[Resolved] Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe Motherboard Won't Detect 1Tb SATA 2 Drive {made a customised BIOS}

[iissmart]

See THIS post for the steps on how to solve the problem!

So I just bought a 1TB Western Digital drive (WD1001FALS) for my file server. Open the package, plug it in, turn it on. Stalls at detecting the drive. Motherboard is an Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe, running BIOS 1013. SATA is controlled by onboard Sil 3112A SATARaid, BIOS 4.2.47. I have an 80GB drive connected to it right now which it detects just fine, but all it does is print:

0   WDC WD1001FALS-00J7B                       _

Where the _ is the flashing cursor.

Now I just figured it was because the drive was ridiculously cold, I mean it's literally about 7*F outside so I just let it hang there for a bit to warm up. Still nothing, and now the drive is hot.

I really don't want to have to RMA this drive, for two reasons, 1) I was expecting to get this drive Tuesday-Wednesday of LAST week, but they "forgot" to ship it, so that was a hassle, and 2) I'm leaving for Christmas Break tomorrow, and won't be around it for ~3 weeks (which gets dangerously close to my 30-day return policy). So I'm hoping its the motherboard, but I'm not sure what to look for...and I need help with this ASAP.

Any ideas?

[Edit] Operating system is Linux (Ubuntu 8.04 LTS 32-bit). It's a complex drive setup. This will be the 6th drive in the case, and no, it's not overheating.

[MoreBandwidthPls]

BIOS is latest so that shouldn't be an issue. Is the BIOS recognising the device correctly?

Any special Linux drivers needed for this device?

Does it need to be prepped (formatted and partitioned) first?

If you're on leave you possibly won't be needing it for the three weeks. Suggestion: Return and replace.

[iissmart]

Originally Posted by MoreBandwidthPls

BIOS is latest so that shouldn't be an issue. Is the BIOS recognising the device correctly?

Any special Linux drivers needed for this device?

Does it need to be prepped (formatted and partitioned) first?

If you're on leave you possibly won't be needing it for the three weeks. Suggestion: Return and replace.

Well the motherboard BIOS doesn't detect anything SATA-related, after POSTing (and detecting all IDE devices), it goes to the Silicon Images BIOS screen, which is where it hangs upon detecting the drive. Clearly it can see what kind of drive it is, because it gets the serial number from it.

There are no extra drivers I would need for this to work in Linux, but that's irrelevant at the moment if the computer won't boot with the drive plugged in.

I will try booting into a livecd and formatting and partitioning the drive that way. I was actually thinking that might be the issue, but haven't had time to go back and try it out (lots of studying for final exams tomorrow). I will try that either tonight or tomorrow early and reply back with a status update.

I realized I am not in as much of a time crunch as I thought. The drive has a 5-year warranty from Western Digital, so if there are any issues I can just send it back to them. The 30-day warranty is from Newegg. I would *love* to have this thing up and running by the time I leave. All my other drives are literally 100% full. Remember that overflow I was talking about in my other thread?

I'm starting to not trust WD's quality as much as I used to...

[iissmart]

Originally Posted by iissmart

Well the motherboard BIOS doesn't detect anything SATA-related, after POSTing (and detecting all IDE devices), it goes to the Silicon Images BIOS screen, which is where it hangs upon detecting the drive. Clearly it can see what kind of drive it is, because it gets the serial number from it.

There are no extra drivers I would need for this to work in Linux, but that's irrelevant at the moment if the computer won't boot with the drive plugged in.

I will try booting into a livecd and formatting and partitioning the drive that way. I was actually thinking that might be the issue, but haven't had time to go back and try it out (lots of studying for final exams tomorrow). I will try that either tonight or tomorrow early and reply back with a status update.

I realized I am not in as much of a time crunch as I thought. The drive has a 5-year warranty from Western Digital, so if there are any issues I can just send it back to them. The 30-day warranty is from Newegg. I would *love* to have this thing up and running by the time I leave. All my other drives are literally 100% full. Remember that overflow I was talking about in my other thread?

I'm starting to not trust WD's quality as much as I used to...

