New Mobo not recognizing SATA hard drive?

Hello again, enlightened ones,

I have decided to build a computer for my sons room, so he can play his Cars games on it and not take up precious time on my computer...that's for ME to play on!

Anyway, I bought an Asus K8V-SE Deluxe Socket 754 motherboard to go with an Athlon 64 3300+ cpu I had laying around looking for a home. I purchased everything off of Ebay, except for the cpu which was purchased from Tigerdirect. I installed everything just like I did when I built my personal computer and fired it up. It starts to boot up, then says that no HDD is found. I have a Seagate SATA 300gb drive installed, and have even tried another drive with no luck. I didn't get a drivers utility cd with the mobo, but can download them from the Asus site (only problem is I don't have a floppy on my computer, and cd didn't seem to work). I am still rather new at this, and don't want to poke around too much in the BIOS in fear of trashing something! I also don't know about RAID settings, so if you could fill me in on that, it might be helpful in finding the cause (I have an Asus cd/dvd drive that is SATA, and another dvd burner that is IDE....the SATA drive doesn't seem to be recognized in the BIOS either).

You guys are usually my first stop when something goes wrong...you haven't let me down yet! Thanks for any help. If you need any other info, just let me know! Thanks again!

 

Was the other drive you tried with this new build also a SATA drive? If so, two possible (but fixable) problems occur to me. What sort of cables (and how many) are plugged into the SATA drive? On most SATA drives (just as with IDE drives) there are two cables -- a data cable (with a narrower plug) and a power cable (with a bit wider plug than the data cable). But SATA hard drives, I think, typically come with only the data cable included in the box. You'll have to find an unused power cable from the power supply to plug into the SATA drive to power it up. If your power supply doesn't have any SATA power connectors there are adapters, I believe, that will allow you to mate the old 4 pin power connectors (like you'd plug into an IDE drive) with your SATA drive.

If you have connected the SATA drive with both a power and a data cable, then the likely problem is in your motherboard BIOS. You'll have to find the setting(s) in the BIOS that must be turned on in order to activate the motherboard's SATA features. You did check that this motherboard supports SATA drives before you purchased it, didn't you? Given that, I think, socket 754 processors are getting a bit long in tooth (and no longer in production are they?) I wonder if your motherboard does provide SATA support? Double check that if you're not certain.

But if it does support SATA, make sure you've hooked it up with both data and power cables and then you'll have to find and turn on the SATA features in the BIOS. I believe in my Gigabyte motherboard there were two different SATA options I had to turn on to get my SATA drive working.

As far as RAID goes, if you only have one drive or you have two drives, but don't intend to use them in a RAID configuration you probably don't need to fiddle around with any of the RAID stuff. In any case, even if you wish to use RAID eventually, I'd leave it turned off for now until you figure out how to get the SATA drive (or drives) working first. Then if you want to implement a RAID setup you may need to install the RAID drivers first and then turn on and configure the RAID layout you want by adding drives to the array, etc.

As far as your motherboard drivers, I guess you may be able to run the installs for those directly off your hard drive. A floppy drive wouldn't help with that as all the motherboard drivers almost certainly would require a heckuva lot of floppies. CD's are good though, if you can use your own computer to download all the motherboard drivers and are able to burn them to a CD. If not, as mentioned before, you could create a special folder (name it "Motherboard drivers" or better yet "DriversForAsusK8V SE Deluxe") and once you get far enough along in the install that Windows is prompting you for the motherboard drivers, point it to that folder. But check for the installation instructions for your particular motherboard on the ASUS website. Some of the software may have to be installed by running the downloaded executable (e.g. utilities to monitor cpu and motherboard temperatures and voltages) while you'll just have to "point" Windows to the location of some files when the "New hardware" wizard kicks in.

Good luck and let us know how you're coming along.

 

Of course, you'll have to download the drivers for the ASUS motherboard hardware, and any useful utility programs to your other computer and then transfer them to ASUS system in some fashion. A USB flash drive would be handy for this purpose, especially if you have difficulty burning CDs. Do you have a USB flash drive? You wouldn't need a large capacity one. Probably even a 512 MB flash drive would suffice and, if you don't already have one, would only set you back, maybe, $12 to $15 -- $20 at most. On the other hand, for just a bit more you can probably find 1 or even 2 gigabyte flash drives.

I forgot to address your concerns about messing something up in the BIOS. While it may be that simply being sure to hook up both power and data cables to the drive will get it working, the SATA hard drive support will probably have to be turned on in the BIOS also. Before you start tinkering with any BIOS settings you should find and read the instructions for resetting the CMOS/BIOS in the manual for the ASUS motherboard in this new computer you've built for your son. Make sure you read the manual for that particular motherboard. The CMOS/BIOS reset procedure is pretty similar among many motherboards but there can be small, but crucial differences.

Because it's possible to make your computer unbootable with incorrect BIOS settings, motherboards are designed to allow the user to reset the BIOS to conservative "fail safe" settings via a "jumper" (or switch). These settings won't get the most performance out of the system, but should at least allow it to boot up, assuming the hardware is OK.

This procedure is usually called "resetting the CMOS." The CMOS chip is the chip that contains the BIOS data and BIOS programming that the system needs to begin booting up. In addition to the BIOS, the CMOS chip also contains the hardware clock and calendar which Windows accesses to get the correct date and time once the OS begins running. Because of this, once you reset the CMOS usually the first thing you do upon booting up after the reset is to go into the BIOS and set the correct date and time as resetting the CMOS also reverts the hardware clock and calendar to some specific time and date.

The CMOS is powered by a small, round flat battery inserted into a socket on the motherboard (or sometimes, in older/cheaper motherboards just attached to the motherboard with solder and wire). This battery is rechargeable and can typically hold a charge for many months before it goes dead. When the system is turned on it recharges. It's this battery that preserves your BIOS settings and data in the CMOS chip and also powers the hardware clock and calendar.

So read your motherboard CMOS reset instructions and look at your motherboard diagram and use it to identify the location of the CMOS battery and of the CMOS jumper. Also note how long you have to leave the jumper in the reset position before you restore it to it's "normal" position. And check to see if your motherboard manual says you need to remove the CMOS battery also. Many CMOS/motherboards do require the removal of the battery in order to reset the CMOS, but some only require that you change the position of the CMOS jumper and then change it back after the specified time (typically from 5 or 10 seconds to a few minutes, but it can be longer, sometimes even much longer, though with modern motherboards I think such longer times are rare).

If you read and understand the CMOS/BIOS reset procedure and have identified the location of the CMOS battery and CMOS reset jumper and assuming you are aware of the need to ground yourself to prevent static electricity discharge before touching anything inside the case (or plugging or unplugging anything into the computer also) then you should have confidence that if you alter some BIOS setting that makes the system unbootable you should be able to reset the CMOS and make your system bootable once again.

Good luck and let us know if you need additional help and how you're coming along.

 

also if the drive is sata2 and onboard is sata1 it may have issues. Some drives have a jumper to limit transfer rate to sata 1.5 some do this internally but it doesnt hurt to check

 

OK....Eezak,

I do have both cables hooked up (power supply, and data cable) and I'm pretty sure that the motherboard supports SATA since it has 4 SATA outlets on it...of course, I'm only assuming that, and we both know what that gets us!

I'm not really sure where to "turn on SATA features in BIOS". I have poked around in there alot, and don't really remember anything about SATA in there at all.

I do have the drivers downloaded and burned onto cd, but the system doesn't seem to be booting enough even to let the cd drive kick in! One time I got Windows to start loading, and then it froze a little bit into it and hasn't worked since.

ibbonkers,
I'm not sure if the drive is SATA II or SATA I....I'll have to check on that, but I think that it is SATA I, because it is older than the one in my computer, and that one is SATA II. I'll check to be sure, and may even try the jumper route just to see if it works that way!

 

Alright, I did some things that were suggested.....

I checked the BIOS, and SATA is enabled in BIOS!

As far as the hard drive goes, it is SATA I.

I rebooted after making sure that the BIOS was set to SATA, and got the following message (like a hundred times before!!!)...

No hard drive found.....F1 to continue

Reboot and Select proper Boot Device or Insert Boot Media in selected boot device and press a key

I do what it says, assuming this means a Windows disc in the cd drive, and nothing (I even tried the usb flash drive with the AFUDOS.exe BIOS update).....it just keeps repeating the same message over and over again! UGGH!

 

And you have hooked up both power and data cables to the drive and checked that they're fully seated? Could have a defective cable, so if you have any extras try substituting.

