how to correctly install sata drives...

[Okasa]

so my basic build is

Asus msn sli dlx
2x WD raptor 74G (raid 0)
2x WD 320G JBOD individual raids

so basically im tyring to get these drives installed correctly, because they are still showing up in the 'safely remove' section on my system tray. my understanding is that even though they are sata, they should (if correctly setup) be shown in the device manager under IDE, but at the moment its under the nvidia jmicron section. please help me out, i think that this is the root of a major problem my system is having...

 

[Roguestar]

If they're using dedicated SATA they should be showing up in the "safely remove hardware" thing, and shouldn't show up under IDE at all, iirc.

Edit: If you think this is the root of a major problem you are having, what is the major problem?

 

[ch33zw1z]

When installing the drives in an array, they will not show up in "Safely Remove Hardware". If they are standalone drives, they will show up there because they can be halted and removed from the system at any time.

*insert Rogue's question here*

 

[AllGamer]

i have been hot swapping SATA and EIDE(ATA) drives for a while they work fine if you put them in those removable drive bays

 

[ch33zw1z]

You hot swap EIDE drives in bays? Just for the sake of asking, how are they connected to the mobo?

 

[AllGamer]

yes it depends mainly on Mobos

the never generation of mobos from Asus works properly for HotSwap

if they supports AMD 64x2 or Core2Duos then they are mostlikely compatible

no special connection

just the EIDE cable to the mobo, and the power both attached to the removeable drive bays

only MAKE SURE the HDD is set to Master or Slave, depending which one you pull out.

and of course never pull out the one for the OS

 

[Roguestar]

Don't you need to use the SATA power connector, and not a standard Molex connector too?

 

[Okasa]

Originally posted by: Roguestar
If they're using dedicated SATA they should be showing up in the "safely remove hardware" thing, and shouldn't show up under IDE at all, iirc.

Edit: If you think this is the root of a major problem you are having, what is the major problem?

so to answer this question, i have been getting a Delayed Write Failed Error from XP for a long time now. the problem occurs only during large file transfers, bout 5GB and higher or so, but can happen out of nowhere as well.

my thoughts are that there may be something wrong with the driver/software installed to handle my sata drives. also, i just recently tested the problem after turning off 'write caching' and 'read caching' on each drive, the problem didnt occur but the tranfer seemed slower, could turning these off solve the problem perhaps?

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: Okasa

Originally posted by: Roguestar
If they're using dedicated SATA they should be showing up in the "safely remove hardware" thing, and shouldn't show up under IDE at all, iirc.

Edit: If you think this is the root of a major problem you are having, what is the major problem?

so to answer this question, i have been getting a Delayed Write Failed Error from XP for a long time now. the problem occurs only during large file transfers, bout 5GB and higher or so, but can happen out of nowhere as well.

It's happening because Windows had a problem writing to the drive while flushing its write cache. Disabling write caching will make Windows stop complaining, but you may still get write errors (and, as you noticed, it will usually be slower).

Either your drivers or some piece of your hardware is messed up.

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: Roguestar
Don't you need to use the SATA power connector, and not a standard Molex connector too?

That's an interesting question. Every SATA Hot-Swap drive bay that I've seen uses the Molex connector to provide power. And the external SATA housings all get their power from either an external power supply or from a standard 110V cord.

I have YET to see a "Safely Remove Hardware" option for ANY SATA drive in ANY of my PCs or Servers. I've put together several Windows 2003 Servers and XP computers that are using SATA backup hard drives, either in Granite Digital's SATA trays, or in external SATA housings. All are using PCI or PCI-E SATA controllers which are "Hot-Swap-Capable" and use the "popular" Silicon Image controller chips onboard. In all these PCs, there's no option to turn off write caching or to "optimize for quick removal". Those options are greyed out.

I believe this is because my SATA controller cards are all "add-in" and are treated as SCSI controllers by Windows.

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: RebateMonger

Originally posted by: Roguestar
Don't you need to use the SATA power connector, and not a standard Molex connector too?

That's an interesting question. Every SATA Hot-Swap drive bay that I've seen uses the Molex connector to provide power. And the external SATA housings all get their power from either an external power supply or from a standard 110V cord.

I have YET to see a "Safely Remove Hardware" option for ANY SATA drive in ANY of my PCs or Servers. I've put together several Windows 2003 Servers and XP computers that are using SATA backup hard drives, either in Granite Digital's SATA trays, or in external SATA housings. All are using PCI or PCI-E SATA controllers which are "Hot-Swap-Capable" and use the "popular" Silicon Image controller chips onboard. In all these PCs, there's no option to turn off write caching or to "optimize for quick removal". Those options are greyed out.

...how do you remove the drives? Is there a separate application for shutting down the drives in a controlled manner?

