My Z97 Pro i7 build may have become a disaster. Need immediate advice.

[inachu]

Thank you for this information, mfenn. Realize that the manual is missing critical information, making it impossible to know what to do with so many drives.

What you guys don't know is that while I was posting here I was on the phone with technical support at ASUS... All day. From around 10 AM to 10 PM. No joke. And one rep after another had no clue and could no answer even the most basic questions.

Worse, one rep after another would put me on hold to ask for help, but their phone system was screwed up so as soon as i was put on hold I was disconnected. This happened again and again and again. But when you call back, you have to wait 30 to 60 minutes to talk to someone. Finally around 5 PM I was fed up and asked for a manager or supervisor. The person I was speaking to refused, got really nasty with me (and I do mean nasty... i wish I was recording the call because it would go viral on YouTube in hours) and I just exploded. I never yell on the phone, but by then I had lost it. Completely.

So I hung up and called their corporate office in California. I explained the situation and let them know I was posting about this online, YouTube, everywhere. They then did what they could to find me a supervisor in tech support.

And they did, but he admitted that no one there had the proper training or knowledge about these boards and that they just "read the manual" while a customer is on hold. They have one or two higher ends techs and neither was there.

Every person I spoke with was terribly confused about the Intel ports. Some said I cannot use 5 & 6 for anything because they are "special for something else." Some said I could only have one single RAID on ports 3 & 4 and no more. One actually told me he was certain the ASMdeia Ports would support RAID and a DVD-ROM drive (never mind the manual clearly states otherwise).

See what I was up against?

Even now I am waiting a callback today with "better information" from the supervisor, who said he was stumped. He said most callers have two hard drives and DVD drive so anything beyond that is very difficult for them to understand.

I will never, ever buy an ASUS product again. This was the worst experience of my life.

By the way, Windows has the Blue Screen of death now. I knew this would happen since it was not set up properly.

Oh and mfenn, the advise you gave me above... That is how I explained to the tech support I wanted to install my setup. I was told either "I don't know if that will work" or "No you can't put a RAID on 5 & 6" or "You can only put one drive on 5 or 6."

You see the insanity in that?

The theme that seems to be trending for a few years that per this post we can conclude that:

Yes we as the end user are the beta testers as they do not have the time or energy to beta test these products themselves.

Would be nice to have an engineering foot note as an insert that states something like:

The following hardware was used to validate.

Also for now on I will only buy motherboards that have the stamp "ISO 9001" Or is it "ISO 90001"

Motherboards with the ISO 9001xxx stamp shows they properly tested the unit for quality control. Not sure if the packaging for this motherboard was stamped with that ISO number or not.

It just helps to know when something has met ISO 9xxxx specifications that you are getting hopefully the best quality to know it was tested.

 

[Ketchup]

The theme that seems to be trending for a few years that per this post we can conclude that:

Yes we as the end user are the beta testers as they do not have the time or energy to beta test these products themselves.

Would be nice to have an engineering foot note as an insert that states something like:

The following hardware was used to validate.

Also for now on I will only buy motherboards that have the stamp "ISO 9001" Or is it "ISO 90001"

Motherboards with the ISO 9001xxx stamp shows they properly tested the unit for quality control. Not sure if the packaging for this motherboard was stamped with that ISO number or not.

It just helps to know when something has met ISO 9xxxx specifications that you are getting hopefully the best quality to know it was tested.

This does make sense actually. If I am understanding this correctly. Intel/Asmedia/whoever has the chipsets. The motherboard manufacturer/engineer has to provide the board's connections and BIOS interface for these abilities. When you call the motherboard manufacturer, you never will speak with an engineer.

And if you do insist on doing it all with this board Matt, leave room for testing (you may even want to buy an extra drive or two for this). You could always turn them into backup drives later.

 

[Matt_Stevens]

Hi all. Today I regroup and start fresh to get it right. It's been difficult to know what I should do. Based upon what I have read I will do the following... Please correct me if my sequence is wrong...

