Abit,XP,and a Raptor

[crazzy]

Hello all. Been lurking for a while, trying to see if the answer I need was in another post. Close but no bananna. My problem is trying to get XP pro on a single Raptor. I really don't need RAID, just want a fast HD. New Abit kv-80, AMD 3400+, 1 gig ram, 500w psu, 36 gig raptor. The hd is not recognized in the bios, unless I go tyo raid setup, then it tells me I can't set up raid with only 1 hd..duh... went thru the whole setup process many, many times, boot from a new xp pro disc, f6 when it asks me to, install drivers and go. Sometimes it sees the hd, sometimes not. When it does, I go ahead with the format and install. Ok until it restarts, then it can't find a drive! Hooked up an old ide, installed xp, went into disk managment and formated the raptor with no problem, ID'd correctly & all. About to give up and get another raptor & go Raid if that's the only way I can use the SATA. I believe this board uses the VIA 8237 southbridge, although I was told to use the Silicon image drivers. Any ideas????

[foolishone]

I know on my Abit, IC7-G MaxII, I had to search in BIOS for a while. I stumbled on something that suggested it enabled the native SATA and allowed to boot from it. I will see if I can find it, and see if that could be a problem.

Why you pressing F6? Are you installing the RAID drivers, if you are...why? Just let that screen go by and don't press anything.

EDIT: Although I think my MB could possibly be newer the BIOS should be similar. In my BIOS, I had to go to Intregated Peripherals > OnChip IDE Device. The setting OnChip Serial ATA Mode, on that page, is set to IDE, not RAID. Also, underneath that, the setting OnChip Serial ATA is set on Enhanced Mode. It works for me, but if yours is different you would have to wait for somebody with that exact board.

I found the manual in pdf and it is different, I will see if I can translate it into KV-80.

[crazzy]

Thanks for the reply. All I could find in the BIOS was under integrated periphials, to turn the RAID on or off. I really don't want raid, just want the HD to be recognized, SCSI, IDE I don't care, as long as it works!

[MaxRat]

you are on the right track....

You need the Sata drivers loaded to a floppy and then hit F6 during install...
You mentioned hitting F6 but, did you have a floppy in the drive or the correct floppy with the right Sata drivers...

If you did not... You will need them...Either they came on a floppy with the Mother board or... they are on the motherboard drivers cd... If on the cd you will have to get them off and load them to a floppy... I would rather go to the web site and get the latest Sata drivers and load those to a floppy....

Before you do another attempt make sure you have the latest Sata drivers loaded to a formatted floppy... Before use clear the Cmos and retry...

If that doesn't work..post back...

[crazzy]

I have the floppy with the drivers that came with the MB. It has 4 different drivers on it. Somewhere ,on this or the forum at Abit, I read to use the Silicone Image one. I have tried all 4, clearing the CMOS each time. Just bought another raptor, will go raid I guess....:-(

[crazzy]

Well, put another raptor in, setup raid 0. tried putting XP pro on ( a NEW disk w/o sp2) Still no go . First time windows saw the disks went thru setup, upon restart, they are gone, (still there in raid). Maybe if I run from a controller card instead of the MB?

[foolishone]

Maybe try the SATA driver found here.

In the manual, it says that on the CD there is a 'VIA Serial ATA RAID Driver'. Maybe install just to get the SATA driver, but disable the RAID.

^fo

[MaxRat]

Basically what you got going on is I think your not getting the drivers right yet...

What happens when you supply the floppy is the drivers are loaded to the ram and then windows loads them to the hard drive and when you re-boot there not where they are suposed to be....

Heres what i would do.... Look at the board by the Sata connector and see what the sata chipset says...(Name) ...glc said Intel...I'm betting he's right...Just in-case take a gander....Now you have 2 choices re-read the manual or call tech support....

When I got my 74gig raptor I was installing a Gigabyte 7nnxp board and I had the same problem you have....I elected to call tech support and glad I did as the manual was misprinted...If you call them they will walk you thru the set-up process...thats what they are there for....

I am in no way trying to be sarcastic or mean... I am trying to help you use all the available resources I can....

[glc]

The KV80 uses a Via SATA/RAID controller, so that's the only driver you may need. I just downloaded the KV-80 manual, and I don't see anything in the bios setup that would control the SATA ports except the SATA RAID Rom, and that looks like a simple enable/disable switch to allow booting from SATA. I can only guess - if you can get into some kind of SATA RAID setup, is there a way to set it to IDE emulation or something like that?

[MaxRat]

Good point...

I wasn't thinking about that... I think to boot from the sata you either have to select "sata" or "SCSI" in the boot order... use that one as the second order under floppy and disable the IDE....

Now on some boards you have to assign the Sata an order you might see some where asking for sata as "Raid" or "Base"

Make sure you thouroughly check your bios options....If not sure post them here...

[crazzy]

The Via raid driver on the cd is part of the via control program that installs in windows, so you can manipulate the drives while in Windows. My controller chip is a via. The driver on the floppy are, Intel, intel, Intel, Silicone Image. SCSI is not a boot option in the bios. Onboard SATA can either be enabled or disabled, it only controls RAID functions. Under boot order, hard disk, I can boot from onboard sata or addin PCI cards, tried both. Just partioned the drives in Windows, will try loading onto them again tonight. Thanks all for all of your help, together we WILL get it right!

[glc]

The Intel and Sil drivers are for other models of motherboards - Abit doesn't use a custom CD for each model.

[crazzy]

Well, everyone. It's up & running! Followed a trail of links to where I finally found where someone ( A very blessed someone!) posted a zip file with the via drivers, and instructions for making the proper disk. Put the right Via drivers in at the F6, and all went well, installed XP on 2 stripe O raptors. Then, probably because I'm a little stubborn, went back into the raid setup, deleted the array and rebooted. Windows still went in. ( The Raid option under Integrated Periphals HAS to be enabled, even w/o a Raid setup). Now my only problem is my system disk is G, my C is empty.... and we all know Windows won't let me switch them, must be a way....
Many, Many thanks to all!!!!