Re: ASUS P4PE SATA Woes...

google@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
I have an ASUS P4PE with a IDE Hard Drive about to fail (WD 1200JB).
Just purchased a Seagate 1TB Barracuda 7200.12 to replace as the board
indicated it was SATA capable. Particular version: P4PE-

The new drive is not recognized. I've tried both the primary and
secondary SATA connectors onboard.

Instructions at ASUS indicate to set onboard SATA to enable and I
don't see it in the CMOS at all. have looked everywhere in the CMOS
for anything related and the only thing I can see is the BOOT area and
I have indicated that there is another boot device and put it 3rd on
the list after CD and Floppy. but before the IDE drive. reference is
to onboard SCSI/ATA drive. The only other reference to BIOS is to
enable BIOS update.... which I left.

It then says to enter the BIOS and to set it to single raid...by
pressign Ctrl-F and then Ctrl-Y.
No amount of Ctrl-F gets me anywhere... I can't seem to get into the
BIOS as it describes. Is there any other way to initiate it?

The only options I have are DEL for SETUP, TAB to view logo screen adn
Alt-F2 for EZ Flash.
Can you help?

4.4.3 PCI Configuration

Onboard SATA/IDE RAID Controller [Enable]

That is the only setting that looks like it could stop you
from using it. There is nothing related to INT 0x13 or INT 19
capture. No setting to enable/disable the FastTrak BIOS code
module. Pressing Control-F should have caused the Promise
screen to appear.

Some RAID code modules need a minimum of two disks detected,
before they will start. I don't know if that is what is happening
in your case or not. Sometimes, RAID code modules have problems
with large disks (some SIL3112 chips and motherboards, freeze
during POST, if a 1TB is connected). But you have no response
at all, which suggests the above "4.4.3" setting isn't correct.

Sometimes, the option you'd want, is to set up a "Stripe of one disk",
as a means to fooling the controller into operating in RAID mode.
Some RAID controllers are perfectly happy to work with single
disks that have not had RAID metadata added to them - it is
the documentation that never mentions it as a possibility.

If the IDE drive connected to the Southbridge was still working,
you could install the Promise driver and then work on it.

Device Manager should be showing an entry for the Promise, even
if the RAID BIOS code module refuses to load. The PCI bus config
space stuff should still respond. There is a field in the Device
Manager properties entry, that will show the VEN/DEV. It should
match something like this

VEN_105A&DEV_3376

That would tell you the chip is present.

The Promise driver package, like several of theirs, does not have
an Add/Remove entry. The vanilla P4PE offers a floppy F6 style
download (suitable for initial Windows installation). If you
install that manually, while the system is running, then you get
a driver, but you also have less control over removing it later.
(That is a problem on the PDC20378, when changing drivers from
the RAID to the IDE one and vice versa. Your PDC20376 doesn't
seem to have an IDE driver, just the RAID one.)

In this folder, I can see a PAM (Promise Array Management) kit.

ftp://ftp.asus.com/pub/asus/misc/ide/pdc20376/

ftp://ftp.asus.com/pub/asus/misc/ide/pdc20376/376pam3218.zip

If you have installed a Promise driver, and then the PAM, it is
possible you can view the drive(s) connected to the PDC20376.
It may allow you to set up the drive as a "stripe of one", or
even to just use the thing as a normal drive. My experience
with a similar chip (PDC20378), is the driver seems to use
a reserved sector and metadata, even when a single drive is
used in a purportedly non-RAID mode. (That is only important,
if you attempt to move the drive to some other SATA chip, and
find a problem viewing partitions.) In any case, using
the 376PAM thing, may give you an option to look at things,
while booted from your old IDE disk. You're going to need
some Promise driver installed anyway, on the image that
is eventually loaded on your new disk.

None of that driver/PAM stuff, gets around the BIOS problem.
Maybe, if you can make some kind of change to the drive, using
PAM, the BIOS module will recognize the drive. And some kind of
recognition is needed, if you ever expect to boot from the
PDC20376 + 1TB drive. So while hacking with PAM may make
the 1TB into a "data" drive, the BIOS has to work, if you
want to boot from it.

I got kinda frustrated with the PDC20378 I had, and only
played with it initially. And never used it after that.
I was annoyed, that it wasn't transparent enough, to allow
moving a drive, between the Promise chip and the Southbridge.

Best guess,
Paul
.

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