Booting process with SATA HDD.

[Enigmatism]

Here I have a fairly concise walkthrough on how to boot your AMD PC using SATA hard drives and Windows XP. This is my first walkthrough, so please correct me if any information is incorrect. I feel I have asked so much of this forum that its only fair to give back some of my knowledge.

This walkthrough is most relevant for users of an ABIT motherboard, but is generally standard for most AMD-based motherboards that support 754 or 939-pin CPUs.

This applies to you if:
You just built your new AMD machine, you turn it on with the windows CD in the CD drive, it shows you the windows setup screen (if it doesnt, dont worry, ill tell you how to get your computer recognize the windows CD). You tell Windows XP to install but it says you have no hard drive. Not to worry.

First make sure your HDD is connected to an availuable SATA port and also, make sure you have some kind of disk that contains SATA drivers (it is strongly recommended that you use a 3.5" floppy).

Now restart your computer with the Windows XP disc in your CD drive. If it doesn't eventually go to the windows XP setup screen without you pressing anything, then do the following: (if it does go to the windows setup screen, then just skip to the next paragraph because your computer knows to look in the CDROM drive for the software to boot)

When you turn on your computer it will show the logo of your motherboard and the AMD CPU. On the bottom it will say "press Del (delete) for BIOS setup." Do so. Once in the BIOS menu, choose "Advanced BIOS features." Now it will give you a list of boot priorities. For first boot device, choose "CDROM." Now save changes and exit. When you restart your computer it will run through the opening logo of the motherboard and AMD CPU, then there will be a list of various things than run by the screen and it will stop when "boot from CDROM" appears at the bottom of the screen. It will stay like this for maybe two seconds, and then it should carry on to the windows setup screen.

Okay, now back to the "no hard drive" problem.

Restart your computer. Again, the first thing you will see is the motherboard logo. The next thing you will see is the list of various things stopping with "boot from CDROM" as discussed above. After this, it should go to the windows setup screen (you will know when the screen turns from a black background into a blue one). It doesn't go to the windows setup menu right away, you will notice the computer doing system checks on the bottom bar of the screen. Before it does these system checks, you will see words at the bottom bar of the screen say "Press F6 for third party devices." This option only stays on the screen for about 10 seconds before it goes on with the system checks preceding the Windows setup menu, so be quick about pressing it. It will then prompt you to insert an installation disk to extract the drivers from. The default drive it will check for the driver installation disc is A: (The 3.5" floppy drive). Insert the disc and press enter. It will read it and give you a list of the drivers contained on the floppy. Choose the appropriate driver from the list and hit enter (look for a SATA driver for Windows XP). Once the driver is installed, save (if necessary) and restart your computer. It will go through the motherboard logo screen like last time, and maybe a few others your reallt dont need to worry about. Once it gets to the Windows setup screen, tell it to install windows. It should now be loading on your hard drive. The rest is self explanitory. See? not so bad.

When you get to your desktop screen on windows XP then mission complete. Take note that you might find some things missing from your computer (Sound, LAN connection, etc). Dont worry, usually nothing is wrong with your computer, you just need to install the appropriate drivers. BUT DONT WORRY! It is a million times easier this time since you are using windows. Just insert the CD that came with your motherboard and a menu will pop up giving you a list of drivers (Audio, LAN, USB2.0, etc). Install any ones you want. The first driver you might want to install is Audio. When you click on the audio driver in the menu it will load, and then you will have sound on your computer in no time (given that you have speakers, of course). Same situation for the other drivers: click on them, load them, use them.

Also, if you are using a video card that is not onboard *99% of the time* then just insert the CD that came with the video card and install the content on it. Again, simple.

Enjoy your new computer.

[Marke522]

It will go through the motherboard logo screen like last time, and maybe a few others your reallt dont need to worry about. Once it gets to the Windows setup screen, tell it to install windows. It should now be loading on your hard drive

Done all this, then the pc restarts, I get the splash screen for the motherboard, all the info, then at the bottom it says Press any key to boot from CD......

And just sits there...forever...

Checked all I can think of, please post a reply if you have any ideas.

Thanks. Mark.