Can't install windows 7 on RAID. windows could not prepare the computer to boot into the next phase of installation

[RobbeyRobert]

FAILING TO INSTALL WIN7 ON RAID-0

Hello, i m trying to perform a clean setup of windows 7 on my machine but it fails all the time at the end of the setup/installation with a message saying : (windows could not prepare the computer to boot into the next phase of installation) i've tried installing windows 7 using only 1 drive... that worked.. then i tried with windows 8.1 using 2 drives = RAID0 that worked too . I am literally pissed off

System - Mobo GA-F2A85X-D3H - 8GB ram
- 2 SATA Drives from SAMSUNG configured in RAID0 via bios 128-1024. hard drives are identical. FORMATED TWICE

I tried everything i knew of, looked it up online but each person had it's own story/situation.. doesn't helps me.
Could it be a windows error ?? i made a bootable usb thumbdrive. did it a few times with 1 different win7 iso i got from internet and still no result
i exclude the HDD's since they are HEALTHY.
Bios i think is configured as it should and there isn't really much to configure anyways.

If anyone knows why that error message pops up please share.


UPDATE -- I FOUND A WAY TO BYPASS THAT PROBLEM -- Seemed to be from windows itself. i tried to install a downloaded version with all the updates, didn't worked, so i used my friends GENUINE DVD that worked. but now for some reason yet unknown at the finish when windows restarts and starts WINDOWS when the boot screen appears it stops right there and reboots the system, over and over. Guess i'll have to figure this out by myself....

 

[das_stig]

You need to load the raid driver when at the screen where you choose the HDD to install on it, so that the drives can be seen.

It's on the CD or get latest version from http://download.gigabyte.ru/driver/mb_driver_sata_raid_fm2_x5_w7.exe

Driver can only be loaded from floppy, USB or integrated in to ISO image.

 

[RobbeyRobert]

You need to load the raid driver when at the screen where you choose the HDD to install on it, so that the drives can be seen.

It's on the CD or get latest version from http://download.gigabyte.ru/driver/mb_driver_sata_raid_fm2_x5_w7.exe

Driver can only be loaded from floppy, USB or integrated in to ISO image.

umm thanks for your reply... u were the only 1 who replied to this. didn't fixed my problem but atleast u took a look at it. wasn't expecting anything else anyway

 

[Paperdoc]

The root of the problem is that there is NO "standard" way to do an y RAID. So, Windows itself does NOT have any device driver for any RAID system - there are just too many different ones. Thus, it cannot use a RAID array to boot from without some help.

But Windows DOES have a good way to solve this problem. Windows Install has a place early in that process to allow you to load the correct device driver into your customized Windows version so that the driver can be loaded from the RAID array FIRST on each boot, and then Windows can use the array for everything else. The wrinkles are that you need the driver(s) loaded on a medium the Install process can access, and you need to know how to get this special step working. In what follows, I am assuming that you are using the RAID system built into your mobo, and not a system based on a separate plug-in card controller.

First, the driver(s). You are trying to set up a RAID0 array and use it as your C: drive. Look in the manual for your motherboard about how to get RAID set up. It will tell you how to find the correct RAID driver for YOUR mobo on a CD that came with it (or maybe how to find and download the one for exactly YOUR mobo from their website). Then it will tell you how to copy that driver (MIGHT even be more than one) to a medium (like a memory stick) you use during Install. Pay close attention also to instructions for how to create the RAID0 array BEFORE you do your Windows Install.

So, with that prepared, begin the Windows Install. Very early you will see a prompt asking whether you want to add special additional device drivers to this version of Windows. If you ignore it, the prompt will go away after a short time. But don;t do that - do what it says - press the "F10" key to allow this feature. It will ask you teo specify where to look for the additional drivers, and you tell it. It will then load that driver and ask whether you have more. When you have them all loaded, say no more and the process will proceed as before. When you do this, first of all the Install process now CAN access the RAID0 array, because you just gave it the driver it needs. And secondly, it will set itself up to find those drivers in a known place on the RAID array at the very start of EVERY boot process. That way your Windows CAN use the RAID0 array to boot from and to run.