And note in my earlier post I mentioned that in my Gigabyte motherboard BIOS I had to turn on the SATA feature in two different places. I wasn't turning on exactly the same thing, but it was like I had to turn on SATA and then, in a different part of the BIOS I had to turn on the particular SATA channel I wanted to use. And, to make it even more confusing, in the BIOS all my drive controllers were labelled as IDE, including the SATA controllers, even though they were clearly labeled as SATA connections on the motherboard itself. I think I figured out I had to just ignore the IDE labels in my BIOS and just note the controller number/channel I plugged my SATA data cable into and make sure that number controller was turned on in the BIOS.

It could be there's some similar foul up in your BIOS, though you'd hope that SATA drives are common enough by now (I bought the Gigabyte motherboard I'm talking about 15 months ago) that they'd be labeling SATA settings correctly in motherboard BIOSes by now.

 

Are you installing XP? It will not recognize a drive over 180Gb and you have to enter the driver for the SATA drive while doing the install of windows. I believe it prompts you to press F3 for install of a third party driver. If you have Vista there should be no problem

Geek on

 

Copasta, Which version of Windows are you installing? I'm not sure that's an important issue, but it would be good to know. Unless it's something earlier than XP with Service Pack 2, I don't think it's got anything to do with your problems. But Huntilla's correct that you may need to install SATA drivers, but it should prompt you just as Huntilla wrote above.

I understand you're getting that message "No hard drive found" but that may only indicate that the BIOS sees no hard drive it can boot from -- which is correct of course, given there's no OS installed yet. And so it prompts you to insert bootable media.

So, let's check a couple of things. You'll have to poke around in the BIOS again...sorry!

Look at the first or maybe second BIOS menu selection on the First/Main BIOS screen and select the one that shows (or would show) the hard drives the BIOS detects as hooked up to the system (even if they don't have anything on them). In this sub-menu, if you see any drives listed, they should all be set to "Auto" or "Auto detect". This will allow the BIOS to examine the drive for itself and automatically make the correct BIOS settings to properly use it (it gets this info from chips embedded in the on drive controller). (Unfortunately however, it can't do this until the correct SATA settings are turned on.)

I know you're telling us the system isn't finding any drives. But as I wrote above, that message may just mean no bootable drives. So look in the BIOS, usually it's the first or second menu selection starting at the top left of the BIOS menus (can't remember what it's called right now), highlight it and press <Enter> and see if any hard drives are listed there and, if so, make sure they're set to "Auto" or "Auto detect".

What about your CD (or DVD) drive? Do you see it listed on any of those BIOS screens?

If neither your hard drive nor your CD/DVD drive is showing up on any of the BIOS sub-menus then I think there may be another setting, in addition to what's already turned on, that you have to find and turn on in the BIOS so your hard drive and your CD/DVD drive can be seen and accessed by the BIOS.

If by chance you do see your hard drive listed in that 1st or 2nd BIOS sub-menu then there are several other things to check. Find the section of the BIOS that let's you change the boot device order. This is where you tell the BIOS which devices you want it to attempt to boot from and in which order it should try them. Because you need to install Windows, I guess (or even some other OS from a CD or DVD), you should designate your CD/DVD drive as the first boot device. You can put your hard drive second, and floppy last or vice versa. The main thing is to have your CD drive listed as first in the boot order until you get far enough long in the Windows installation routine that it begins to reboot so it can begin running from the hard drive. At that point, when it reboots it may prompt you to be sure that the boot order in the BIOS has the hard drive listed first. So when you reboot at that point, enter the BIOS yet again and change the boot order so the hard drive is once again designated as the first device to attempt to boot from.

Some BIOSes display a message (on the same screen where it tells you to press <Delete> or whatever to enter setup/the BIOS) about accessing a special menu allowing you to choose which device you wish to boot from if you don't want the BIOS to follow the boot sequence saved in the BIOS. If this motherboard happens to have this feature then you don't have to fiddle around with changing the boot device order in the BIOS, just look for the instruction and hit the proper key. On my Gigabyte motherboard system, for example, it says, right on the same line I see the "Press <Delete> to enter setup/BIOS" message, "Press F12 to select a boot device" (or similar words). Look for something like that and you won't have to fiddle with changing the boot device order in the BIOS and then have to change it back later. Just press F12 (or whatever the instruction says) and select "CD or DVD drive" or something similar and then press <Enter>. Not all motherboards have such a feature however, and the older the design is the less likely you'll see this option at bootup. In that case just change the boot device order in the BIOS and change it back (to hard drive as the first boot device) later when you need to in order to complete installing Windows.

One more question...are you by chance using a USB keyboard with this newly configured/built computer? If so, I urge you to disconnect it and hook up a PS/2 keyboard instead. Borrow one if you have to, just until you get Windows installed and then you can return it. USB keyboards are often "iffy" to use for Windows XP (not to mention earlier versions of Windows) installs, but usually OK to use once you've finished installing Windows.

But if the BIOS is recognizing your key press that allows you to enter the BIOS and you're able to make changes to the BIOS settings, I guess your keyboard must be working fine. Still, I prefer to use a PS/2 keyboard for Win XP installs as I know from experience they can cause problems during a Win XP installation. (My own keyboard for this Win XP system I'm using is a USB, but when I first built it and was installing Win XP I used my old PS/2 keyboard and then swapped it out for my USB keyboard once I had Windows installed.)

A PS/2 keyboard has a small round connector that plugs into a special round jack on the rear of the computer, instead of the flat USB type. You'll probably see two such round jacks on the back of your computer. One is for a PS/2 mouse and the other for a PS/2 keyboard. I think they use a standard color code and the keyboard jack will be purple while the PS/2 mouse jack will be green.

Let me know if any of these suggestions allow you to make any progress at all. I know this is very frustrating (I've been there many times and so have most of us here). Work carefully, look over all the BIOS sub-menus to make sure you haven't overlooked anything that might keep your drive controllers on the motherboard turned off.

And yes, I think it's a fair presumption that since your motherboard has SATA jacks on it, it surely supports SATA drives! But then again....

Do you have a manual for this motherboard and have you read it carefully to see what the instructions are for connecting SATA hard drives to it and making sure the BIOS recognizes your hard drive and your CD/DVD drive? I know, I know, motherboard manuals are still often the worst written manuals for any part of the computer, but hey, it's only the motherboard!

And by the way, did you purchase the motherboard from eBay? -- "everything but the CPU" I believe you wrote somewhere above. Is the motherboard new or used? And did you check the seller's rating before you bid or bought the item outright?

I'll try to download your motherboard manual and take a look at it to see if I can find any helpful clues about what we're overlooking, but I likely won't have time to do that before this weekend.

 

OK, I don't have much time because I have to leave for work, but I'll try to answer some questions quickly before I go.

First of all, I have tried BOTH Windows XP Professional, and Windows Vista Ultimate on the install, and same result from both...basically not even reading enough to get to boot sequence, or something.

I am using a PS/2 Keyboard.

In BIOS, my hard drive is NOT listed in the boot sequence, nor is my dvd-rom drive, which is also SATA, which leads me to believe it is an SATA problem. My DVD-RW drive IS listed, as it is installed using an IDE cable, and even though it is set to auto detect, it still won't boot the OS. (Seems like it doesn't even spin-up, if you know what I mean...lights are on on BOTH drives when disk is installed, but no boot-up!).

I do have the manual downloaded from the Asus site and installed on my personal computer, so I do have access to that. I have read over the section on enabling SATA, but may have missed something somewhere else (I was pretty frustrated last night with it!). I will try again tonight, or this weekend when I have more time!

The board was purchased on Ebay, and the seller had good feedback and whatnot. He has been trying to help me along as well, but our communication is through email is often time-consuming and hit or miss! I thought you guys would be a better bet, since several people could diagnose at the same time!

I thank you guys for all the help, and look forward to more suggestions soon. Right now, I have to get to work....UGGHH, AGAIN! But it is Friday! Talk to you soon!

 

I GIVE UP! I've tried EVERYTHING with this GD thing, and NOTHING WORKS! I will NEVER buy another ASUS part again! The reason I bought this was the fact that Asus was rated as one of the best....yeah, RIGHT! I installed an Abit board in my computer....NOT ONE PROBLEM! I'm going to take this thing out of the case so I can STOMP IT INTO OBLIVION!!!!!!! Maybe then, at least I'll have some satisfaction!

 

Ok...now that I've slept and calmed down some...I can breathe a little better now.

I found a floppy drive in an old computer, and was able to actually download the newest BIOS to the floppy disk and flash it into the other computer. It didn't go exactly like the manual stated it would, but it did say that the update was successful!