Also, if you have set up RAID arrays, Windows doesn't see them as individual 'drives' anymore. You'll only get the 'safely remove' options (in general) if you are running the disks individually and Windows is directly managing them. If some other driver is involved, management decisions get made at that level.

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: Matthias99
...how do you remove the drives? Is there a separate application for shutting down the drives in a controlled manner?

Also, if you have set up RAID arrays, Windows doesn't see them as individual 'drives' anymore. You'll only get the 'safely remove' options (in general) if you are running the disks individually and Windows is directly managing them. If some other driver is involved, management decisions get made at that level.

These are all single SATA 320GB drives, swapped weekly and taken offsite.

There's really no way to perform any "safe removal" procedure that I can see. There's no way to be sure what day they'll be removed. Plus, they are Domain Controllers, and I don't necessarily want people logging into them as Domain Administrator just to disconnect the backup drive. We just "pull the plug".

As far as I can tell (based upon acquaintances and small business IT forums), this is COMMON PRACTICE in the small business IT community. Each night, there's a SINGLE file (typically 40GB to 150GB in size) written to the drives in NTBackup .BKF format.

I'm reading that write caching might be selectively turned off via a command-line tool that Microsoft issued. At least there was a Server 2000 version of this utility. And, it might also be possible to do something to flush the write cache every morning, before the drives could be removed.

And now I see why it works for me.....
As part of the backup routine, NTBackup runs a "Verification Pass". I doubt that the Verification could be performed unless the disk write was completed!

I'm now taking a second look at this procedure. I do periodic tests of backup file integrity, but I am going to do some tests to be SURE that the drives that are being taken offsite don't have any corrupted files. Since all the drives contain TWO to FIVE full system backup files, I really doubt it's likely that they'd ALL be corrupted. But, obvioiusly, I want to be sure.

 

[Okasa]

Originally posted by: Matthias99

Originally posted by: Okasa

Originally posted by: Roguestar
If they're using dedicated SATA they should be showing up in the "safely remove hardware" thing, and shouldn't show up under IDE at all, iirc.

Edit: If you think this is the root of a major problem you are having, what is the major problem?

so to answer this question, i have been getting a Delayed Write Failed Error from XP for a long time now. the problem occurs only during large file transfers, bout 5GB and higher or so, but can happen out of nowhere as well.

It's happening because Windows had a problem writing to the drive while flushing its write cache. Disabling write caching will make Windows stop complaining, but you may still get write errors (and, as you noticed, it will usually be slower).

Either your drivers or some piece of your hardware is messed up.

ive replaced my mobo, my psu, my ram, my hds, and the problem ensued. which drivers should i reinstall exactly, because ive tried to do that as well and im not confident i got them all

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: Okasa

Originally posted by: Matthias99

Originally posted by: Okasa

Originally posted by: Roguestar
If they're using dedicated SATA they should be showing up in the "safely remove hardware" thing, and shouldn't show up under IDE at all, iirc.

Edit: If you think this is the root of a major problem you are having, what is the major problem?

so to answer this question, i have been getting a Delayed Write Failed Error from XP for a long time now. the problem occurs only during large file transfers, bout 5GB and higher or so, but can happen out of nowhere as well.

It's happening because Windows had a problem writing to the drive while flushing its write cache. Disabling write caching will make Windows stop complaining, but you may still get write errors (and, as you noticed, it will usually be slower).

Either your drivers or some piece of your hardware is messed up.

ive replaced my mobo, my psu, my ram, my hds, and the problem ensued. which drivers should i reinstall exactly, because ive tried to do that as well and im not confident i got them all

I'd start with basic stability testing -- run Memtest86+ overnight, then try Prime95 (use multiple instances if you have a DC CPU) for at least a few hours running "Blend". If you can pass those, you can start in on potential software issues. But eliminate bad hardware first.

 

[Okasa]

well i have run memtest86 with the same problem and im pretty sure ive run prime95, didnt try mult instances and i do have DC. every time i have the error, my system log is filled up with multiple disc, NVRAIDSERVICE, and nvraid errors. also, i get a delayed write failed error on the desktop for F:\$Mft which is the harddrive i was accessing a lot of info from. this is why i think my raid setup could be the problem

 

[jbmx4life]

Aren't the Jmicron drivers problem-atic? I see it all over the place unless they have already released new drivers to fix the old ones?

 

[Okasa]

i have checked for newer drivers to no avail but ill double check now, what other drivers could i use? also, the errors say disc, nvraidservice, and nvraid, i know that jmicron is handling the raid as well but those errors are saying nvidia arent they?

 

[Okasa]

the odd thing is that the problem does not occur on my 2x 74 raptors on raid 0, only my 320 wd in their JBOD arrays, should i have not put them in arrays and just had them installed as individual sata non raid disks, as they are not in a raid. i used to have them in a 640 JBOD until this problem surfaced and i thought that huge drive could be the problem.