 

[Calvin7]

You want to use a clean drive and not a formatted one. Delete all existing partitions at the beginning of the installation and Windows will create the partitions it needs.

 

[RobbeyRobert]

The root of the problem is that there is NO "standard" way to do an y RAID. So, Windows itself does NOT have any device driver for any RAID system - there are just too many different ones. Thus, it cannot use a RAID array to boot from without some help.

But Windows DOES have a good way to solve this problem. Windows Install has a place early in that process to allow you to load the correct device driver into your customized Windows version so that the driver can be loaded from the RAID array FIRST on each boot, and then Windows can use the array for everything else. The wrinkles are that you need the driver(s) loaded on a medium the Install process can access, and you need to know how to get this special step working. In what follows, I am assuming that you are using the RAID system built into your mobo, and not a system based on a separate plug-in card controller.

First, the driver(s). You are trying to set up a RAID0 array and use it as your C: drive. Look in the manual for your motherboard about how to get RAID set up. It will tell you how to find the correct RAID driver for YOUR mobo on a CD that came with it (or maybe how to find and download the one for exactly YOUR mobo from their website). Then it will tell you how to copy that driver (MIGHT even be more than one) to a medium (like a memory stick) you use during Install. Pay close attention also to instructions for how to create the RAID0 array BEFORE you do your Windows Install.

So, with that prepared, begin the Windows Install. Very early you will see a prompt asking whether you want to add special additional device drivers to this version of Windows. If you ignore it, the prompt will go away after a short time. But don;t do that - do what it says - press the "F10" key to allow this feature. It will ask you teo specify where to look for the additional drivers, and you tell it. It will then load that driver and ask whether you have more. When you have them all loaded, say no more and the process will proceed as before. When you do this, first of all the Install process now CAN access the RAID0 array, because you just gave it the driver it needs. And secondly, it will set itself up to find those drivers in a known place on the RAID array at the very start of EVERY boot process. That way your Windows CAN use the RAID0 array to boot from and to run.

Thank you very much ! that helped a lot..all in-depth detail. wish i could reward you but i made a mistake by making this post a discussion.

Anyways i succeeded in installing the software on the RAID array following your steps, only issue i face now is that S.M.A.R.T status is dead. i cannot see any details of my hard drives using 3rd party softwares like (HD TUNE, SENTINEL, AIDA64 or SPEEDFAN) not even temperature which is in my interests too.

Would you know the answer for this ? Sincere thanks.

 

[Paperdoc]

I suspect the problem is the third-party software you use does not know about all the RAID in the world. In fact, it may be because the tools you use run under Windows, and they depend on the device driver used by Windows but don't recognize that.

After some looking around I think that the old Samsung Spinpoint hard drive line was taken over by Seagate, and that Seagate's hard disk utility collection called SeaTools may be able to deal with those drives. But the trick is, that set comes in two forms. One is a Windows application you can use, but if it depends on what Windows knows through its device drivers, it may not work for your RAID array system. So instead, you need to try their SeaTools for DOS, which you can download from the Seagate website. I actually prefer this version because it can work on any system, even one with no working HDD's at all. However, it requires a little more work.

Seatools for DOS is downloaded as an .iso file. That is, the file is a complete image of a bootable CD disk. First you download that file from the website. Then you need a CD-R disk to put it on, and a disc-burning utility like Nero that can burn an .iso image to a disc. You use that to burn that disc, then back out of it. Now you need to reboot and go immediately into BIOS Setup and adjust your Boot Priority so that it will boot first from the optical drive that contains the new bootable CD. Let it boot from there and it will load its own mini-OS into RAM, set up a RAM disk to write info to if you want, and then run itself. Using its menus you can then choose which HDD you want to diagnose, and it will show you first the SMART data for that. You can change to another HDD and look at it. For whichever HDD you are examining now, there are many diagnostic tools. All the simpler ones do no writing to the HDD so they are safe for your data. BUT SeaTools DOES include data-destructive tools too, and it usually will warn you that you are going to destroy data before it does anything like that. So WATCH the information carefully and no NOT let it do that type of work. For what you want, though, the tools you need are NOT destructive. It can read and show you the SMART data for each HDD. For each, also, it can run Short and Long tests of the HDD to verify its functions.