Drives placed as follows...
Samsung SSD on Intel SATA 1 for my OS
DVD on Intel SATA 2
Two Samsung HDD's on Intel SATA ports 3 & 4.
Intel SATA ports 5 & 6 empty for now (these are the SATA Express)
ASMedia SATA empty for now

(I will worry about additional drives later - I can just install a SATA card for the RAID 1)

The BIOS has been set to RAID (all sata ports are enabled) and I verified it is in fact SAVED. I'll even do that again.

I will go ahead and start setting up the raid in the BIOS, but not until i read through the MB section on this one more time. I believe I set it to RAID in the BIOS (done) and then reboot and CNTRL I into the RAID setup.

Once that is set I will reinstall Windows 7. Should I wipe my Samsung SSD drive first? It of course has a busted Win7 on it.

During the new installation I make sure to LOAD DRIVER during the install, that way I can load the drivers needed for Windows to see my SSD. I should come across this...

note: I worry my current Win7 install will see my SSD since Win7 is on it, in which case I will not be sure what to do... Unless my configging RAID in the BIOS properly means my Windows 7 install CD will absolutely not see the SSD now??? Hence my asking if I need to wipe the SSD first.

If I am correct I am installing Intel RST RAID Driver version 13.6.0.1002 from a flash drive...

https://downloadcenter.intel.com/product/55005/Intel-Rapid-Storage-Technology-Intel-RST-

Once that is complete I can continue to install Windows.

When I come to the screen about authenticating or registering (or whatever it is) Windows 7 I click on "SKIP" and continue to finish the install.

Once that installation is finished I can (and this is where I am not 100% sure of the proper sequence, so correct me if I am wrong)...

I install all of the chipset/audio/lan/wifi/bluetooth drivers from the ASUS CD (I already checked them against the latest on their website. The CD has all the latest drivers, other than the one for the ASMedia SATA ports, which I will download). I am very comfortable using CD's for installs. I'm old fashioned.

Then I can install Intel Rapid Storage Technology monitoring software??? I am not sure on this. I had such software on my prior system (it was a MSI MB hardware RAID, with Intel able to monitor stability in the software, if I understood it all correctly).

AM I RIGHT? I believe I cannot install Intel RST until I have the MB chipset drivers installed to Windows, yes?

Thank you for the help in this. I really want to get it right this time.

 

[Bearach]

The first 6 are all gray and from Intel.

Then there are two more that are black (those are the ASMeida, which do not support RAID or DVD-Roms and are known to be slower than Intel).

It's possible 1 & 2 are different shades of gray (they are the SATA express ports, "Compatible with 2 X 6Gb/s SATA"), but I have a strange form of color blindness (not joking) so I can't tell if that is the case.

I have the older revision of the board, but they're similar (no USB 3.1). Not sure if it will help, but the "first" 6 SATA are not all Intel.

I've taken images and tried to show where the Intel ports are.

Unless they've changed the board a lot, I don't know I've not checked the manual yet, this should be the layout of the ports.

EDIT: I see this information wasn't needed!

 

[Matt_Stevens]

My board is very similar. ASMedia, then above the 4 intel and then above the SATA xpress, which are Intel 5 & 6.

 

[inachu]

Hi all. Today I regroup and start fresh to get it right. It's been difficult to know what I should do. Based upon what I have read I will do the following... Please correct me if my sequence is wrong...

Drives placed as follows...
Samsung SSD on Intel SATA 1 for my OS
DVD on Intel SATA 2
Two Samsung HDD's on Intel SATA ports 3 & 4.
Intel SATA ports 5 & 6 empty for now (these are the SATA Express)
ASMedia SATA empty for now

(I will worry about additional drives later - I can just install a SATA card for the RAID 1)

The BIOS has been set to RAID (all sata ports are enabled) and I verified it is in fact SAVED. I'll even do that again.

