sata drivers

[wseyller]

with the motherboards these days is it typical that you have to install drivers when installing windows with sata drives.

 

[rmrf]

Originally posted by: wseyller
with the motherboards these days is it typical that you have to install drivers when installing windows with sata drives.

Not just typical, it's required. You can slipstream a windows installation cd with the drivers in it if you are so inclined, but if you are just installing from an ordinary disc from microsoft, the floppy will be required during install.

 

[wseyller]

I have heard of some people not needing drivers is why I asked, and I wondered if sometimes the drivers are included with the motherboard or on the disk drive itself.

 

[MrChad]

Originally posted by: wseyller
I have heard of some people not needing drivers is why I asked, and I wondered if sometimes the drivers are included with the motherboard or on the disk drive itself.

nForce4 SATA chips will masquerade as IDE controllers so that Microsoft's generic IDE drivers work. AFAIK they are the only SATA controllers that do not require separate drivers on install.

 

[shortylickens]

I want to say that WinXP with SP2 will let you do SATA without any extra work. You could even boot from SATA if your MB allows it.

Any one want to tell me I'm wrong?

 

[IceBreakerG]

Originally posted by: shortylickens
I want to say that WinXP with SP2 will let you do SATA without any extra work. You could even boot from SATA if your MB allows it.

Any one want to tell me I'm wrong?

You're wrong lol. I've tried it before (installing XP Media Center 2005). I have a Gigabyte K8NXP-SLI motherboard, and it has 2 SATA controllers on it. The nForce4 SATA controller, and the Silicon Images 3114r5 SATA controller. I "HAVE" to use a floppy disk with the sata driver on it if i want to install windows to a drive on the Silicon Images controller. I was unsuccessful in trying to install windows to a hard drive on my nForce4 SATA controller. I don't know why it wouldn't work though. If i can get the money to get 4 of Seagates new 500GB drives, i might try to move my 2 SATA hard drives to the nForce4 controller and boot from that, and run Raid 5 on the 500GB drives (yeah, i know, wishful thinking lol). But yeah, unless you slipstream it, you gotta use a floppy for the drivers (its treated like a SCSI device). Hopefully this will change with Vista.

 

[MrChad]

Originally posted by: shortylickens
I want to say that WinXP with SP2 will let you do SATA without any extra work. You could even boot from SATA if your MB allows it.

Any one want to tell me I'm wrong?

Microsoft didn't package any additional drivers with SP2.

And the reason that IDE drives work without separate drivers is because Microsoft developed a generic IDE driver that talks to most IDE controllers. They haven't done the same for SATA controllers, yet, but I would expect them to by the time Vista is released.

 

[hectorsm]

In my case my 300GB Maxtor was detected as an IDE drive during Windows install but only limited to 137GB. I bypassed this issue by cloning my previous 200GB PATA drive into my SATA drive. However, if you want to install a fresh copy of Windows in a big SATA drive you will need the drivers (use the F6 method).

 

[athlon64X2]

Apologies for being ignorant here :

But when I installed windows, my 160GB Sata2 was recognized as an IDE drive and I went through with the installation process. Then I installed the nVidia drivers that came with my Chaintech motherboard.

But I have not installed any specific SATA drivers at all. Does that mean my drives are still being treated as PATA?

And if I have to install the SATA drivers, where do I get them from?

THanks;

 

[MrChad]

Originally posted by: athlon64X2
Apologies for being ignorant here :

But when I installed windows, my 160GB Sata2 was recognized as an IDE drive and I went through with the installation process. Then I installed the nVidia drivers that came with my Chaintech motherboard.

But I have not installed any specific SATA drivers at all. Does that mean my drives are still being treated as PATA?

And if I have to install the SATA drivers, where do I get them from?

THanks;

Nope, you're fine. nVidia's SATA controller works with Microsoft's generic IDE driver. There is no need for additional drivers.

 

[hectorsm]

I am just curious... Did Windows format your drive as a 160GB drive? I could never get the Windows install to recognize the full capacity of my 300GB SATA drive even though the BIOS did recognize it. My understanding i that it needed the driver floppy for that.

 

[athlon64X2]

XP did recognize the entire 160GB space.

And I did not partition that drive, so it is @154GB after installation.

 

[hectorsm]

Maybe I had the issue because my Windows XP CD did not have any of the service packs included.

thanks.

 

[lumbus]

Originally posted by: MrChad

Originally posted by: wseyller
I have heard of some people not needing drivers is why I asked, and I wondered if sometimes the drivers are included with the motherboard or on the disk drive itself.

nForce4 SATA chips will masquerade as IDE controllers so that Microsoft's generic IDE drivers work. AFAIK they are the only SATA controllers that do not require separate drivers on install.

nForce3 too, I think?

 

[Seeruk]

Yup - All Nforce 3 & 4 mobos (I have built about 18 in last 6 months alone) install with no extra drivers. Its only the VIA chipsets and some RAID controllers that need drivers.

 

[MrChad]

Originally posted by: hectorsm
Maybe I had the issue because my Windows XP CD did not have any of the service packs included.

thanks.

Yes, you need at least SP1 in order for XP to recognize drive sizes above 137 GB. If your XP setup CD does not include a service pack, you need to slipstream SP2 onto the setup CD for the initial setup to utilize the full size of your drive.

 

[athlon64X2]

I was just going through the system summary that CrystalMark showed me and following is a part from it:

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Device
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ChipSet : NVIDIA nForce4
North : NVIDIA nForce4
South : NVIDIA nForce4
IDE Controller : NVIDIA nForce4 Parallel ATA Controller
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
HDD
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Type Size Model ( Buffer Mode )
SATA 164.6GB HDT722516DLA380 7674KB SATA/150
SATA 82.3GB HDS728080PLA380 7677KB SATA/150
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I am wondering why the IDE controller is nForce4 PATA and not SATA?
Does that mean my setup is wrong in some way?

THanks.

 

[Basie]

I think that an earlier post #4 by MrChad answered that question.