Well I realized one of my other RAID-1's on my fileserver was degraded, for some reason the 2nd drive wasn't attached to the RAID, so without thinking I re-attached it and now it's rebuilding. Unfortunately this means I can't reboot, since I'm not sure what will happen to the RAID if it reboots in the middle of rebuilding.

But, I just realized that SATA devices are hotswappable, and I happened to have the power cable attached but not the data cable, so I just plugged in the data cable and Linux picked up the drive. Formatted it, partitioned it, mounted it, and I now have 878GB of free space

However, I'm going to wait until this RAID-1 finishes rebuilding before rebooting and testing how the BIOS handles it. That will probably happen tomorrow.

[Edit] Just kidding. Rebooted, and the Silicon Images BIOS still hangs when it detects the drive...

[iissmart]

Swapped the SATA devices. There are only two ports. Here is the exact output:

Sil 3112A SATARaid  BIOS Version 4.2.47
Copyright (C) 1997-2004 Silicon Image, Inc.

Press <Ctrl+S> or F4 to enter RAID utility
0   ST380013AS                              76293 MB
1   WDC WD1001FALS-00J7B                 _

Drive 0 is my 80GB drive. So it's hanging on trying to detect the total size of the drive, even though it's partitioned. I also copied ~2GB of data to it before rebooting. After rebooting with it unplugged again, then plugging it in upon completion of bootup, and doing 'mount -a' (to remount the drive), all the data is persistent. So it's not the drive, its the motherboard. I think I need to update the Sil SATARaid BIOS, but how?

[MoreBandwidthPls]

RAID 0,1,2,5,10 or JBOD?

[iissmart]

I have two RAID-1's set up so far, a few drives are connected but not partitioned/set up (waiting to copy everything from my external to my 1TB), and I have that 1TB as a solo drive. Everything in software, no hardware RAID cards and no motherboard RAID ("fakeraid", "BIOS raid").

[MoreBandwidthPls]

Section 5.5 in your motherboard manual (http://dlcdnet.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/...x-e_deluxe.pdf) points to a RAID manual on the driver CD. I don't have access to that CD so you may need to read it yourself for hints if the RAID BIOS is updateable.

Pay particular note to the section in the main motherboard manual called "Resolving Conflict" on the bottom of page 5-15 where incorrect RAID metadata is contained on the disk and how to fix that. This may be the fundamental cause of your problem.

According to page 2-17, the motherboard jumper can be set to enable or disable the SATA controller. Is this in the correct setting?

See the warning on page 2-21: Hot plug support is not available for this motherboard. You may end up cooking the port if you keep trying it.

[salleluia]

I purchased an WD1001FALS HDD and added it as my second SATA drive to my A7N8X deluxe motherboard but it just hangs after displaying the Harddrive name.
Have you found the solution? The manual does not provide enough details to know what the problem is.

[iissmart]

I've been out of my apartment (the location of my file server with the hard drive) for a week now and I've just been hoping it doesn't lose power or crash, therefore rebooting and hanging after detecting the drive name.

If I need to reboot the machine I just unplug the SATA data cable, reboot, then hotplug it in after it's done booting. Even though the manual states the SATA ports are not hot-swappable, it's built into the tech behind SATA that all SATA ports are hot-swappable, so I don't see an issue in doing that each reboot (from the standpoint of frying the motherboard).

I do not have the driver CD for the motherboard anymore.

Page 5-15 doesn't apply to this situation.

So in other words, no, I have not found a solution, other than to just live with it or buy a new motherboard.

If you happen to find the solution, please post it here as well, so I can get mine fixed too!

[salleluia]

I am thinking of buying a PCI SATA 2 controller card. Have you heard of any good cards around.

[iissmart]

Originally Posted by salleluia

I am thinking of buying a PCI SATA 2 controller card. Have you heard of any good cards around.

If the card is going to be PCI then SATA2 is completely unnecessary. SATA2 runs at a faster speed that the PCI bus can handle so it will get throttled down to SATA "one" speeds anyway. The only ones I've looked into are in the $400+ range...because if I'm going to get a RAID controller card, it's going to be a good controller card. And those were PCI Express.

