Change an Intel motherboard without reinstalling or repairing windows XP
- From: "CIDM" <cidm@xxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: 24 Jul 2006 21:33:18 -0700
Hi everyone !
I wanted to share my little experience with a motherboard change I did
today. I finally got it it fully working and this, without reinstaling
or reparing XP, contrairy to what is stated in the Intel Matrix readme
file. Here's the walkthrough, it might bring some lights over the
wonderful blue screen of death (STOP error 7B) that many might have
encontered...
The setup :
We had a 3.4 P4 800Mhz + 915PBL board working very fine. C: drive is a
standalone 80 gig 7200 rpm, D: is a RAID 0 array consisting of 2 x 120
gig SATA drive giving 240 gig of speed for video editing. The SATA mode
is then RAID (matrix) in the BIOS.
The sad thing ( :> ):
The owner of the machine won a fine 3.4 Pentium D (950 If I remember
correctly...) and the 915PBL does not support Pentium D... Calls for a
motherboard change ! Since Intel stocks are VERY limited, we opted for
the 945Gnt, different but quite the same features as for Matrix RAID
capability... So... We do a backup of the 240 gig on an external
enclosure. (never skip that step... belive me). The motherboard is
replaced... everything is fine... I reboot to windows, fix all the
conflics, fix the activation part, fix everything... Good. The only
thing missing is the D: (RAID). So I go to BIOS, set SATA mode from IDE
to RAID. Then here is is, the infamous STOP 7B error... the new Matrix
RAID is a new ICH type... arggg... and windows would have needed it
from the F6 function at initial install. Everyone talks about windows
repair function but this sometime does quite a lot of damage... I could
have flush the D: array, but as soon as the RAID is enabled Windows
won't boot because the C: drive (even if is not a RAID member) is on
the RAID controller...
The solution :
1. I managed to set everything back to IDE in the BIOS. This allows
windows to see the SATA controller as a standard one, using the drivers
built in... (or previously installed from the old board?) Windows is
booting fine, no conflics, no error except from the missing RAID
array... that's ok for now.
2. Turned off computer, found a 80gig IDE drive and connected it to the
good old PATA interface, Turned back compter on.
3. Cloned with Ghost from the SATA 80 gig to the temporary PATA 80 Gig.
4. Turned off computer, disconnected the SATA 80 gig leaving only the
two SATA RAID members (120x 2). Turned back on, went in the BIOS
setting it to boot from the PATA device first.
5. Got it right into Windows. Made sure everything was ok in device
manager.
6. rebooted to the BIOS, now ENABLING the SATA mode to RAID... Watched
that the 2 120 gig members formed the old array again in the BIOS.
Booting to windows went fine.
7. Now windows detects the RAID controller ! Time to insert the floppy
used in the F6 sequence. Made sure the drivers for the RAID are
correctly loaded. (note that we are still of the PATA drive, original
system's clone). Rebooted, made sure the array was ok in windows (D:
drive and data finally appeared there :) Changed the label of C:
(important!).. Turned off the computer.
8. Reconnected the original SATA 80 gig. Turned on. WENT DIRECTLY in
BIOS.
9. Changed back to IDE (SATA mode)
10. Ghosted back from PATA 80 gig (new label as a guide for which one
is the source) to the original SATA 80 gig. Turned off computer...
11. Disconnected the old PATA drive... Turned on. WENT DIRECTLY in
BIOS.
12. Changed back to RAID (SATA mode) made sure the standalone SATA was
first to boot.
13. Windows started booting. Crossed my fingers and ... no blue screen
!!!
14. Made sure the D: RAID 1 array was operationnal, the C: is booting
from the SATA drive. Noconflic in device manager. Opened a cold beer.
The morale of the story:
Booting from a standard controller (the one for the CD-ROM and older
PATA drives) will almost succed everytime without problems. The drivers
needs to be detected by windows before booting a RAID array, and the
RAID array must be active at booting for windows to detect it... (the
thing goes round and round). Using the old PATA, you trick windows into
having the system booting from a STANDARD controller, and the ability
to install the RAID from the live windows.
I hope it gives some ideas for the ones Googling on that matter.
Francis Lessard
CIDM
.
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