Any computer wizzards out there?

[Glorified Ape]

Alright, here's my problem. I have an Asus A7V333 motherboard running WinXP. I bought a SATA hard drive for storage, along with a SATA controller card (Silicon Image) to enable the board to deal with the drive since the A7V only has regular ATA. I've installed the controller card, installed the drivers, and connected the new HD to the card but my computer won't detect the new HD.

I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong here, so if there are any computer wizzes out there, I'd be ridiculously grateful for any help. I don't know if I have to change something in the BIOS or what.

 

[aesop081]

Alright, here's my problem. I have an Asus A7V333 motherboard running WinXP. I bought a SATA hard drive for storage, along with a SATA controller card (Silicon Image) to enable the board to deal with the drive since the A7V only has regular ATA. I've installed the controller card, installed the drivers, and connected the new HD to the card but my computer won't detect the new HD.

I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong here, so if there are any computer wizzes out there, I'd be ridiculously grateful for any help. I don't know if I have to change something in the BIOS or what.

I had one of those once but the wheels fell off.......

 

[8Ball]

Yo Ape !

Go into the computer management console (right clik on "My Computer" and click on manage).
Once in the CMC, in the left panel click on disk mgmt. You should see all the drives and partitions that is on your PC.

There should be one disk/partition that is inactive. Just activate the disk and format it.

After that, the new disk will show up in your disk list.

 

[Glorified Ape]

Ahhhh, thanks 8. I'll give it a shot. The help is much appreciated.

 

[Infanteer]

If that fails, hit it with a hammer and buy a new one....

 

[winchable]

Listen to infanteer Percussionary Repair is an effective method of fixing things, at least that way if someone asks you what's wrong with your computer you can say "Oh I say, there's a hammer through the casing and it seems to have punctured the chips." instead of "I have no idea, I'm going to have to take it to a computer guy."

 

[Infanteer]

Listen to infanteer Percussionary Repair is an effective method of fixing things, at least that way if someone asks you what's wrong with your computer you can say "Oh I say, there's a hammer through the casing and it seems to have punctured the chips." instead of "I have no idea, I'm going to have to take it to a computer guy."

:rofl:

"Percussionary Repair"?  That sounds like some dorky band thing....

 

[sigpig]

8balls advice sounds like it should work, but if it doesn't consider this. When I added linux to make my machine dual boot linux did not recognize my sata hd no matter what I tried. There were two different sata connectors on the mobo, and it seems they used different types of controllers. When I simply changed the cable to the other connector suddenly the sata drive was recognized and everything was great.

 

[8Ball]

Yeah Sig ! you are right !

But he did not mention Linux ! I think !? LOL

 

[Glorified Ape]

8balls advice sounds like it should work, but if it doesn't consider this. When I added linux to make my machine dual boot linux did not recognize my sata hd no matter what I tried. There were two different sata connectors on the mobo, and it seems they used different types of controllers. When I simply changed the cable to the other connector suddenly the sata drive was recognized and everything was great.

I'll give it a shot - the other suggestion didn't work but now I know that "manage" option exists for the system. This fricking thing is driving me nuts.

 

[honestyrules]

I can feel your pain. My guess is that you'll have to contact the silicon iamge rep on the net or something. There is quite a bit of nightmare stories about SATA. Nothing wrong with the drives, but the implementation (particularly in your case with the add-on card) is painfull. I have a sata compliant mobo, but no"native" support (that is the term employed anyway. I need a special driver disk to have the drive recognised but the mobo. I don't even dare to format the darn thing!

Call the company that manufacture the controller, it's the only way out IMHO...

 

[Glorified Ape]

I can feel your pain. My guess is that you'll have to contact the silicon iamge rep on the net or something. There is quite a bit of nightmare stories about SATA. Nothing wrong with the drives, but the implementation (particularly in your case with the add-on card) is painfull. I have a sata compliant mobo, but no"native" support (that is the term employed anyway. I need a special driver disk to have the drive recognised but the mobo. I don't even dare to format the darn thing!

Call the company that manufacture the controller, it's the only way out IMHO...

I guess I'll have to - I've tried all the suggestions here but nothing is working. I've updated the driver, which Windows doesn't seem to like even though it's supposedly signed. It has no issues with the RAID driver, but I'm not running a RAID and the straight SATA driver gets the yellow exclamation point on it in the device manager listing, even though it's the most recent version and it's signed.

I've rechecked all the connections and they're good. The drive isn't being recognized in the BIOS or Windows. I try to update the controller card bios, but the option is greyed when I run the Silicon Image SATA Controllers application. This is driving me nuts. I've got 250gb of disk space sitting idle.

 

[MadNad]

What about Service Pack 2,
There is a know problem with large drive if you don't have WIN XP SP2.
Also, What is the harddrive, Let me think, WD or Maxtor. These drive could drive you nuts also.
Also remember, that if you change some of your hardware, i would recommend to unisntall and reinstall Service Pack 2.
Sometime it solve a lot of hardware problems.

Have Fun

 

[Kat Stevens]

Can't help you. In my computer lexicon, "re-boot" means "kick it again, harder".

 

[ThatsLife]

Ape, I would suggest finding a computer help forum on google. That's the best I could offer you, i'll try and find you a good one.

 

[sigpig]

The forums at anandtech, http://forums.anandtech.com/, are a great place to look for info.

 

[Glorified Ape]

Thanks to all for the suggestions. I finally took the drive in to a shop to confirm that it wasn't a problem with the drive itself and, low and behold, the drive isn't spinning up, so it's defective. I've sent it back to Maxtor and they're sending me another. Hopefully that will be the end of my troubles.

Thanks again for the help - I'll be trying all the suggestions over again should the new drive not work.