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problem f6-ing sata raid drivers

rbnhood

Junior Member
Hi, I've just assembled a new computer and I've spent the last few hours scouring the internet for a fix to my windows install problem, but have been unable to overcome it.

Relevant specifications:
Motherboard: Gigabyte ex38-ds4 (ICH9R RAID Controller)
Hard Drives: 2x Seagate Barracuda SATA HDD
Optical Drive: Lite-on SATA 20x DVD Burner
Floppy Drive: Mad Dog external USB floppy

For setup I've set the SATA RAID/AHCI MODE in bios to RAID and created the raid0 array in the AHCI bios. (Note if I disable RAID mode windows sees the two HDDs just fine, however I am trying to run the drives in RAID0)

I am getting the infamous error code when booting the windows XP SP2 CD:
***STOP: 0x0000007B (0xF78D2524,0xC0000034,0x00000000,0x00000000)

Looking online I've found this has to do with windows not correctly recognizing my RAID0 parition due to lack of the appropriate controller drivers. Here's what I've tried so far to fix this problem:

1. Downloaded the SATA RAID driver from the following website:
http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Sup...el.aspx?ProductID=2754
Per the instructions placed the driver files onto a blank formatted floppy and connected my USB floppy drive. On windows install I hit f6 to load 3rd party drivers and pressed S to specify additional adapters. Now the strangeness begins..

It prompts me to insert the driver disk into A but when I hit enter it does nothing.. just waits a few seconds and returns me to the same insert disk prompt. It doesn't try to read from the floppy drive, no errors, nothing at all, just back to the same "insert manufacurer's OEM driver diskette prompt"

I thought this may be result of a bad floppy drive or disk but I have tried multiple disks and checked their contents, and also checked that my USB floppy drive is showing up as drive A at startup.


2. After failing to f6 the RAID controller, I saw there was another way to do this without a floppy disk: to slipstream the drivers onto the startup disk using nLite Windows. However after following their instructions and successfully creating the new windows disk, I still recieved the same error code upon startup (no f6ing this time).

By now I've wasted the better part of a day on troubleshooting the seemingly simple issue of loading a 3rd party raid controller. At this point I'm stuck and have had no luck finding other people with a similar setup and startup problem as me. is there anything I'm clearly overlooking here? Any help would be greatly appreciated at this point.
 
You're a little confused. The SATA driver you need (for the OS to see the drives ) is native to XP (sp1 and beyond) and Vista, so they don't have to be F6'd. Some chipset driver packages will include an enhanced SATA driver to improve SATA performance, but you don't need that to set up a RAID. With XP you do have to F6 the RAID driver though, and the set up the RAID (stripe/mirror, etc.) with the driver's setup utility. With Vista the RAID driver is native and is setup by choosing to install RAID during the install. Also be sure to set up RAID in your BIOS first.
 
So which is the RAID driver I have to f6? Can you point me to a link?

I was using the Intel ICH9R Driver for preinstall, f6ing does nothing with that driver on my floppy.
 
Solved! Ok it required digging up an old school floppy drive and using the floppy cable to connect to my mother board for the f6 to properly load drivers from it.

so FYI, USB Floppy drives will not work correctly when f6ing RAID drivers, at least with my above computer setup. You must use an internal floppy drive connected by floppy cable for the f6 to work correctly.
 
Originally posted by: rbnhood
so FYI, USB Floppy drives will not work correctly when f6ing RAID drivers, at least with my above computer setup. You must use an internal floppy drive connected by floppy cable for the f6 to work correctly.
USB floppy drives WILL generally work for drivers in XP, but it might be an issue with your particular motherboard BIOS or USB floppy drive.

A connected UBS floppy disk drive does not work when you press F6 to install mass storage drivers during the XP installation process.

"When you attempt to install Windows XP on a computer that has a USB floppy disk drive connected, and press F6 to install mass storage drivers from a floppy, the USB floppy drive does NOT work.

The Windows XP installation supports a limited number of USB floppy disk drives, which are included in the Txtsetup.sif file:

Plug and Play ID USB floppy disk drive model
USB\VID_03EE&PID_6901 Mitsumi
USB\VID_057B&PID_0000 Y-E Data; Sony part number 09K9835
USB\VID_0644&PID_0000 TEAC; IBM option part number 27L4226, FRU 05K9283


The following USB floppy disk drives are NOT included in the Txtsetup.sif file:

Plug and Play ID USB floppy disk drive model
USB\VID_03F0 &PID_2001 HP
USB\VID_054C &PID_002C Sony
USB\VID_057B &PID_0001 Y-E Data
USB\VID_0409 &PID_0040 NEC
USB\VID_0424 &PID_0FDC SMSC"
 
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