I'm currently looking around Asus' forums, as it seems some people made their own custom BIOS update which includes the updated Sil Image SATARAID driver in it, which fixes the hanging issue. Problem is, I don't really trust "homemade" BIOS updates...got more reading to do. I'll post back here when I decide on a BIOS update to try.

[iissmart]

Success! The computer now boots with all the drives plugged in, and detects the 1TB drive just fine. Here are the steps I did:

1) Grab a blank floppy, and a computer running Windows with a floppy drive.
2) Download C18E1013.zip (A7N8X-E Deluxe Latest BIOS, from Asus), AWDFLASH (Also from Asus), the latest Silicon Image SATARAID BIOS (from Silicon Image), and CBROM 2.15 (Alternative CBROM 2.15 download link)
3) Extract all the contents of everything into an easily accessible folder, preferably something like C:\bios
4) Make sure you have no other folders in this new folder. Everything must be within C:\bios, so for example there shouldn't be anything in C:\bios\BIO-003112\

5) Open a command prompt (Start -> Run, type "cmd" and hit enter, without the quotes)
6) Navigate to the folder you just created using the command "cd" (For example, if you used the folder I suggested above, you would type "cd C:\bios", without the quotes, and hit enter)
7) Now type "cbrom215 c18e1013.bin /pci 4284.bin" without quotes, and hit enter. This will take the latest BIOS for your motherboard, and merge the new SATARAID BIOS into it.
8) To make sure everything went correctly, type "cbrom215 c18e1013.bin /D". This will show a list of the modules in the BIOS. At the bottom should be a line with PCI(A), and should have "4284.bin" at the right end of that line.

9) Now put the blank floppy into the computer with the floppy drive.
10) Open My Computer, right click on the floppy drive (probably A:), and select "Format"
11) The formatting window should pop up. Check the box labeled "Create an MS-DOS startup disc" (which should disable all the other options), and click Start.
12) Click OK and close the format utility when the process completes.
13) Copy the modified BIOS file c18e1013.bin and the file AWDFLASH.EXE to the floppy disc (simply a drag and drop).

14) Close everything on the computer with the A7N8X-E Deluxe motherboard and reboot it. Make sure the computer is set to boot to the floppy drive, and that you have put the floppy in the drive.
15) Type the command "awdflash c18e1013.bin /py /sn" once you get to the "A:" prompt.
16) Press enter to confirm that you wish to overwrite the current BIOS.
17) Wait.
18) Once it says it is complete, remove the floppy, press F1 (as instructed), then reboot the machine (which should happen automatically once you press F1). Now the computer should detect the 1TB drive upon booting.

Hopefully these instructions work for you. If you need any other assistance, post back here and I'll gladly help you out.

[marcwolf]

I signed up here just to say thanks iissmart, you are a legend!

This fixed and resolved the whole Asus A7N8X-E SATA RAID hang problem for me, I was trying to enable it for the first time ever with a new Seagate 1TB SATA drive, and the Silicon Image 3112A onboard controller hung with the same problem for me, it detected the HDD but choked on the drive size and just sat there doing nothing.
I like the way you wrote it and used the latest A7N8X-E bios for the job.

I followed your very well written steps above, and it worked like a charm, all up and running with no trouble at all.

I am reinstalling XP fresh on this 1TB drive now (as a single boot drive, no raid running), I found working 3112A SATA floppy drivers for the F6 key boot install here: (the driver files from Asus/Silicon Image package below give an error loading on the XP fresh install)
http://kdegraaf.net/sil3x12.html

After the install I used this package to Install/Refresh the driver within the OS: "Silicon Image Serial ATA driver version V1.0.0.50 WHQL and Serial ATA Utility V1.1.3"
http://dlsvr04.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mis...icon_v1050.zip

It's all good so far, XP is installed and running off it now, thanks again, I was just looking at the hassle of "fixing it" by buying a PCI SATA RAID card and this saved me lots of extra time and trouble.