Upon rebooting, it now shows the hard drive in the BIOS, which I set to be the first bootable drive. When I rebooted, it went into the same page, asking to Reboot and Select Proper Boot device...etc....I try that and it just keeps repeating over and over again!


I guess I'm back to square one, except the fact that now the hard drive is actually showing up. Any suggestions from here?

Thanks for being patient with someone who is so obviously, what I like to call, computerally challenged!

 

That bit about the Abit motherboard... When I first saw that I thought you meant you had pulled the ASUS board and substituted an Abit and then the drive was recognized and accessible for the OS install. And I thought for a few minutes you had successfully completed the OS installation and because the ASUS board was apparently defective (according to my reading of your post) you were going to stomp the ASUS board into oblivion. But upon re-reading, and after reading your following/last post, I guessed what you meant was that when you built your own computer, the one that you're using to access the web and post to this thread I guess, you used an Abit and everything went fine?

Assuming I've understood correctly what you've done, can you tell us in more detail what happened when you flashed the ASUS BIOS? How was the procedure different from how the manual said it should be? But that question may be moot and everything is quite possibly OK if your DVD-R/W drive is also showing up in the BIOS. Is it?

If so, then you should designate your DVD drive as the boot drive, put in your Windows install CD/DVD and cross your fingers, reboot and see if the installation routine begins.

Or did I miss something and have you already completed the installation of Windows but now find you're unable to boot to that drive? If you haven't yet installed Windows then I think what's happening is the computer is attempting to boot from your (empty) hard drive, finding it can't and is saying, "Select some other device that is bootable." And, at this point, that other device should be your DVD drive with the bootable
Windows installation CD/DVD.

I hope I'm correct, because then you're not "back to square one" but may almost be rounding third and heading for home! (Mixed my metaphors, I'm afraid, but that's a problem for a site called "Major Metaphors". )

 

Alright....you understood correctly! I was blowing off some steam last night, and when I had a chance to take a breath and look at this again this morning, is when I got the updated BIOS.

However, the rest is not so easy! I went back into the BIOS to check some things over, and this is exactly what is listed in there...

Under the Main BIOS column is:

Primary IDE : DVD-RW Drive
Secondary IDE : Not Detected
Third IDE : Not Detected

Under the BOOT BIOS column is:

1st Boot Device: HDD
2nd Boot Device: DVD-RW
3rd Boot Device: Floppy Drive

Thinking this was the problem, I quickly changed the first boot device to my Dvd-rw drive, but for some reason it wouldn't let me list my Hard Drive as second, so Floppy went next, and then Hard Drive 3rd!

I booted it back up and guess what!!!!!!!!!!!???????????

Nothing.....same result...! "Reboot and Select proper Boot Device....etc.

I feel like I'm so close to getting it right, but something is preventing it....can't figure it out!

 

OK.....here's a DUH! moment! Get this....

I have a copy of Microsoft Windows XP Professional Corporate Edition....I can install it on as many computers as I want...I think legally....anyway, I made a copy of that in case the original disk quit working, and the COPY is the one I was trying to install! Guess what...I tried the original, and Windows is loading as I type this! DDDUUUHHHHH! I guess the copy never copied correctly, or something!

Whoops....just failed! Hard drive NOT DETECTED! AAARRRRRRRRRRRHHHHHHHHHHH!:cry

I'll have to get back to you....

 

Yep, I think you're getting close, assuming you're not dealing with a piece of defective hardware (which, to be fair, happens now and then even with stuff bought from the most reliable companies).

The list in the Boot Bios/Boot order menu doesn't mean the stuff in the list has actually been detected as present in the system. It's just a comprehensive list of potential boot devices that might be connected to the motherboard. You have to be sure any devices you wish to boot from are properly connected/detected and then you can designate the boot order in that "master" list.

It appears that your DVD drive is working fine now, as the Windows install began to run but then failed due to the hard drive still not being detected. Lets see...there's no jumper needed on the SATA drive, I think, is there? I.e. SATA drives don't need to be designated as either master or slave or cable select, because each SATA cable can only connect a single drive, rather than having possibly two connections as IDE cables generally do. Still, check over both the installation instructions that came with the drive and your motherboard manual instructions for any info regarding SATA drive jumpers to be sure that isn't a problem. You're not using any sort of adapter with the SATA drives or cable are you? Not actually plugging your SATA drive in with an IDE cable and a SATA data cable adapter of some sort, for example?

I'm also remembering that in my Gigabyte motherboard BIOS my SATA channels/controllers on the motherboard were present in a BIOS list of IDE channels on the motherboard and could be set to either "disabled" or "enabled" in that menu. Why SATA channels/controllers would be labeled as IDE I have no idea, but they are in my Gigabyte BIOS in that one sub-menu.

Anyway, look through your BIOS and see if you have something similar showing a list of IDE channels (drive controllers/controller plugs on the motherboard) and see how many are listed and if there's anything to indicate that some of them are actually SATA channels. If so, make sure they're "Enabled" or otherwise turned on in the BIOS.

If you find such a list in the BIOS but aren't sure if any of the channels are SATA then see how many such channels are listed (they should be numbered in sequence) and ask yourself if the total is in excess of the number of IDE channels the motherboard is supposed to have (typically 4, I think -- 2 each on two IDE controllers). If so, then the excess are probably actually SATA (this is the case on my Gigabyte motherboard, so I'm reaching here). If this appears to be the case, (or even if it's not) try plugging the hard drive SATA data cable into one of the other SATA connectors on the motherboard to see if that makes any difference.

Does your manual (or maybe a supplementary sheet of instructions that came with the motherboard) say anything about having to install drivers in order to get the motherboard's SATA features working? If you see something like this for SATA RAID I wouldn't worry about that, but what about just the basic SATA features? Did the collection of drivers you burned to CD/DVD for this motherboard include any SATA controller drivers or software (excluding SATA RAID)?

 

Eezak,
I'm off to church now, but will post quickly. I searched the Asus website last night, and found that there are SATA drivers to download. I tried the route of loading them on cd again, but should have known better! It didn't work! Since it was late, I gave up.

Today, I will go the route of installing the floppy drive once again, and loading the SATA drivers on them. I don't quite know how to get them to load in the computer, whether it will just recognize the floppy drive on bootup (which it does!) and just start loading them, or ask for a DOS command, or whatever....I'm not sure what command to put in if it does, but I will search the manual once again to see if it outlines it.

I'll let you know how things go! I think I am actually rounding third and coming home! I just hope I don't get thrown out at the plate...or thrown out with the bathwater, since you like to mix metaphors!

 

I'm looking at your motherboard manual (pdf download from ASUS). Notice in section 4.2.1 ("BIOS Menu Screen") at the bottom left of the picture of the BIOS Menu Screen, there are sub-menus listed for "Third IDE Master" and "Fourth IDE Master", as well as for "IDE Configuration".

This looks very similar to me to my Gigabyte motherboard's confusing "SATA listed as IDE" channels I referred to in an earlier post.

I think those Third and Fourth IDE Masters may be the SATA controllers on your motherboard. Click on each one in turn and make sure they are enabled. Once you get the SATA drive recognized you should be able to turn off whichever of these "Masters" aren't in use. (You may find that the SATA plugs on the motherboard have either a 3 or 4 labeling them, but sometimes those mobo lables aren't right next to the item they designate, so it can be confusing). But for now, I'd turn them both on.

I'm not sure what that last sub-menu, "IDE Configuration" contains. But take a look at it and if you see anything referencing SATA or the Third and Fourth IDE Masters, make certain they are turned on, enabled or whatever.

In addition, I think there's one other clearly labeled SATA option in the BIOS to be turned on, but I think you probably already found that.

I didn't see anything in the manual about needing to install SATA drivers separately, but may have missed it or there may be a separate instruction sheet that was included in the mobo box about that.

But let me know if those Third and Fourth IDE Master sub-menus had anything turned off in them and if turning them on finally let your hard drive be recognized. As I said, those particular sub-menus look very similar to what I had to turn on in my Gigabyte BIOS to allow my SATA drive to be recognized (in addition to the clearly labeled SATA function I had to turn on somewhere else in the BIOS).

Sorry, no more time right now (and nothing more to suggest at the moment). Will try to check back this afternoon and see if you've made any progress.

Rounding home, heading for square one and the bathwater...to mix all the metaphors!

 

Re: SATA drivers Note this thread I found here at MG:

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=77083

Once you finally get your hard drive recognized, watch for the message from the Windows installer asking if you wish to install other drivers (and prompting you to press F6) -- I think this message may not appear up in the center of the screen. Instead it may be down at the very bottom. Then, once the installer prompts you, you would insert the floppy disk that you copied the SATA drivers to.