I will go ahead and start setting up the raid in the BIOS, but not until i read through the MB section on this one more time. I believe I set it to RAID in the BIOS (done) and then reboot and CNTRL I into the RAID setup.

Once that is set I will reinstall Windows 7. Should I wipe my Samsung SSD drive first? It of course has a busted Win7 on it.

During the new installation I make sure to LOAD DRIVER during the install, that way I can load the drivers needed for Windows to see my SSD. I should come across this...

note: I worry my current Win7 install will see my SSD since Win7 is on it, in which case I will not be sure what to do... Unless my configging RAID in the BIOS properly means my Windows 7 install CD will absolutely not see the SSD now??? Hence my asking if I need to wipe the SSD first.

If I am correct I am installing Intel RST RAID Driver version 13.6.0.1002 from a flash drive...

https://downloadcenter.intel.com/product/55005/Intel-Rapid-Storage-Technology-Intel-RST-

Once that is complete I can continue to install Windows.

When I come to the screen about authenticating or registering (or whatever it is) Windows 7 I click on "SKIP" and continue to finish the install.

Once that installation is finished I can (and this is where I am not 100% sure of the proper sequence, so correct me if I am wrong)...

I install all of the chipset/audio/lan/wifi/bluetooth drivers from the ASUS CD (I already checked them against the latest on their website. The CD has all the latest drivers, other than the one for the ASMedia SATA ports, which I will download). I am very comfortable using CD's for installs. I'm old fashioned.

Then I can install Intel Rapid Storage Technology monitoring software??? I am not sure on this. I had such software on my prior system (it was a MSI MB hardware RAID, with Intel able to monitor stability in the software, if I understood it all correctly).

AM I RIGHT? I believe I cannot install Intel RST until I have the MB chipset drivers installed to Windows, yes?

Thank you for the help in this. I really want to get it right this time.

Yeah wipe the drive and start fresh.

If you truly want to keep your windows 7 install then I think the only raid supported for you would then be "SOFTWARE RAID" http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/36504/how-to-create-a-software-raid-array-in-windows-7/

By doing a fresh install then you know right from the getgo that raid is supported at the start and not just by software. It's been ages since I did a raid setup. Maybe I should try it this weekend.

 

[mfenn]

Hi all. Today I regroup and start fresh to get it right. It's been difficult to know what I should do. Based upon what I have read I will do the following... Please correct me if my sequence is wrong...

Drives placed as follows...
Samsung SSD on Intel SATA 1 for my OS
DVD on Intel SATA 2
Two Samsung HDD's on Intel SATA ports 3 & 4.
Intel SATA ports 5 & 6 empty for now (these are the SATA Express)
ASMedia SATA empty for now

(I will worry about additional drives later - I can just install a SATA card for the RAID 1)

You can use the SATA Express ports for your RAID 1. They act as normal SATA ports when there isn't a device connected to the extra SATA Express sense block.

I will go ahead and start setting up the raid in the BIOS, but not until i read through the MB section on this one more time. I believe I set it to RAID in the BIOS (done) and then reboot and CNTRL I into the RAID setup.

You shouldn't need to do anything in the RAID BIOS (CTRL-I) menu. If you don't set up the drive, it will default to an independent disk.

Once that is set I will reinstall Windows 7. Should I wipe my Samsung SSD drive first? It of course has a busted Win7 on it.

No, you don't need to.

During the new installation I make sure to LOAD DRIVER during the install, that way I can load the drivers needed for Windows to see my SSD. I should come across this...

note: I worry my current Win7 install will see my SSD since Win7 is on it, in which case I will not be sure what to do... Unless my configging RAID in the BIOS properly means my Windows 7 install CD will absolutely not see the SSD now??? Hence my asking if I need to wipe the SSD first.

