did you have a look at the device manager. Did everything look fine or were any exclamation marks evident.

Also in device manager did you check the 'Device by connection' radio button at the top and try to locate the drives or at least the hub.

Also although you have not stated this explicitly but your mobo does have an eSATA port?

Good Luck

 

I have 3 Maxtor One Touch II ext hdds. I've installed the software that came with them, Retrospect, but Retrospect is only a back-up program, no drivers. I've looked for a 1394 Front Panel driver but couldn't find one. The drives are recognized by My Computer and I've never had a problem with them.

I checked Device by Connection and took screenshots of Device Manager. I took them in three ways: without the hub connected, with the hub connected to the controller card, and with the hub connected to a SATA I adapter card that's connected to a port on my mobo. All three ways, Device Manager didn't change and the green led light on the hub didn't light up. Screenshots are attached in case I've missed something. I have 17 ext hdds. Some are USB 2.00, some firewire, some SATA I, some SATA II. All the drives are recognized by My Computer. When I connect drives to the hub, they aren't recognized by My Computer.

I have a SATA I adapter card attached to a SATA port on my motherboard. I used an I to L cable to connect the hub to the SATA I port but a hdd conected to it wasn't recognized by My Computer.


Each time that I connect the hub, the green led light doesn't come on. Each hdd connection has 2 green led lights and there's a main green led light which shows that the hub is on. The green leds used to turn on occasionally (off and on) but they no longer turn on.

 

Denise_M, best I can make out from the screenshots attached, you have installed SIL software 3124 (under the heading for scsi devices, the C with a bar across). This is seemingly confirmed by you original post saying

According to the above screenshot, the SIL has recognised 3 Western Digital drives. Now I am not sure where the SIl 3176 comes into it, since you say that this is the required software to install the sata hub.....:confused. Maybe you need to download version 3726.

Question. I take it that this is the first time that you have installed any SIL scsi type software?

Other question? I have tried to find out about your 3 Maxtor One Touch II ext hdds, can these be connected by IIIE 1394 type (firewire) or USB 2.0 or both.

Last question (for now). When you connect an external SATA drive to the SATA expansion slot without the hub, is it recognised. I think you already said no to this....

Cheers

 

A quick edit. I did watch the very un-informative video to which you had linked.

How does the manual state that you should connect the eSATA drives and eSATA hub and more specifically the order, ie connect the eSATA drive to the eSATA hub and then the eSATA hub to the controller/expansion adapter on the pc, then switch on the eSATA hub and then boot your pc.

 

Hi risk_reversal,

You're correct that this was an error. I was looking at so many driver numbers that I typed 3176 instead of 3726.

In an email from the manufacturer, I was told that it needed a 3726 driver, but it didn't mention firmware. The description for the 3726 firmware says

At this point, it started to get confusing.

I found firmware for 3726 but not just a driver. I'm not sure what firmware is. I downloaded it but I haven't installed it because I wasn't sure if it was compatible with my computer or if it would do more harm than good.

Yes, I've never gotten involved with this type of software.

They can be connected by firewire or USB 2.0. Since firewire is faster, I use that connection. When in use, they work fine. The only "problem" is that they have the yellow question mark in Device Manager. I can't find a driver for them.

That's a good question and I have the most noted answer for it. My dog ate it. I'm not kidding. She's my daughter's puppy and she got ahold of it and tore it to shreds. Considering all the other components that I installed, I mistakenly thought that it didn't matter so I threw the shreds away. That was before I tried to install it and thought that all I'd have to do was connect it to a SATA II port like conecting USB 2.0 hubs to USB 2.0 ports. The site says

With this statement, I thought it would be easy. I'll look on the internet for a downloadable version of it.

A question for you, if you don't mind. After installing the driver and it didn't help, I was later advised that

It sounded to me as if they're telling me that this hub won't work with my pc. However, it did work for the briefest time (on and off) when I had it connected to the SATA II controller card, and then stopped working altogether.

 

Well it does sound like it.

Tell me abot the SATAII controller / expansion card that you installed. Did you install this for use with the hub. Is it just a pci back plate (ie slots into a pci slot or maybe where the floppy drive is) with data cables connecting from the eSATA's controller card to your mobo's SATA ports? Or is it something more ellaborate which requires driver install?

Think not. Hence me asking whether all eSATA drives were all connected to the hub, etc and on prior to firing up your pc. The boot sequence picks up a bios screen relating to the eSATA hub. On that same screen i would have thought that any drives connected to the eSATA hub would have been shown. It's just that that is how it works on my mobo's Promise controller. That controller has a bios and when booting shows the drives connected to it.

At the eSATA bios screen is there anything that would allow you to access the bios ie a set of key ie ctrl+F, or other

Good Luck

 

I bought a NORCO-4618 PCI-X / PCI eSATA / SATA II / SATA I Controller Card RAID 0/1/5/10/JBOD

http://www.newegg.com/product/ProductReview.aspx?Item=N82E16816133002

I inserted it into the PCI slot. I downloaded and installed the 3124_x64_11130 driver.

The controller card has 4 ports and no matter which ext hdd that I connect to it, they're all recognized by My Computer. The card works great since I installed the driver. It came with no software so I thought that no software was needed. There's a thread here about that also but it's resolved now since I installed the driver. I bought the controller card because I have a number of eSATA drives. I bought the SATA hub because I have more than 4 eSATA drives. The hub would've give me 5 more eSATA ports.

I do have a SATA I card (one port) that's connected to a SATA I port on my motherboard. I connected the hub to it using an I to J cable but the green led light (which shows that the hub is on) didn't light up (when I first got the hub, this led lit up but it doesn't any longer). The red led lights up. This one shows that it's getting power.