I hope you're making some progress and are almost at home plate.

 

Haven't had any luck so far.....installing Windows still gets to the "Press enter to install Windows", then says "No Hard Drive Detected on Computer".

I haven't tried your suggestion from the other thread yet....just saw that this morning. I will try that when I get home, although I don't know if that will work either. It's like the hard drive is showing up in the POST and everything now, except when you want to load Windows! I just don't get it. I'll try again tonight.....losing hope fast!

 

Did you look at the sub-menus for those "Third/Fourth IDE Masters" to see if they're enabled in the BIOS? Apparently they are, I guess, or you wouldn't be seeing the hard drive showing up after the POST runs. What about that "IDE Configuration" sub-menu? Was there anything in there that looked like it might need to be turned on or set differently?

I don't suppose you have another SATA hard drive you could try using with this motherboard to help narrow down whether it's 1) a problem with the motherboard hardware (or BIOS) or 2) you actually have a defective drive? Or you could try removing, temporarily, the hard drive from your computer and put this new SATA drive in your machine (I'm hoping you've been using a SATA drive in that computer also, so you'll have every reason to expect a SATA drive should be recognized immediately and the install should go smoothly unless there's something wrong with the drive itself)?

You don't need to actually remove your current boot drive from your machine. Just disconnect the power and data cables from the drive and, after installing the new SATA drive from your son's computer, plug the cables into it and attempt to install Windows on that setup and see what happens.

I know that's some more work and hassle, but it should help to pinpoint whether the problem is the drive itself (it could have some defect) or whether there's a problem with the motherboard (or a BIOS setting on the motherboard, though that's starting to seem less likely).

 

Hope you have some luck at last! Did you check those "Third/Fourth IDE Master" sub-menus I mentioned to be sure those are enabled? What about that "IDE Configuration" sub-menu? What sort of setting(s) did you find in that sub-menu?

If nothing in my last few posts gets your install rolling, and you're not entirely out of patience, it may be time to try a different approach and try to rule stuff out via some troubleshooting....

Does your computer also have a SATA drive in it? If so, you could shut it down and remove the power and data cable from that SATA drive. Install the new SATA drive from your son's machine and hook up the same cables that were plugged into your working SATA drive on that machine. Then, using the same Windows install disk, attempt to install Windows to the new SATA drive hooked up in your machine.

If the install begins without a hitch that will at least tell us that the drive itself isn't apparently the problem.

That will still leave us with multiple suspects: a defect on the motherboard itself, a problem with the BIOS (faulty update, wrong BIOS), or a defective SATA cable (can happen even with a new cable). But at least you'd know the drive itself was OK.

 

Eezak,
Wow....it's hard to keep up! Let me see here....ok...

First of all, looked at the third and fourth IDE masters, and they were set to auto....reset them to auto just to be sure.....they still say not detected in the list, though. As for the IDE Configuration menu in the BIOS, I'm not seeing that anywhere in my BIOS. I've searched everywhere!

As for the hard drive, yes......yesterday I tried the switch to my computer and installation of Windows that way. It started to load up, and then said that "A copy of Windows is already loaded on this drive" (something like that?) and wouldn't let me load any further. That's when I remembered that when MY hard drive went bad (after 6 months!), I used THIS ONE from my sons computer (before I built it) as a substitute while waiting for Seagate to send me a new one. It worked fine the entire time, though I thought that I had formatted it when I switched back, because I wanted to start out with XP Pro instead of Vista Ultimate in my sons. Anyway, justs to be sure about the drive, I ran the Seagate SeaTools diagnostic on it....passed every test with flying colors! I don't know why it wouldn't let me load Windows on it....I wonder if there is still something from Vista Ultimate on there that won't let me revert back to XP Pro?

Lastly, I did (very quickly and hastily) try the install this morning with the F6 command, and it was like the F6 button didn't work....just kept booting right passed it and went into loading Windows files, which as we know, eventually ends up with NO DRIVE FOUND....REBOOT! I'll try again now that I have a little more time and patience.

Hope this helps out somewhat....I feel like I'm losing momentum again....kind of discouraging, if you know what I mean. It HAS to be something with those SATA drivers! It HAS to be!

 

No luck so far.....I looked at this site that had some pretty interesting things with alot of people having my same problem, or close to it, but I'm not technologically advanced enough to know what they are talking about! Maybe you could take a look.....

http://www.tkarena.com/forums/asus-arena/27545-k8v-se-deluxe-bios-via-sata-problems.html

It looks like reverting back to an older BIOS version might work, but I can't seem to figure out how to do that correctly, and I'm afraid I'm going to really screw something up!

 

Let's backup a bit. What other settings/options, if any, were there for those Third and Fourth IDE Masters (which I'm convinced refer to your SATA controllers on the mobo)? Only "Auto" and "Disabled/Off" or were there any other choices?

That "IDE Configuration" sub-menu item, according to the picture of the Main BIOS page in your motherboard manual, should have been right underneath the "Fourth IDE Master" sub-menu item. But apparently it isn't there nor anywhere else in view? It could be an unimportant feature that was dropped from later BIOSes, but I wish we knew what it was for.

When you found, by installing the SATA drive, in your computer that there was already a Windows installation on it, did you repartition/reformat it so it would be clean for a new installation?

I looked at the link you provided and that appears to be a possible explanation -- something about later versions of the BIOS causing a conflict between two different drive controllers. It's late and I'll have to wait until tomorrow to delve into the details and get clear how we should proceed to troubleshoot that potential cause of your woes. But in the meantime, go into the BIOS and see what version you have currently (you did upgrade the BIOS from an older to a newer version didn't you say?) Whatever version you have should display on the first or second screen that appears at power up, or if you enter the BIOS you should be able to find it there. We're interested in the ASUS BIOS version, not the Phoenix or Award BIOS number. If the BIOS version number is higher than 1005 the problem discussed in that last link you provided may be the issue to be resolved. But I need to read that page over more carefully as I'm not clear on a couple of things and it's too late tonight, I'm afraid. If it is the problem, never fear -- moving back to an earlier version of your BIOS is just like updating to a newer version. You download the older version and flash it to the BIOS in the same way you did the upgrade to a newer version. But I suggest you hold off on that until I get a chance to read that link over more carefully. And anyway, it may be possible (and easier) to just turn off one of the conflicting controllers in the BIOS if that's really the problem.

In the meantime, please provide the answers for the questions in the first half of this post.

 

Ok....quickly here before I leave for work, I'll try to get you some answers!

This is what comes up on the two different screens while booting up:

VIA VT8237 Series SATA RAID BIOS Setting Utility V4.80

SATA378 TX2plus BIOS Version 1.00.0.33

But I think this is what you might be looking for, listed in the actual BIOS:

AMI BIOS Ver. 08.00.09
Build Date: 09/08/05
ID: A0058002

Hope this helps....

Also, in the BIOS for the IDE's, here is what is listed on the MAIN page:

Primary IDE - Master Not Detected
Primary IDE - Slave DVD-RW Drive
Secondary IDE - Master Not Detected
Secondary IDE - Slave Not Detected

(Didn't know if I listed that before or not, so I thought I'd list it again just to be sure!) Most of the settings in the BIOS seem to be Auto, Enable, or Disable.

P.S. I ran the "Quick Format" while trying to install Windows on MY computer.

 

The BIOS number I was hoping you'd find should be in the range of 1001 to 1008.004

But the info you posted is helpful. Note this info from the page link at the ASUS forums you previously posted:

"The 1005 BIOS for the K8V Deluxe SE ( rev 12/22/2004) is the last of the BIOS's that does not cause any issues if both the VT8237 Controller and the Promise-378 Controller are both used at the same time--

After that BIOS version ---Starting in March/April 2005 is when the un-fixed BIOS "bug" is introduced that causes the VIA BootROM to be blocked out completely ----> if SATA's (either as standalone, JBOD or in a RAID Array are connected to both the VIA VT8237 Controller and the Promise-378 Controller simultaneously. Again this "bug" only manifests itself or rears it's ugly head if you use both controllers at the same time. Apparently, the vast majority of end users use either the VT8237 Controller or the Promise-378 Controller but not both at the same time."

Looking at your mobo manual I see that both the VIA and the Promise controllers are SATA RAID controllers. Look at your motherboard diagram. You'll see that you have two different sets of 2 SATA connectors:

1) Just to the right of the VIA VT8237 controller/chip are two SATA connectors labeled "SATA2" and "SATA1"

2) Down and just to the right of the CMOS battery is the other SATA controller/chip, the Promise 20378. And just to the right of it are SATA connectors labeled "Sec(ondary)_SATA" and "Pri(mary)_SATA".