If I am correct I am installing Intel RST RAID Driver version 13.6.0.1002 from a flash drive...

https://downloadcenter.intel.com/product/55005/Intel-Rapid-Storage-Technology-Intel-RST-

Download the f6flpy-x64.zip from here and extract it to your USB device. When you load the driver, you will see your SSD with the previous Windows partitions on it. You can delete the partitions from the Setup GUI until it says "Uninitialized drive" and then click next.

When I come to the screen about authenticating or registering (or whatever it is) Windows 7 I click on "SKIP" and continue to finish the install.

Correct.

Then I can install Intel Rapid Storage Technology monitoring software??? I am not sure on this. I had such software on my prior system (it was a MSI MB hardware RAID, with Intel able to monitor stability in the software, if I understood it all correctly).

From the Intel Download page I linked above, the SetupRST.exe package includes the full RST driver and monitoring tools (as opposed to the minimal bootstrap contained in the zip).

AM I RIGHT? I believe I cannot install Intel RST until I have the MB chipset drivers installed to Windows, yes?

You can install the RST driver at any time. There is really no such thing as chipset drivers anymore. The Intel INF Update utility just converts the generic names that Windows uses by default into the Intel (R) Official Names (TM). There's no harm in installing it, but it also doesn't really do anything and is certainly not a prerequisite.

You can setup your RAID sets from the RST Windows GUI or the BIOS, it ends up doing the same thing either way.

Thank you for the help in this. I really want to get it right this time.

Happy to help.

 

[Matt_Stevens]

Thanks again. Much appreciated. I have been working my the Shuttle XPC build I mentioned and am just about done. It went smooth as silk. No trouble outside of the usual Windows Update doesn't went to update because it's stupid and needs a quick fix.

This was good practice. I will go gung-ho forward with my ASUS tomorrow morning.

Real quick... What's your opinion on the Samsung Magician Software?

 

[mfenn]

Thanks again. Much appreciated. I have been working my the Shuttle XPC build I mentioned and am just about done. It went smooth as silk. No trouble outside of the usual Windows Update doesn't went to update because it's stupid and needs a quick fix.

This was good practice. I will go gung-ho forward with my ASUS tomorrow morning.

Real quick... What's your opinion on the Samsung Magician Software?

I use it to update firmware and that's about it. I don't like stuff starting on boot, so I usually install the latest version when I need to do a firmware update, do the update, and then uninstall it.

 

[Matt_Stevens]

A real quick update since I am strapped for time. I did as described in my prior post. It wasn't perfect, but I think it worked.

It took four hours for Microsoft to activate my Windows today. Once I reinstalled I naturally had to re-activate, but they just could not figure it out. I ended up at Level 3, which I had no idea existed. I knew of Level 2 Help, but Level 3?

But yeah, four hours! I am regretting doing this system build myself. I should have paid someone to build the f***er. But how was I to know it would end up like this?

The way in which I have the rig set up is exactly like I had planned when I ordered the MB, but was told I could NOT do by everyone at ASUS.

SSD on Intel SATA 1.
DVD-ROM on 2.
3 & 4 are the RAID 0 and 5 & 6 are the RAID 1.
My spare drive is on ASMedia SATA port 1.

And it's perfectly fine. In fact, i didn't even have to format the RAID drives. Because of Intel RST the Bios recognized the drives were raids and BAM, they were just like what I had on my prior system. Amazing.

I had to install an internal SATA card for my BD drive, but whatever. Not a big deal.

Now onto the Windows updates (using WUSoffline). I actually won't have time today since I am heading out, but maybe I am in the home stretch.

Thanks to all for helping me out. I'll post back when I am finished.

Oh yeah... I still need to install the graphics card.

 

[Torn Mind]

Seems like ASUS's reputation for crappy tech support strikes yet again. It is likely they try to meet a 95-98% quality target and the small percentage of duds are utterly kicked to the curb because they will still make money off the premium they charge for the boards.

 

[Matt_Stevens]

All I can say right now is I am thrilled that I have made some progress. i think ASUS makes terrific parts, but their technical support is abysmal at best.