Cheers,

Marc

[iissmart]

Glad to hear you got it working as well, and thank you for linking to the extra files needed for an XP install. I'm running Ubuntu Linux on that computer, so I didn't even think about drivers

Hopefully you enjoy the rest of the forums here as well. We have lots of friendly people helping out others and are always happy to meet newcomers. Welcome!

[jpb0104]

So I totally found this thread just when I needed it. I have an old A7N8X Deluxe running FreeNAS. I just grabbed a 1TB Hitachi from Newegg. So pumped to drop it in. Granted I never had even enabled the SATA chip on this board so it was a bit of a gamble from the git-go.

A few differences from iissmart above. I don't have a floppy and don't care to use one ever again. So I went with a USB Flash drive.

Steps getting the new SATA BIOS:

1. Get the 1008-D.BIN from ASUS (latest revision for my board)
http://support.asus.com/download/dow...N8X-E%20Deluxe

2. Get the three other files mentioned above from
AWDFLASH, Sil Img BIOS, and CBROM

3. Follow iissmart steps 3 - 8, just subbing in 1008-D.BIN instead of C18E1013.bin

4. So at this pt we have the correct BIOS with the new SATA BIOS in the file 1008-D.BIN. We need to make a USB Stick MSDOS bootable. So download the HP Tool from here http://files.extremeoverclocking.com/file.php?f=197

Follow the directions on this site to make the USB disk bootable.
http://www.bay-wolf.com/usbmemstick.htm

5. After that copy the AWDFLASH and your bios file to the USB Stick.

6. Boot your A7N8X from the USB drive and when the C:\ comes up run
"awdflash c18e1013.bin /py /sn"


That's it. Much props to iissmart.

[wd1tbuser]

I registered just to say thank you for the information. I am about to try this now as mine is doing the same thing.

I even tried it on an adaptec hardware SATA RAID controller card and it prevents freezing but windows doesn't see the drive at all.

I'll try this first for native motherboard support and then I'll have to look into the raid controller card issue.

Funny thing is that my 1TB Seagate drive works fine on the sata controller card, just not the motherboard sata controller. Beware of the seagate 1TB drives though, there's a firmware bug in them...I bought this WD drive to mirror my seagate drive before applying the firmware update.

This has been quite a time consuming process compared to using smaller sized drives!

[salleluia]

Thanks so much iismart. I followed the directions exactly the only difference is my updated Bios is 1008-D since I have a ASUS A7N8X Deluxe Rev 2.00 motherboard. There are different Bios updates depending on the REV number for this motherboard. I am running Windows 2000 and used an XP machine to create my MS-DOS boot floppy disk. Thanks sooooo much now my WD1001FALS HDD gives me all the space I need. I left a donation and I want to encourage others who found this information useful to do the same.

[Alaric]

After struggling for a couple of days I found this thread. Thanks Iissmart. I followed your steps exactly and it worked, my board now sees the 1TB drive (I'm using a Seagate 1TB drive). I was able to install Win XP, pressed F6 and installed the drivers, etc, but when XP reboots I get the post screen, then it just sits there. I've tried reconfiguring the bios boot settings but no luck. What next?

[iissmart]

Originally Posted by Alaric

After struggling for a couple of days I found this thread. Thanks Iissmart. I followed your steps exactly and it worked, my board now sees the 1TB drive (I'm using a Seagate 1TB drive). I was able to install Win XP, pressed F6 and installed the drivers, etc, but when XP reboots I get the post screen, then it just sits there. I've tried reconfiguring the bios boot settings but no luck. What next?

This sounds like you don't have the correct boot device. Boot into the BIOS, go to the Advanced tab, then Advanced BIOS Features. Look at the options "First Boot Device", "Second Boot Device", and "Third Boot Device". What do they currently say? Also, is "Boot Other Device" set to Enabled or Disabled?

Try disabling the second/third boot device, and going through the list of choices for the first boot device, one at a time, until the system boots. Since this is a SATA drive, it might see it as SCSI, so try that first. Other potential choices: HDD-0, HDD-1, HDD-2, and HDD-3. Post back here with the results of changing these options so I (and others) know if they worked or not.

Don't worry, we'll get it working