I think, since you decided to update your mobo BIOS early on in this process, it's almost certain you likely now have a BIOS version that has the potential to experience the "dueling SATA controllers" problem. (Deciding to update the BIOS to attempt to solve your problem and get your SATA drive recognized wasn't an unreasonable thing to try, but it turned out that newer BIOSes for this particular mobo have a bug that earlier versions didn't have.)

But the description, on that ASUS forum webpage, of this potential conflict/problem between the two SATA controllers on your mobo makes it sound as though this conflict only occurs if SATA drives are actually plugged into both controllers' motherboard connectors. But you're only using a single SATA drive aren't you? And you're not using any old IDE hard drives are you? -- the one's that use the wide, flat, gray data cables? I imagine your DVD drive has that sort of cable and it's apparently plugged into an IDE controller and that's fine. Though if by chance you're using a SATA DVD drive, please let me know as that could be a problem with this motherboard. (Actually, SATA CD/DVD drives shouldn't work at all with this mobo according to the manual.) So I want to be certain you're only trying to hook up a single hard drive, the SATA one, and a single IDE (not SATA) DVD drive, for now at least.

Note that, as if things aren't confusing enough, there is another VIA chip on your mobo -- the one labeled K8T800 on your mobo diagram. That's for something else entirely, so don't worry about that.

Looking at your initial boot screens and BIOS again, do you see any BIOS version numbers in the range of 1001 through 1008.004?

And it might be a good idea if you can get confirmation from ASUS (maybe by way of posting the question in the ASUS forums) that this potential conflict between the two SATA controllers can't occur if they're both merely turned on in the BIOS -- that it can only happen if at least one SATA drive is actually plugged into a connector for each SATA controller. It may take a day or two for you to get a response if you post this question in the ASUS forums though. If you don't have the patience for that, you may, of course, try contacting ASUS support through (I was going to type "via" instead of "through" but didn't want to risk have it misinterpreted as "VIA", the SATA chip manufacturer -- so many land mines to avoid! rolleyes) an 800 number for telephone support (I guess they have one of those on their website don't they?) But that takes patience also and the quality of telephone support from any computer related company is often not very good, and/or too often support personnel don't speak or understand English very well.

In the meantime, or if you just don't want to bother with trying to contact customer support, I think it would be fine to try one set of SATA connectors and then the other. And try each individual connector in each set of two, before switching to the other controller's connectors. If you try this, be sure that the SATA controller you're plugging into is turned ON/ENABLED in the BIOS and the other SATA controller is turned OFF/DISABLED, if possible (i.e. you can find somewhere in the BIOS to turn the brand name specific chips on/off -- that is, the VIA and the Promise SATA controllers -- but that may not be possible).

 

The BIOS number I was hoping you'd find should be in the range of 1001 to 1008.004

But the info you posted is helpful. Note this info from the page link at the ASUS forums you previously posted:

"The 1005 BIOS for the K8V Deluxe SE ( rev 12/22/2004) is the last of the BIOS's that does not cause any issues if both the VT8237 Controller and the Promise-378 Controller are both used at the same time--

After that BIOS version ---Starting in March/April 2005 is when the un-fixed BIOS "bug" is introduced that causes the VIA BootROM to be blocked out completely ----> if SATA's (either as standalone, JBOD or in a RAID Array are connected to both the VIA VT8237 Controller and the Promise-378 Controller simultaneously. Again this "bug" only manifests itself or rears it's ugly head if you use both controllers at the same time. Apparently, the vast majority of end users use either the VT8237 Controller or the Promise-378 Controller but not both at the same time."

Looking at your mobo manual I see that both the VIA and the Promise controllers are SATA RAID controllers. Look at your motherboard diagram. You'll see that you have two different sets of 2 SATA connectors:

1) Just to the right of the VIA VT8237 controller/chip are two SATA connectors labeled "SATA2" and "SATA1"

2) Down and just to the right of the CMOS battery is the other SATA controller/chip, the Promise 20378. And just to the right of it are SATA connectors labeled "Sec(ondary)_SATA" and "Pri(mary)_SATA".

I think, since you decided to update your mobo BIOS early on in this process, it's almost certain you likely now have a BIOS version that has the potential to experience the "dueling SATA controllers" problem. (Deciding to update the BIOS to attempt to solve your problem and get your SATA drive recognized wasn't an unreasonable thing to try, but it turned out that newer BIOSes for this particular mobo have a bug that earlier versions didn't have.)

But the description, on that ASUS forum webpage, of this potential conflict/problem between the two SATA controllers on your mobo makes it sound as though this conflict only occurs if SATA drives are actually plugged into both controllers' motherboard connectors. But you're only using a single SATA drive aren't you? And you're not using any old IDE hard drives are you? -- the one's that use the wide, flat, gray data cables? I imagine your DVD drive has that sort of cable and it's apparently plugged into an IDE controller and that's fine. Though if by chance you're using a SATA DVD drive, please let me know as that could be a problem with this motherboard. (Actually, SATA CD/DVD drives shouldn't work at all with this mobo according to the manual.) So I want to be certain you're only trying to hook up a single hard drive, the SATA one, and a single IDE (not SATA) DVD drive, for now at least.

Note that, as if things aren't confusing enough, there is another VIA chip on your mobo -- the one labeled K8T800 on your mobo diagram. That's for something else entirely, so don't worry about that.

Looking at your initial boot screens and BIOS again, do you see any BIOS version numbers in the range of 1001 through 1008.004?

And it might be a good idea if you can get confirmation from ASUS (maybe by way of posting the question in the ASUS forums) that this potential conflict between the two SATA controllers can't occur if they're both merely turned on in the BIOS -- that it can only happen if at least one SATA drive is actually plugged into a connector for each SATA controller. It may take a day or two for you to get a response if you post this question in the ASUS forums though. If you don't have the patience for that, you may, of course, try contacting ASUS support through (I was going to type "via" instead of "through" but didn't want to risk have it misinterpreted as "VIA", the SATA chip manufacturer -- so many land mines to avoid! rolleyes) an 800 number for telephone support (I guess they have one of those on their website don't they?) But that takes patience also and the quality of telephone support from any computer related company is often not very good, and/or too often support personnel don't speak or understand English very well.

In the meantime, or if you just don't want to bother with trying to contact customer support, I think it would be fine to try one set of SATA connectors and then the other. And try each individual connector in each set of two, before switching to the other controller's connectors. If you try this, be sure that the SATA controller you're plugging into is turned ON/ENABLED in the BIOS and the other SATA controller is turned OFF/DISABLED, if possible (i.e. you can find somewhere in the BIOS to turn the brand name specific chips on/off -- that is, the VIA and the Promise SATA controllers -- but that may not be possible).

 

Attn: Board moderators

My two posts to this thread, immediately above, are duplicates. Please delete one of them. I'm not sure how this happened, but I was getting some sort of "page unreachable" error when I tried to post and thought this latest post to the thread hadn't made it through at all.

 

Quickly....just found what we were looking for! BIOS IS 1008 BETA 004!

Could be our problem, huh?

P.S. I DID have an SATA DVD-ROM drive connected in one of the other SATA ports!

 

Alright....I flashed the BIOS back to the 1005 version in hopes of solving our little problem, and started to reload Windows.....

...."Setup is loading files".....then it freezes up! I have no idea if the problem is fixed and moved on to another problem, or what, because now it's not even getting as far as it was before!

I'm getting ready to tell it......"Say hello to my leetle frend"!

BOOM!:wave

 

Yes, flashing back to the 1005 was probably the best way to proceed. Though, if I understood that ASUS forum post you linked to, it sounded as though that problem only occurred if you had hard drives (or maybe a hard drive and/or a SATA DVD drive?) plugged into both controllers.

I think the best way to proceed now is to make sure you only have one SATA drive plugged in and no other hard drives, whether SATA or the older IDE variety. And only one DVD drive and that should be an IDE drive, plugged into an IDE controller with one of those older type flat broad gray ribbon cables. But do not plug it into that IDE controller labeled "Pri_Raid". I recommend you make sure the jumper on that DVD drive is set to the "Master" position and plug it into the IDE connector labeled "Sec(ondary)_IDE", which is located along the very edge of the motherboard. Furthermore, make certain you plug in the connector that is on the end of the ribbon cable, not the one further down (if you were going to use that one you'd have to have the drive jumper on the DVD drive set to slave).