I still need to do all of the Windows Updates. i just don't have the energy to do it right now. Maybe this weekend.

 

[Matt_Stevens]

More on my status...

My MOUSE is hell on earth. it will not work right and I have tried FIVE of them. Two corded (USB) and three wireless (each has a little USB connector). Basically the mouse has massive inconsistent lag. It's bad. And clicking is highly unreliable.

I have never encountered anything like this before and it is making it pretty much impossible to do anything on my brand new top of the line system. Earlier today I ordered a PS/2 Mouse just in case something is screwed up about my USB ports (I tried every USB2.0 port I have).

I absolutely checked my device manager each time to make sure only one mouse was installed and there was never a ! anywhere.

Meanwhile, onto a less destructive issue...

In my Device Manager I do have a ? at...

Other Devises, "PCI Simple Communications Controller" and "Unknown device"

 

[Ketchup]

Did you use the "wizard" on the Asus CD to install all your drivers? A really slick program.

Google the hardware ID under properties for each to see what they are.

 

[Matt_Stevens]

Yes, I installed it all. It was quite simple.

Right now I have a mouse plugged into the USB2.0 port on the FRONT of my Case. And after one hour I have no lag or problems.

I am starting to believe my Asus MB is a dud. Even in the BIOS the mouse was acting squirly. Stuttered. So I may be in a world of hurt and forced to tear this thing apart and send the MB back to NewEgg for a replacement. God help me if that is the case.

 

[Ketchup]

Which USB ports are you using?

 

[Matt_Stevens]

I have tried all of the USB2.0 ports in the rear. With each mouse. I have not tried the USB3.0 ports since that would an insane waste. I have numerous 3.0 devices that will need to be plugged back there.

My thinking is something is wrong in how the BIOS is set up or... I have a bad board and am in hell. But how to determine which of the two?

The mouse still works flawlessly hooked into the front case USB port.

 

[Ketchup]

A PCI simple communications controller could easily be a chip the controls your USB ports, so take care of that first.

I haven't done a side-by-side comparison, but just as an example, under Universal Serial Bus controllers I have:

ASMedia XHCI 1.0 Controller
Intel 9 Series .... 8CA6
Intel 9 Series .... 8CAD
Intel USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller

and various hubs and devices

 

[Matt_Stevens]

And I have that ? in my Device Manager. I wish I knew what it was.

I would call ASUS, but we all know that is a waste of time.

 

[Ketchup]

And I have that ? in my Device Manager. I wish I knew what it was.

I would call ASUS, but we all know that is a waste of time.

I don't understand the problem. Right-click the devices in question, select properties. Go to the details tab, then Google the data in the value field.

 

[VirtualLarry]

A PCI simple communications controller could easily be a chip the controls your USB ports, so take care of that first.

No, that's the Intel ME engine interface device.

 

[Auric]

Also, your screenshot shows BIOS 0401 while current is 2401 (oldest listed is 0603)?

http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/Z97PRO/HelpDesk_Download/

 

[Auric]

No, that's the Intel ME engine interface device.

If so and not required then rather than installing the driver, disable it from the BIOS or MEBx.

 

[Ketchup]

No, that's the Intel ME engine interface device.

Makes sense, thanks VL.

 

[Matt_Stevens]

Gents, thanks for replying. I have spent so much time on this system I had to step away yesterday.

I am downloading the BIOS and BIOS UPDATED from ASUS' website, though I have never actually flashed a BIOS before. Kind of scary, but I'll read up on it.

My mouse works great, as long as it is plugged into the front case USB2.0 port. Maybe a BIOS update will solve the issue.

I'm still unclear what "Intel ME Engine Interface" is.

And as I think I mentioned before, maybe my troubles with these issues explains why I cannot plug either my SATA card or 1394b card into anything but the top two PCI Express slots, which means they are right above and below my NVIDIA card. That's a heat issue.

When I try and plug either into the lower PCI Express slots they just don't work. It's as if they are not there.