using onboard raid controller as just another IDE controller

[hashpuppy]

hi,

i have an ASUS P4PE with a PDC 20376 onboard parallel/serial ATA raid
controller.

i want to put one of my drives on it so i can split my OS and data drives
onto two different controllers for performance reasons. i would put the
one drive on the secondary channel, but i have a DVD-ROM and CD-RW
as well.

is it possible to do this? oh how i miss my A7V with 8 possible IDE devices


leon

 

[Lord Evermore]

You can do it. You may need to set a BIOS option to make the controller only function as IDE and not RAID.

I wouldn't expect all that much performance difference from having a separate OS and application drive in the first place, and having them on different controllers might help even less.

 

[hashpuppy]

hmm. after hunting through the BIOS, nothing was immediately obvious.
i have one option though, that becomes available when i enable the raid
controller:

"Onboard ATA device first"

the manual also says that saying "Yes" to this loads the onboard ATA "Option ROM".
what is an "Option ROM", and what does it do?

i'm clueless googling didn't reveal anything helpful, either.

 

[Aikouka]

Try looking on your motherboard. My mobo (Soyo Dragon K7V Plus) has an on-board RAID controller as well but you have to turn it on using a jumper. Maybe you need to do the same?

 

[Lord Evermore]

The ROM makes it so you can boot from the SerialATA controller as the C drive, rather than it just working as an extra controller. Onboard ATA device first just makes it look for a boot drive on the SATA controller rather than the regular IDE ports.

The manual should tell you about any SATA settings. If there are not settings to enable/disable the RAID function specifically, then it doesn't matter and the controller will work either way. Whether it does RAID or just regular SATA would depend on how you set it up with the SATA BIOS comes up, usually by hitting a key combo to get into the setup to configure a RAID array.

 

[hashpuppy]

the manual claims by default the controller operates in standard ATA non-RAID mode until you create arrays
of disks.

but i've tried without success to actually boot from a drive on the raid controller. i can't seem to get the system
to see the drive at all, neither at boot time (with Onboard ATA device first off or on), nor when i boot up from a
rescue CD. the drive is a Parallel ATA drive, and is set to "Master", as required by the manual.

the rescue CD (Knoppix 3.2) detects the controller, but doesn't make anything available as "No arrays are defined".

i feel that i'm missing something here. but there were no jumpers on the motherboard w.r.t. RAID, no other bios
options apart from enabling/disabling the RAID controller and the associated "Onboard ATA device first" option,
and entering the RAID controller setup menu just offers options to create/delete/manage arrays. all of which i
assume are destructive of data and aren't really what i want.

argh!

 

[hashpuppy]

in case i was not clear, the raid controller's BIOS menu (the thing accessed when you press Ctrl+F) does see the drive. i just can't boot from it or see it from anything else

 

[Lord Evermore]

Check the boot order list (depends on the type of BIOS) and see if any of that needs to be modified to take into account that you've enabled the ATA controller.

Hmm, actually, just occurred to me, you may not be able to use an already formatted drive on the RAID controller, even in ATA mode. I've never seen it mentioned. But with SCSI drives, you can't move a hard drive to a different type of controller without reformatting. SATA is supposed to be software compatible with PATA, but this may be a limitation.

 

[boomerang]

I was going to jump in a few days back. I should have, as I have the same board.

When I first got this board, I tried every combination there was (I think) and could not boot off a drive connected to either of the three RAID enabled connectors. The drive I used was, however, a formatted drive with XP Pro installed on it.

Lord Evermore may have hit on it. Try an unformatted drive.

I would say that the Onboard SATA/IDE Controller will have to be [Enabled]. (Of course)
Onboard ATA Device First should be [Yes].

In the Boot Menu;
#4 Other Boot Device will have to be set to [SCSI Boot Device]. This is the only one of the 4 that provides this option. The preceding #1 through #3 will have to be set accordingly so that a bootable device will not be present.

Remember that if you are using the PRI_RAID1 connector, that the drive will not only have to be jumpered as Master, but you will have to use the two connector IDE cable that was provided with the board.