So, you should have one and one only hard drive, your SATA, plugged into one of the SATA controller chips' connectors on the mobo. And one and one only IDE DVD drive plugged into the Secondary IDE connector with a flat gray cable. And you should have the jumper on the DVD drive set to master and it should be connected to the plug on the very end of the data cable.

If your install still freezes up, let me know exactly when that happens. I mean what, if any, is that last device driver name you see displayed at the bottom as the install routine starts to copy hardware device drivers to the hard drive. Or does it freeze even before that now. And are you still seeing a "No hard drive found" (or however it reads) message. But first hook up exactly as I've suggested with no additional drives. Once we get this sorted out, then if you wish, you can try adding additional drives to the system. For now we need to try to get the install running with as little hardware as possible hooked up to the motherboard.

Recheck all your relevant BIOS settings to make sure each drive controller that you have a drive plugged into (whether your SATA hard drive or you IDE DVD drive) is turned on in the BIOS. If the BIOS settings allow it I suggest you turn off any drive controllers that you don't have anything plugged into even though, supposedly, that drive controller conflict isn't a problem with the 1005 BIOS.

If you're still not making any progress (and apparently you're not even getting as far along since downgrading your BIOS as you were before -- or did you change anything else besides flashing back to the 1005 BIOS???) I wonder if you've thought about giving up on this SATA drive attempt and buying a small IDE drive? I think you can buy a 40 GB IDE drive from NewEgg, for about $50. That's not a very large drive nowadays, but will probably be adequate for your son for some time. For that matter you might be able to buy a 60 or 80 GB IDE drive for not much more.

I'm not intending to discourage you, but I suspect, given your "leetle frend" comment that you're, understandably, getting quite frustrated. I'm not ready to bail out on you by any mean, so if you're content to continue trying to install to the SATA HD that's fine also.

Let me know if you're hooked up to only one hard drive and only one CD drive (it has to be an IDE as your mobo manual says the SATA controllers are only designed for SATA hard drives, not SATA CD/DVD drives). And let me know, if you can, exactly where in the initial install sequence it is freezing up. I haven't done an XP install in quite some time so I can't recall the exact sequence. Is that "Setup is loading files" message the first thing you see when the install begins? About how many seconds elapse from the time the install starts until it freezes up? Is there any other sort of error message or any other info anywhere on the screen that provides a clue about the problem at that point?

And please confirm that you are using a keyboard that is plugged into the round PS/2 connector on the back of your computer, not a keyboard that is plugged into a USB connector.

 

Ok, keyboard is still plugged into PS2 port, not USB....

Setup exactly like you specified, checked BIOS for settings...
Currently, BOTH SATA BOOT and Promise Controller (RAID configuration) are enabled.....

Booted, install of Windows, same thing! Freezes at this point....
"Setup is loading files...(Kernal Debugging file....)"

That is the same point as yesterday when I tried it.

This has GOT to be the longest posting ever on this forum!

 

Is anything plugged into the Promise controller? If not, turn it off/disable it in the BIOS. On the other hand, if nothing's plugged into the VIA controller, then turn that off/disable it in the BIOS. What device does "SATA BOOT" refer to? Does that info appear in the same sub-menu as the Promise RAID controller listing? Or is it just a setting somewhere else in the BIOS?

You should only have one device, your SATA hard drive, plugged into one or the other of your SATA controllers, right? Whichever SATA controller has nothing plugged into it should be turned off in the BIOS if you can do that without turning off all SATA features (which would disable both controllers, I imagine). And you only have one DVD drive hooked up to the mobo currently and it's plugged into the Secondary IDE controller, the drive jumper is set to "Master", and the plug at the end of the data cable is plugged into the DVD drive (not the plug "in the middle" of the cable)? Sorry to repeat all this, but just want to be certain you've done this.

Also, if there are any options to turn RAID off but leave regular SATA function on, I'd turn off/disable RAID.

Try each connection on the motherboard for whichever controller you've plugged your SATA drive into. If you can't get any further along in the XP install, then shut down and try each of the other SATA connectors on the other controller in turn to see if either of those work any better. But when you switch from using the mobo connectors for one SATA chip to the connectors for the other SATA chip, be sure to turn off/disable the controller the drive is no longer plugged into, and turn on/enable the controller you've just plugged the drive into. I believe those sub-menus labeled "Third IDE Master" and "Fourth IDE Master" on the Main BIOS screen refer to your two SATA controllers, the VIA and the Promise. But which is which I'm not sure. Try turning "Third IDE Master" on/enabled in the BIOS while turning "Fourth IDE Master" off/disabled. If the install still freezes, then reverse the settings for those two BIOS items -- turn "Third" off and "Fourth" on. If still no luck, power down, try plugging the hard drive into one of the other SATA controller's connectors. Once again try turning "Third IDE Master" on/enabled in the BIOS and "Fourth" off and then reverse those settings if the install still freezes.

Again, it's been awhile since I've done an XP install (though I'll likely be doing one in another day or two). When you first boot up and the CD spins up, are you seeing any option that would allow you to partition and format the SATA hard drive? If so, I recommend you use that, don't skip over it. Furthermore, create only a single partition, for type select "NTFS", and make sure you allocate all the space on the entire drive to that partition. I'd also suggest, since you already tried the "Quick format" (when you put this drive into your computer), that you do a full format. This will take much longer, but seems advisable given the problems we keep having.

And yes, if we decide to publish this epic, it will rival Tolstoy's War and Peace!

 

Sorry, I should have clarified that a little better....

SATA hard drive (only one) is plugged into the Primary Sata controller (the lower one on the mobo, next to the Sec Sata). I currently don't have any jumpers set on the hard drive, but did once try the setting for 1.5gb rather than 3.0gb, just to be sure (didn't work then).

DVD-RW is plugged into the Secondary IDE on the right side of the mobo, and the very last plug at the end of the cable is plugged into the drive itself, with the jumper set to Master.

I do have an SATA DVD-ROM drive, but have unhooked that completely based on the earlier post....(I read that in the Manual as well, about cd drives not being supported by this mobo, but hoped that something would work out anyway! I may have to swap it out with the one from my computer. I'll let that go for now...

The SATA BOOT (sorry, wasn't exactly named that) is under the ADVANCED menu, Onboard Devices Configuration menu, and is listed as OnChip SATA BOOT ROM....choices are enable, disable. Right below that is the Onboard Promise Controller with the choices of enable / disable, but this one has a submenu called Operating Mode with two options...RAID, or Onboard IDE Operating Mode. It is currently set to RAID. (For some reason, I don't think it worked configured the other way, but I can try again if you like).

For now, I'll turn RAID off again and see if that works, and try the other SATA plug (Sec. SATA) to see if that works.

 

FYI....with the Promise Controller DISABLED in the BIOS ADVANCED menu screen (as described in the previous post), essentially eliminating the RAID setting (it's NOT AVAILABLE with Promise Disabled), I reboot and get this message almost immediately:

NO hard disk drive detected.....press F1 to resume.


Hmmmm.....

I then Enabled Promise Controller (with the RAID enabled), and DISABLED the SATA BOOT ROM setting, rebooted and got this:

Disk Read Error......Press Ctl Alt DEL to restart

I then changed the RAID setting to IDE, but got the same result.....disk read error.....

I'm really at a loss here....

 

You seem to be proceeding in an orderly fashion and have the right idea. The main thing is to just change one setting or connection at a time. If you change several things at once, then you don't know exactly what's causing any change in the error messages or a change in how far along the installation proceeds before it freezes.

Of course, as you've seen, sometimes changing one setting in the BIOS makes other settings unavailable, but in such a case you're making one change which turns off other BIOS features or settings dependent on the item you've disabled so that's fine.

Is is possible to enable the Promise SATA RAID controller, but disable it's RAID feature/setting somewhere in the BIOS? Or is there such a combination of settings (SATA/RAID controller enabled, but the RAID feature of that controller disabled/off) available with the Promise controller turned off and the VIA SATA/RAID controller turned on?

Check your SATA hard drive info (go to the manufacturer's website if necessary to get this info, using the exact model number to find the drive specs). Your motherboard manual says its SATA features support a data transfer rate up to 150 MB/s (megabytes per second). I think that probably means you should have that drive jumper set to the lower speed.

It's very important, when trying to troubleshoot a really difficult problem, to not change more than one thing at once. If you change a drive jumper and also change some BIOS settings then you may have just moved from one unworkable configuration to another. And, unless you're making careful notes about what you've tried, it's easy to overlook some combination of settings that may be exactly what's required to solve your problem.

