Serial ATA - fresh Windows installation

[Frans De Ridder]

Could you help me with following problem please ?

I have build a new PC and I am trying to install Windows
XP Professional - OEM version.
During the installation, Windows is sending a message
asking to use eventuall the F6 function key to
install "non standard" drivers for Hard disk (I am using
ONLY SATA disks).

Windows is NOT responding to the F6 and continues with the
installation - at the end there is an error message saying
that the installation is not possible while there are
errors with the hard disks.

Hereafter, you will find some more detailed information:

Hardware
Motherboard Gigabyte GA-SINXP1394
Processor Intel 3.06
Sound card Creative Labs SB Audigy II
Platinum EX
DVD SONY DRU 510A attached via
IDE1 (master)
Hard disk Maxtor Serial ATA 120 GB x 2
ONLY SERIAL ATA - NO other disks -
attached
Graphical card 9800 PRO
Screen Neovo K 19
Memory Corsair CMX512 (4* 512 MB)

Settings in the BIOS
- Boot order SATA
- First boot device DVD (set to DVD only for
the installation).
- Second boot device DVD
- Third boot device HDD-0.

The system is starting up and does not give any error
messages.
The system is recognising the hard disks.
While booting, the control S or F4 gives following
information
Option Raid 1
0 PM Maxtor 6Y12M0
1 SM Maxtor 6Y12M0
No conflicts exist
Set 0 Sil mirrored set (PM)
First HDD * 0 Maxtor 6Y12M0
Maxtor 6Y12M0
The windows installation procedure did load quite a lot
of information from the DVD drive but was not able to
start the installation on the hard drive.

The keyboard was working well - I tested with 2 keuboards
(1 AZERT and 1 QUERTY) - both worked.
I tested the Function keys - they worked well on both
keyboards (I used F4 in replacement of control S).
I did prepare a diskette with the drivers.

Maybe it has to do with the fact that ONLY Serial ATA
drives are used ?

Thanks in advance
Frans

 

[Frans De Ridder]

-----Original Message-----
I think you are missing one important screen in the Windows setup procedure.
After you press F6, it does SEEM that Windows has ignored this keypress, but
it has taken note of it. It does go on to write installation files to disk
and to ask for your input in the installation procedure. At some point,
however, it will ask you to press S to install additional drivers (which you
have called for by pressing F6 earlier). You then will be propted to place a
floppy in the a drive and to press the appropriate key to copy the files
from the floppy. You will be asked to do this each time you indicate that
you have additional drivers to install (by pressing S).

I THINK you missed this step, and that is why the installation is not going
well.

MarkS





.
Hello Mark

Thanks for the prompt reply.
As you were mentionning, I had to wait until the system
has loaded the standard drivers. At the end he is asking
for the specific drivers.
I have used the "S" and loaded the drivers from the floppy
(as the documentation was not very clear, I had to
reorganise the files on the floppy).
The installation procedure went further and was trying, at
the end, to reboot from the disk.
This was NOT successfull; The system gave following
message:
"Windows could not start because of a computer disk
hardware configuration problem. Could not read from teh
selected boot disk. Check boot path and disk hardware.
PLease check the Windows documentation about hardware and
your hardware refrence manuals for additional refrence".

The Bios is from Award. I tried to boot with both
following settings :
- once with first boot device as "SCSI" and once with "HDD-
0" - both options gave the same error message.

Kind regards
Frans

 

[Frans De Ridder]

-----Original Message-----
Hi Franz

Since you are familiar with the F6 procedure (as you've detailed in your
previous response)

Here are a few things to check out.

BIOS update...
The latest BIOS for your mainboard is version F6. There have been problems
reported on this newsgroup with Gigabyte boards (BIOS F5) with Corsair
memory installed. I'm not clear on whether this update resolves the issue -
the previous problem was fixed when version F6a was used but make sure you
have the current update at least.

http://www.giga-byte.com/Motherboard/Support/BIOS/BIOS_GA- SINXP1394(GA-8SQ800%20Ultra2).htm


I'd also download the necessary drivers from the Gigabyte Website and create
the required floppy disk from those files... the version there is 1.0.0.44
for the SATA only driver (should be referenced in device manager as
'SATALink controller' once XP is loaded) and 1.0.0.28 for the SATA RAID
driver (SATARaid controller).

http://www.giga- byte.com/Motherboard/Support/Driver/Driver_GA-SINXP1394(GA-
8SQ800%20Ultra2).htm


If you're *not* using a RAID array than the SATALink controller should be
used for the Silicon Image controller. Use the appropriate file from the
download to create the floppy disk.
'SiI3112.exe' for non-RAID - 'SiI3112r.exe' for RAID.

To boot from SATA, I think the Gigabyte mainboards require the SCSI boot to
be selected as the boot device - not HDD-0, but check in your mainboard
manual to be sure.

If that doesn't clear it up then it may be the Maxtor drives (there have
been some issues with some mainboards) or you may have to contact Gigabyte
for a further BIOS update - might be worthwhile sending them a quick email
anyway in the meantime.

There may also be a chance that the OEM version is tied to previous
hardware.... hopefully not... if you had a retail XP CD to check that idea
against it would be nice )

Post an update when you can

hope that helps
Pete
--------------------------




.
Hello Pete,

I installed the F6 version of the BIOS and during a first
retry of the installation it went wrong again.

Than I started the Windows installation from scrath with a
reload of the SATA drivers and it worked (during the
installation, the procedure warned that a "previous"
version of Windows was already available on the hard
disk).

Thanks for the help.

I tried also tried to send a message to Gigabyte but their
server was not accepting the message (I tried several
times).

Kind regards
Frans