When you have finished testing your HDD's, you can exit out of SeaTools for DOS, remove the disc from the optical drive, and reboot into BIOS Setup again. There change your boot priority back to what you want normally, and away you go.

 

[RobbeyRobert]

I suspect the problem is the third-party software you use does not know about all the RAID in the world. In fact, it may be because the tools you use run under Windows, and they depend on the device driver used by Windows but don't recognize that.

After some looking around I think that the old Samsung Spinpoint hard drive line was taken over by Seagate, and that Seagate's hard disk utility collection called SeaTools may be able to deal with those drives. But the trick is, that set comes in two forms. One is a Windows application you can use, but if it depends on what Windows knows through its device drivers, it may not work for your RAID array system. So instead, you need to try their SeaTools for DOS, which you can download from the Seagate website. I actually prefer this version because it can work on any system, even one with no working HDD's at all. However, it requires a little more work.

Seatools for DOS is downloaded as an .iso file. That is, the file is a complete image of a bootable CD disk. First you download that file from the website. Then you need a CD-R disk to put it on, and a disc-burning utility like Nero that can burn an .iso image to a disc. You use that to burn that disc, then back out of it. Now you need to reboot and go immediately into BIOS Setup and adjust your Boot Priority so that it will boot first from the optical drive that contains the new bootable CD. Let it boot from there and it will load its own mini-OS into RAM, set up a RAM disk to write info to if you want, and then run itself. Using its menus you can then choose which HDD you want to diagnose, and it will show you first the SMART data for that. You can change to another HDD and look at it. For whichever HDD you are examining now, there are many diagnostic tools. All the simpler ones do no writing to the HDD so they are safe for your data. BUT SeaTools DOES include data-destructive tools too, and it usually will warn you that you are going to destroy data before it does anything like that. So WATCH the information carefully and no NOT let it do that type of work. For what you want, though, the tools you need are NOT destructive. It can read and show you the SMART data for each HDD. For each, also, it can run Short and Long tests of the HDD to verify its functions.

When you have finished testing your HDD's, you can exit out of SeaTools for DOS, remove the disc from the optical drive, and reboot into BIOS Setup again. There change your boot priority back to what you want normally, and away you go.

Thanks for the useful information you provided me with, really appreciated !! didn't know my samsung HDD's were owned by Seagate.
Anyhoo i haven't tried Seatools for DOS but i was able to run some tests with SeaTools for windows, HDD's passes basic tests, but was unable to read the temperatures and SMART.

I discovered that there is an option to download firmware for my hard drives,either by downloading them with the tool or by entering the serial on their website which i couldn't do since i need to open the PC case to get the serials.

Question is, do you think if i made a firmware update, would i get more performance or maybe more lifespan from the HDD's would the firmware correct some problems ?? i've been using these 2 HDD's now since a long time, one of them was used for surveillance 24/7, and i never had any issues with them, they usually reached a max temperature of 35C which is very good compared to others i've seen and they are silent too.

This would be my last question. I really appreciate any help you can provide. thank you

 

[Paperdoc]

The potential benefit of a firmware update for an HDD is highly variable - it depends on what features they tweaked, and what problems (if any) they fixed. If you go to where the update is available, there should be some notes to read about what the firmware will do for you. That will tell you more about whether the changes it makes are of any use to you.

I would add a note of caution. I do NOT know whether doing a firmware update on a HDD can effectively destroy its contents by making the unit forget everything it already knows about itself and its organization. So, as a precaution, I would urge you to do a compete backup of the drives before doing any other operation. Since these are in a RAID0 array, basically you would need to back up all its contents to some other drive (NOT a RAID0 array). Then, to be sure, verify that you can read that set of backed up files. THEN do the firmware update on each drive if that's your plan. When that is done, test whether you still have a RAID0 array working, or whether access to those units has been damaged. With luck you will have no trouble and you won't need the backup, but keep it anyway just in case you find a problem a week or two later.