So, check your drive specs/info against the mobo manual and see whether or not you should put that drive jumper back to the slower setting -- I think that's what it should be on.

I think the message "Disk read error" may be a good sign! It would seem to indicate that the drive is detected, but can't be accessed for read/write operations for some reason -- for example, the drive jumper setting is too fast for the SATA controller.

Summing up....if possible, whichever SATA controller your SATA drive is plugged into should, of course, be enabled in the BIOS (but, if possible, turn off the RAID feature of the controller). Check your SATA drive specs against your mobo manual and see if you shouldn't have it set to the slower speed. Figure out the correct setting and then leave it there while your try out the various combinations of SATA controllers/SATA mobo connectors/SATA BIOS settings.

Your attempting to use the SATA DVD-ROM drive wasn't a bad idea. Mobo manuals (and computer hardware manuals in general) all too often contain erroneous information. And it's not at all unusual that flashing a later version of the BIOS will add additional features/abilities to the mobo that it didn't originally have.

But for now, take the more conservative route and stick with the IDE DVD drive. Once we find one workable combination that allows you to complete the installation of Windows, then, if you wish, you can hook up different hardware to see if it will work well or at all.

One last thought for now....how old is this motherboard and how was it stored? Was it just thrown into a cardboard box and other stuff got tossed in on top of it or was it sometimes picked up (and maybe zapped with static) and moved around in any manner that might have damaged it? I think there are probably some combinations of BIOS/hard drive settings/SATA connections/SATA controllers you haven't yet tried that may get this install running, but the possibility that the mobo suffered some damage during storage or handling can't be overlooked either. You have used this motherboard sometime before, right? How long ago was it last used? Was the boot drive you used with it then a SATA drive?

 

As you recall, I purchased this MOBO on Ebay, and I'm not sure of the previous condition or how it was handled. It was packed very well in a motherboard box (though not THIS motherboards box) in a static proof bag with foam surrounding it, so I think it was taken care of pretty good. It seemed to be new, but only had a 7 day warranty on it, although the guy did offer to take it back (and actually has refunded my money already, but I told him to hold off and see if I can get it working yet!). I didn't install right away because I was waiting on other items that I didn't have yet....DVD, HDD, etc.

 

Sorry....something happened in that last post where it embedded all my replies into your original post, and it's not letting me edit for some reason.....guess you'll just have to decipher it! Sorry!

 

I haven't read all the postings, so this may already have been covered. Regarding the issue of DVD errors etc. you mentioned that your IDE cable was connected as a Slave. With just one IDE device on the cable it should have the jumper set to Master. It should also be connected on the last connector on the cable as in:
[]----------------[]-----[]
MBoard ---------------- DVD as Master
The reason: the Master jumper selection informs the DVD/CD to apply the cable termination loads. This is just a series of resistors that helps prevent signal ringing on cables. Once you've done that, and set this DVD drive as your boot drive it should now behave as expected.

 

The DVD drive is not the problem! The dvd drives works up to the point of pressing "Enter to Install Windows XP"....and then says that "No Hard Disk Drive is Detected"..EVEN THOUGH IT SHOWS UP EVERYWHERE ON THE COMPUTER AND IN THE BIOS!!!!!!!

Sorry.....I reaching peak frustration again! I'm thinking new Ebay listings will be up shortly! I've had it with this D@&*) thing!

 

Eezak,

Just got the computer to load all the Windows XP Pro files all the way up to the point of "Press enter to install Windows"

Guess what.....

"No Hard Drive Detected....Windows cannot continue....Press F3 to Quit"......

So, I did just that.....I pressed F3, AND I QUIT! These parts are headed for Ebay, and my son can live without a computer! I GIVE UP!!!!!!!!!!!:cry

 

No problem! . We've all been there at one time or other and this experience will make you so much better for your next project. Best of luck.:wave

 

Eezak,

What do you think? Adapter cable possible solution to our problem?

http://www.neoseeker.com/forums/4/t1070473-possible-fix-help-with-sata-150-k8vse-deluxe/#5

 

First about that link where someone with the same motherboard was able to fix a hard drive problem that sounds similar to yours. I couldn't tell exactly what he had done to solve his problem as I found his explanation a bit garbled. I'll try to read it over again, but probably won't have time until tomorrow.

I'm doubtful that the special cable will solve your problem, but again I have to re-read that linked post and see if I can understand more clearly exactly what that fellow did that worked.

Sorry re: my confusion about where the mobo came from. Yes, I looked back at your early post in this thread and remember now that you had purchased it off eBay while it was the CPU that you'd had sitting around for some time, apparently.

My best guess is that your mobo's SATA controllers, for some reason, can't quite be configured correctly to work with this particular SATA hard drive. Maybe there's some combo of settings and connections we've overlooked, but maybe it just isn't compatible, period. Or maybe it would work with one particular version of the BIOS, but I don't think that's likely and it would take a lot of time to download the oldest BIOS, test it (with all possible BIOS settings and SATA controller/connections!), and then the next oldest and test it and so on.

If you want to test just one other BIOS I'd once again flash the newest one and try that again, making all the "one at a time" methodical changes to connections/controllers plugged into on the motherboard and then trying all possible BIOS settings that have anything to do with the SATA hard drive controllers. I know there's the possibility of that SATA controller conflict if you flash the newer BIOSes (anything with a higher number than 1005 wasn't it?), but I think that's unlikely to actually occur -- as long as you're only using one hard drive and if you switch off, in the BIOS, whichever SATA controller you're not using.

It's not clear to me (and I don't have time right now to read back over our posts here) whether you've been able to turn off the Promise controller and turn on only the VIA SATA controller. Have you tried that?

I understand your frustration and certainly can't blame you if you feel you shouldn't put anymore time into tinkering around with this particular hardware configuration and sell or get refunds for as much of this equipment as you can.

I once spent nearly all my free time one entire month (that is, all my time except when I was at work, eating meals or sleeping) trying to get a new graphics card installed and working. After extensive experimentation (downloading new BIOSes, new graphics drivers, then older graphics drivers, new mobo 4 in 1 drivers, etc etc etc) and with assistance from the graphics card manufacture's support via web chat and a forum, we finally concluded that this graphics card, which had only been on the market for about a month or so and had a brand new "engine"/chip, just wasn't compatible with my motherboard. I couldn't afford to buy a new mobo then (and would have also had to buy new RAM at least) so I just wrote off all that time I'd spent for nearly an entire month and felt very frustrated and discouraged.

On the other hand I learned a great deal about my motherboard and some of my other system components. It was a frustrating way to learn certainly, but it really wasn't all time wasted.

If you decide to give up now, remember that you did learn a lot, I think. How to reset and how to flash your BIOS. How to identify some of the parts on your motherboard and, in the case of SATA controllers, which connectors go with which controllers (though it is, I think, unusual to have two different kinds of SATA controllers on one mobo, which may have complicated your problem). The next time you have to look for a connector or jumper or something on a motherboard or mobo diagram maybe it won't look quite so much like a map of alien territory as it used to.

You learned an important troubleshooting principle also (though maybe you already knew it, as it can apply to other non-computer related problems also) -- when you're trying to sort out a really difficult problem it's usually best to only change one connection or BIOS setting (or any other factor) at a time, rather than changing multiple things at once.

I will check in here again tomorrow and see if I can understand that fellow's solution to his problem with the same mobo to determine if it might be relevant to your equipment and to see if you've found any other helpful info.

Good luck!

 

I read over the posts at that last link you provided and think I finally understood what that guy did and it won't help with your problem, unless you have an IDE drive you want to substitute for the SATA.

Note this quote from that link (I've substituted the word "their" for each use of "there" since that's apparently what he meant):

"...since my parents system had a IDE HDD and their mobo did support SATA (not their PSU though) I downloaded the Seagate software to make a total HDD image and swapped their IDE for the SATA then hooked the IDE in my system and proceeded to install a fresh copy of my streamlined purged burned copy of WindowsXP"

The special cable he talks about is just an adapter that allows a SATA drive with the regular SATA power connector to be hooked up to the older style IDE hard disk power connector ("molex" connector). So he apparently convinced his parents to trade him their IDE hard drive for his SATA hard drive. He then hooked up the SATA drive to his parents' computer and, before removing the old IDE drive, used the Seagate hard drive utility software to image their IDE installation (the OS, installed programs and data) to the SATA drive (which apparently was recognized without any problems by his parents' mobo BIOS). He had to use the special power cable adapter for the SATA drive in order to be able to hook it up for power to the molex connectors on his parents' computer.

