still can't boot with a promise controller?

[TheOverlord]

i got a promise 66 controller and am having problems booting with the hard drive connected to it...i had booted on a floppy and copied the NT4 i386 folder to the drive then ran the install...when it needed to restart i took out the floppy as it requested and then restarted...but now it hangs on restart at the "verifing DMI pool data....." is this because i dont have any drives installed on the motherbaord itself ro what?!? how can i get past this...thanks

 

[sharkeeper]

Make sure boot sequence in BIOS is correct!

The Promise controller is a mass storage device. (read: treated like a SCSI controller)

Change boot sequence to something like this:

1ST Boot Device: FLoppy
2ND Boot Device: CD Rom
3RD Boot Device: SCSI.

Cheers!

 

[konichiwa]

Yep, check your BIOS settings -- probably the most likely place.

 

[TheOverlord]

ah...thnaks ill try it

 

[TheOverlord]

set the boot sequence to SCSI,A,C and it wont work..other ideas?

 

[Raincity]

I have the same problem when setting up Win2k. If your doing a new install of NT, try doing the install off the motherboard ide controller and let NT install. Then add the Promise drivers and reboot then make sure the card is installed ok in NT, then shut down and move your drive to the Promise card and change your boot sequence to scsi. IF you have your bios managing your hardware, you may want to reset the ESCD again.

Rain

 

[IskandarTaib]

Well, I was messing with mine last night. I got a Ultra66 for $10 earlier in the week. I've got NT4 already installed on the drive. I moved the drive to the Promise controller, and after messing with the BIOS, I got it to recognize the drive (Maxtor 40GB 5400 rpm). I get the boot menu, it detects the hardware, I get to the part where it says "NT4 SP6", but then I get a BSOD. I did install the drivers off the Promise website in NT beforehand, of course.

I don't think the problem is the one mentioned on the Promise site (different detected drive geometry), but who knows. I tried flashing the Ultra66 BIOS, but PTIFLASH 1) recognizes the card as a Fastrak66, and 2) doesn't like the BIOS file. (v.2.0 b18)

Pondering whether I should try reinstalling NT4 while the drive is on the Promise controller. I'm making a backup right now. I wonder if a rescue install would work.

 

[bacillus]

you may find it easier to use the m/board ide controller to load your OS(if not already installed), put in the promise card & let the system detect it & install the necessary drivers then transfer over the hdd to the promise controller.

 

[IskandarTaib]

Right, that's what I did. Actually, the OS was already installed on the drive for a while. I added the card, and loaded the drivers (the ones from the web page). Then I moved the drive.

There's something I read on the ars-technica forum that might help:

1) Set "SCSI" as a boot option.

2) Put a non-bootable drive in the old slot.

 

[bacillus]

when you move the drive to the promise controller, you have to set the boot order in bios to floppy then scsi as your controller is seen as a scsi device. if you have a bootable hdd still attached to m/board ide, system will try to boot off of it instead of the promise hdd. you don't by any chance have another scsi pci card in your system, do you?
are you sure that the controller card is not conflicting with another piece of hardware via an irq? the promise cards usually share well but there are always exceptions.
if all seems in order & you still get hanging at verifing DMI pool data, then try setting PNP OS setting in bios to no!
let us know how you get on!

 

[IskandarTaib]

OK.

No hard drives attached to the IDE channels on the motherboard.

Tried setting "SCSI" as boot device -> gets BSOD (after the boot menu) as NT is loading, as before.

I'll try turning PNP off.

I'll try the "non-bootable drive in the Motherboard IDE channel" trick once my new Maxtor 20GByte arrives. I'll also try installing the new drive on the Promise card, and install NT on it.

I'll also try a Promise Ultra 100 soon.

 

[IskandarTaib]

OK.. I've "fixed" this, in a way.

I tried a non-bootable drive on the first motherboard IDE channel - that didn't work.

What finally fixed it was replacing the Ultra66 with a (Maxtor) Ultra100. I think the problem was that my Ultra66 had a really old BIOS (1.10). It didn't allow me to flash it to the most up-to-date BIOS. I'll keep it around to play with - let's see if I can turn it into a FasTrack66. Mebbe in the next few months I might be able to pick up a pair of 20 MByte drives real cheap.