XP Doesn't recognize any Hard Disks???

[deadweight]

Yesterday, I sat down, spent two hours walking through all the documentation to put my computer together, everything is recognized in the BIOS (Including the SATA HDD) and DOS boot disks run. I think I'm ready to install XP. So I slap in my XP home, start the install process........and it says that no hard disks are installed, please check your connections, blah blah blah. So i go back in to my motherboard manual, yes it's hooked up correctly, but it says that if I want the SATA to be my Primary Drive with XP installed and recognized on it, I need, to create a Floppy disk w/ the correct drivers on it from the Motherboard support CD, hit F6 in the beginning of XP install to add the specific RAID or SCSI device. Sooooo, i put the CD in my old pc, fire it up, create the floppy with the drivers. Then stick it in my new comp, folly teh steps specify the right driver. Follow the instructions, then i still get the same error message, wont recognize it, whatever, though i know its set up right cuz the BIOS sees it and i followed the mobo manual. I tried it with various other drivers on the CD and various CMOS settings, but still the same error. So after thinking talking and considering, I belive I have 3 options and in this order:
1. Download new drivers from www.asus.com and Flash my BIOS with the newest update.
2. Temporarily install an IDE drive I have layin around and Install XP on that, then use Norton ghost or a shareware program from www.westerndigital.com which uses a bootable floppy that can copy hard drives, putting XP on my SATA drive after I get it set up and recognized through XP.
3. Buy another Seagate 80 GB SATA and hope it works with the RAID driver also avaliable on the mobo Support CD.

Any other ideas??? what would work best??? what do you think about my ideas???

any input is welcome

 

[Roshi229]

i'm not sure of your train of thought on this issue, but somehow it sounds right.
first i would check Asus' website for whitepages or something, possibly contact thier tech support before running out and buying another SATA drive, that's costly, unless you got the $$ and just need the excuse
i've not had the pleasure of installing SATA yet so i'm not much more help.

Good luck
~KB

and welcome to TF

 

[sPlAtOiD]

You didn't get a floppy drivers disk with your MOBO?And are you sure the drivers copied correctly to your floppy?And i assume if the Bios sees your hard drives you have the raid setting in your bios Enabled.It sounds like you have the book so you probably have it set right.When I set my raid up and used the disk it went without a hitch.Your hard drives are the same size?Just Checking some of the obvious.

 

[SanToast]

Do you have an onboard S-ATA controller?

 

[deadweight]

I got a CD with my mobo that had all the support drivers and manuals i could ever want on top of the manual given. I followed what was outlined in my manuals and it was triple checked by three other techie buddies. I only have one hard drive, my third and least likely to happen option suggests i get another drive, and setup a RAID 0, hoping that works with the drivers on the floppies. To my knowledge the folppies had the correct drivers on them, formatted em first and ran an extraction program from my mobo support CD that automatically copied the information to my floppy. I tried copying them manually, but when i got to the point that XP asked for my support floppy, i wouldnt recognize it as a support floppy, whereas the one that was automatically loaded said the drivers were at least avaliable

what do u think of option #2??? im likin it more and more but i dont know if it'll werk.

thanx
deadweight

 

[deadweight]

Yes santoast, if u look up the specs on my mobo, it supports RAID 0, 1, 0+1, and JBOD.

http://usa.asus.com/products/mb/socket939/a8v-d/overview.htm

Look in the DUAL RAID section, up to 4 SATA drives

 

[SanToast]

Install the South Bridge drivers. It will add support for the S-ATA controller.

 

[deadweight]

The mobo didnt came with a CD support disk, not a floppy. From it, I created floppies using there automatic driver floppy creator. I believe I tried the following drivers, I'm not sure, these are from the website, not the CD.
Promise SATA378 Driver V1.00.0.26 for Windows 98SE/NT4.0/ME/2000/XP/2003

Promise FastTrak 378 RAID Driver V1.00.1.37 for Windows 98SE/NT4/ME/2000/XP/2003

VIA VT6420 (VT8237) SATA RAID Driver Package Version 2.20D WHQL.

from http://usa.asus.com/support/download/item.aspx?ModelName=A8V Deluxe

I believe these are the southbridge drivers youre talking about.

they may be updated versions of the drivers and i will try them now, but even so, they might be the same thing.

P.S. please respond to the idea of using a hard disk copying software (for example Norton Ghost in Norton System Works or Western Digitals' Data Lifeguard Tools from http://support.wdc.com/download/index.asp?swid=1 .) from a IDE drive to my SATA once it gets recognized in an Installed XP Home??

thanks, deadweight

 

[SanToast]

Use the VT8237 (your South Bridge) S-ATA RAID drivers.

You can use any software you want to copy the HDD's contents as long as the formatting is the same (FAT to FAT or NTFS to NTFS). Check it man.

EDIT: Don't get your drivers from the asus website. Goto VIA Arena.