Next he configured the SATA drive as the boot drive in his parents' computer and took the IDE drive out and installed it in his ASUS K8V SE Deluxe mobo, using, of course, IDE data and power cables and one of the IDE drive controllers/connectors. The older IDE interface hard drive was recognized without any trouble and he was able to repartition and reformat it and install Windows XP without any problems. So he solved his SATA installation problem with the ASUS K8V SE by getting rid of the SATA drive and using an IDE drive instead.

The special cable only came into play because it allowed the fellow to swap his SATA drive for his parents IDE drive as their computer's power supply only had the molex/IDE type of power connectors. So that solution isn't any help, unless you do indeed have an IDE drive available for your son's computer.

Have you tried using the VIA SATA controller/connectors with your SATA drive? If you have and that doesn't allow the drive to be recognized so that the Windows install runs successfully, I'm not sure what else to suggest.

Clearly that other fellow tried many different tweaks and settings to get his SATA drive recognized by this same ASUS mobo and had no luck and so swapped his SATA for his parents' IDE drive.

If you're still determined to install Windows to this SATA drive using this particular motherboard I think it's time to bite the bullet and contact ASUS support and see if they can figure out what we've overlooked. At the same time it might also be helpful if you contacted the SATA hard drive manufacturer (I've forgotten which brand of SATA drive you have) to ask if they have suggestions or tips about using this particular model of their SATA hard drive with the ASUS K8V SE Deluxe mobo.

I think using an IDE hard drive instead of a SATA drive would be the easiest way to get this system up and running. But if you don't want to spend still more money to purchase an IDE hard drive (which is quite understandable) you might ask around among your friends to see if any of them might have a similar sized new or working IDE hard drive they'd be willing to swap for your SATA drive. Or advertise it here at MG (at no cost to yourself) in the "Buy, sell, trade" forum as an offer for a straight up swap for a similar sized IDE hard drive.

If you've worked systematically, have downloaded the proper set of drivers for this mobo, and have downloaded and copied to floppy disk the proper SATA drivers, have systematically tried the various BIOS SATA settings with the drive plugged into different SATA connectors/controllers and tried both older and newer versions of the BIOS (while again working systematically through the various combinations of BIOS settings and SATA controllers/connectors), I don't know what else to suggest -- except asking ASUS and your hard drive manufacturers' customer service for assistance or else buy (or trade your SATA drive for) an IDE drive.

Maybe someone else here who's been following our epic attempts will have some more suggestions. Also take a look at the "similar theads" links at the very bottom of the page if you haven't already. I'll try to give those a look also, but now it's dinner time!

 

Yeah, I've tried Asus already.....it's like asking them "Why did the chicken cross the road?". I explained to them, in detail, what was going on and what I have tried already. I then asked them EXACTLY what drivers I need to download and install to correct this problem.

Heres the reply I got from them.....

"Dear Sir/Madam

You must load the 3rd party Via storage drivers during the windows install. Also make sure your drive is a S-ATA 1 drive rather than S-ATA 2 (300mb/s).

Best Regards,"

What a bunch of dumb@$$e$! I SWEAR I will NEVER buy another piece of Asus junk EVER AGAIN!

I guess I'll list this on Ebay and dump the entire project. Thanks for trying.

 

I imagine the ASUS support people are suggesting solutions for the most common problems/mistakes, in their experience, that people are likely to encounter when hooking up a SATA drive to this motherboard. Once you confirm you've done those things they may suggest additional troubleshooting steps.

Again, I certainly understand if you feel you don't want to spend anymore time on this project. Just let me know.

But there is some important info in that message from the ASUS support people. Your single SATA drive should have the jumper configured so it works at the slower SATA I speed (150 MB/sec, I believe it is) and it should be plugged into one of the SATA data connectors associated with the VIA SATA controller on your mobo, not the Promise controller. This may be because the Promise controller may only work as a RAID controller and thus requires a minimum of two drives to be hooked up to it. At any rate, we now know that you should be plugging your SATA drive into the SATA connectors for the VIA SATA controller.

I think you should also be sure to set those "Third/Fourth IDE Masters" to "Enable/Auto" in the BIOS. In addition, it might useful to ask ASUS why your mobo BIOS doesn't seem to have that additional sub-menu choice that should appear immediately under "Third/Fourth IDE Masters", labeled "IDE Configuration"?

That is, if you want to continue. If not, just let me know. I think the problem is that the SATA drivers for the VIA SATA controller chip aren't getting loaded for some reason. You may want to check again to insure you've downloaded the correct SATA drivers for this specific VIA SATA controller chip (identified, if possible, by the chip number from the list of available SATA controller driver downloads on the ASUS or VIA websites). This driver, once downloaded, should be copied onto a floppy and the floppy inserted into your floppy drive when prompted by the Windows install routine for "Additional 3rd party driver disks" (or similar words). Have you tried copying the VIA SATA driver to a second floppy to rule out the possibility that you're using a defective floppy disk? We need to figure out why the SATA drivers for the VIA SATA controller aren't loading up from the floppy disk. What happens when you see that message to "Press F6 to load 3rd party drivers" (or however that reads)? Does it appear that the drivers are being copied from the floppy drive (the light should stay on for some seconds) or does the floppy drive light just flash on and then off immediately? Or not at all?

I think if we can get the VIA SATA drivers to load off the floppy, you'll be off and running at last.

Is there any option to load those 3rd party drivers off a CD or does the mobo manual say they have to be loaded from a floppy disk? If there is such a CD option, you could try burning the VIA drivers to a CD and then insert that into your DVD/CD drive when the Windows install prompts you to "Press F6".

Don't forget you can try to contact your hard drive manufacturer's support for some help also. I think it really is, strictly speaking, a motherboard problem, but it's quite possible the hard drive support people will know about it and may have some suggestions that will help get the drive fully recognized so the install can proceed.

 

(From section 4.4.3 of your mobo manual)

OnChip SATA BOOTROM [Enabled]
OnBoard Promise Controller [Disabled/Off]
Operating Mode [This should be "ghosted"/not accessible once the Promise Controller is set to disabled/off]

My best guess is that the "OnChip SATA BOOTROM" refers to the VIA SATA controller so be sure that's enabled in your BIOS.

[The settings referred to below probably won't be available until we manage to get the SATA drive fully recognized by the driver floppy being read correctly by the Windows install, so don't worry about this stuff below for now -- unless you do already see these or similar settings available in the BIOS.]
----------------
Also notice section 4.3.5 of your mobo manual. I realize this section refers to IDE hard drives plugged into the mobo's IDE controllers, but you should find something similar for your SATA drive (perhaps if you check those sub-menus for "Third/Fourth IDE Master" -- remember I said I believe those are mislabeled and actually refer to the SATA connectors/controllers, not IDE?)

Given that your SATA drive is apparently recognized by the BIOS (but not yet by the Windows installer routines), you should be able to locate settings for that drive in the mobo BIOS similar to those shown for IDE drives in section 4.3.5 of the manual.

Once you find those settings for your SATA hard drive, you want to be sure that, beginning with "Type" everything is set to "Auto" that can be. In particular, make sure that LBA is set to "Auto". (LBA is "Logical Block Addressing" -- this enables the use of hard drives above, I believe, 127 GB in size.)

Check all the other drive settings in this section of your BIOS (once you locate these settings for your SATA drive). Do you see anything there that isn't set to auto or otherwise looks different or unusual, indicates any sort of problem or is there any setting that is "ghosted out"/unavailable?
----------------
Finally, of course, any time you make changes to even a single setting in the BIOS make sure you "Save changes" and confirm by insuring "Y" ("yes") is displayed by the BIOS confirmation, not "N", and then pressing <Enter>.

 

Sorry....had a doctors appointment and didn't have time to check this out until now, and it's getting towards bedtime..

Anyway, just a few things....first of all, as I stated back in post #26, the only IDE options that are listed are:

Primary Master
Primary Slave
Secondary Master
Secondary Slave

I have yet to see where these Third and Fourth IDE settings are in my BIOS that you are talking about. Under what menu are you seeing that???

Again, as I stated before, Windows does NOT seem to allow me the F6 for drivers option....I mean, it's there, but nothing happens when I press F6....it just continues to load the other files. I don't quite know what to do here......???

I DO have the settings for Type and LBA, and I'm quite sure that LBA is set to auto, but I'm not sure about the type....think everything in that menu was set to auto.

I'll have to go over everything again tomorrow and check and double check everything. I am losing faith, and patience for that matter, but am willing to keep trying. I'll have to try to find the driver again and be sure that I have the correct one. (I think I tried to load that with the flashing method of alt-f2 at bootup...maybe thats the problem!).