On boot-up, a screen shows the eSATA hdds that are connected to the controller card. Since the hub doesn't work, nothing is shown for it.

I'll have to check this out. I've been in CMOS and BIOS a number of times but I wasn't looking for eSATA. Right now I'm processing files and I don't want to stop in the middle of it. I'll let you know about this later.

Thanks for helping me with this

 

This controller card apparently has a SIL chipset 3124 and installing the driver which can be seen in the Device Manager in the first screenshot in your earlier post has allowed eSATA HDDs connected to it to be correctly detected.

In respect of the eSATA Hub, I believe that you must also install drivers for it to operate and to be able to detect the eSATA drives connected to it. The eSATA Hub has a SIL 3726 chipset and needs those drivers. Now whether both those SIL drivers will play nice together with the Via based board that you have is another matter.

But in my opinion given that the eSATA controller card is working properly there should in theory be no impediment to the eSATA Hub also functioning correctly. The controller card is overcoming the VIA sata controller shortfall that it is not a portmultiplier enabled host.

If you see what I mean

Good Luck

PS. Was there no driver disc included with the eSATA Hub?

 

That's what I thought but I needed it to be confirmed.


At http://www.siliconimage.com/support/supportsearchresults.aspx?pid=26&cid=23&ctid=2&osid=0&
it says:

I can get the SiI 3726 firmware on this site and the Update Utility but I haven't been able to find "3726 Firmware Download Utility." Unless they're using different wording and it means that I should download and install the 3726 firmware and the download and install the update. Is that correct?

 

Well the 2 progs available on the silicon image site are firmware revisions to your eSATA Hub. Pretty much similar to when flashig a bios or such. The first file is the newer firmware and the second prog underneath that is the download utility (downloaded the zip file and had a look) is the prog that you use to make the 'flashing' happen.

I am not sure if flashing you eSATA hub will work although it might.

Best I can ascertain is as follows.

When you boot your pc the post sequence shows
On start-up, my computer shows that I have SiI 3124 SATARaid BIOS ver 6.3.18.
This relates to the eSATA controller card which works fine. If any HDD were connected to this at boot they would show up.

What the eSATA Hub should do is allow for a multiplier effect, much in the same way as a USB Hub.

Looking at the product details again. It states that this has naitive support which seems to suggest that no drivers are required.

At this stage I am not sure what to suggest short of uninstalling the controller card driver and starting again in case there was some initial corruption. I did find this google groups thread which indicates that this should work

http://groups.google.co.uk/group/al...n&lnk=st&q=esata+hub+sil3124#c6a00b6e08740dd8

I will have a further ponder.

Good Luck

 

Denise_M, as a postscript can you also go into your main Asus bios and have a look around to see if you can find anything which might relate to the controller card.

Good Luck

 

I agree . . . it's much more complicated that USB 2.0 hubs and the recorded directions at the site. You cleared up many or most of my questions, and I thank you for that. I'll open my case and remove the controller card and then remount it and I'll do the same with the adapter card. After a reboot, I'll set a restore point and then install the SiI 3726 firmware, followed by the update. Hopefully, this will work.

Thanks again, risk_reversal. I'll let you know what happens.

 

I just installed the SiI3726 firmware and update and connected the hub to the controller card, but the green led wasn't lit. I then connected the hub to the eSATA I port that's connected to the SATA 1 port on my mobo and, again, the green led wasn't lit.

When I went into BIOS, I saw nothing related to the controller card or the hub. I had no eSATA hdds turned on at the time.

You might agree with me that when I first received the hub, it was only partially working, that it was defective. It's now completely defective. If this isn't the case, then the hub isn't compatible with the components in my pc.

I've written an email to the manufacturer and was given an RMA number. I'll be mailing the hub back to them after the weekend. They also asked me to include a written explanation regarding the manner in which I connected the hub so that they can duplicate it, as closely as possible.

Thanks again, risk_reversal. I'll let you know the outcome.

 

I wanted to see if there were any differences in Device Manager after I installed the SiI3726 firmware and update. It seems to have changed drastically.

The only changes that I made today were:

1. I installed SiI3726 Firmware and Update
2. I uninstalled Retropect (the backup software for my Maxtor One Touch II's).

 

I received a new hub and I'm going to be connecting it to my adapter card (multiplier) tomorrow. The instructions at the SiI site state:

How do I do this? :confused

 

I have a lot of questions and I hope someone has the answers.


I found this in the on-line manual.

http://www.siliconimage.com/docs/SiI-DS-0121-C1.pdf

I attached 2 screenshots. The first one contains directions for installation of the HUB. The second one is a block diagram of the HUB.

The block diagram shows a buffer between the hub and the port on my controller card. What should I use as the buffer?

What also confuses me is located on the installation screenshot. It mentions code transfer from the EEPROM (I2C). Is this something that happens internally with the HUB or something that I have to do?

My last question might be the simplest. Could it be that since I have the insides of the HUB already inside a HUB, that most of these questions/problems/installations aren't needed?

If anyone can give me the slightest bit of information, I'd really appreciate it. It doesn't seem like plug&play to me, or I might be reading more into it than there actually is.

 

I tried to install the 3726 firmware. The readme says:

How can I install the firmware from a DOS prompt?

After I connected the HUB to a SATA II port on the controller card and connected a SATA II ext hdd to the HUB and turned on the SATA ext hdd, I rebooted. I received no message that my computer had found new hardware. I had it search for new hardware but it found none. The SATA II ext hdd was not recognized by My Computer.