Motherboard Hangs at SATALink Screen

[jujumbura]

Hello all, this is an issue I am having with my motherboard, the P5N32 SLI SE Deluxe.

I have a previous post that I listed here, about failing to boot with modified BIOS settings. I believe that post is incorrect, since I am having the same problem with no modified settings ( except for the MemoryRemap feature, which is essential to running Vista64 with 4 gigs of RAM ).

This is what seems to be the real problem. When I do a fresh boot up from a powered-off state the machine will get past the POST screen, scroll some text, and then put up the following text on a black screen:


Sil 3132 SATALink BIOS Version 7.3.13
Copyright (C) 1997-2006 Silicon Image, Inc.


It will then hang on this screen. Sometimes it will only hang for a minute or two, and then will proceed to the OS selection screen. However, sometimes it will hang indefinitely and I have to reboot the machine in order to get past it.

When booting the machine from a restart ( as opposed to a power-down power-up ), I do NOT have this problem. The screen mentioned above disappears immediately and it proceeds to the OS selection screen.


I did notice that there is an updated version of the SATALink BIOS for Sil 3132, version 7.4.05. However, this does not appear to be used by the lastest ASUS BIOS for the P5N32 SLI SE Deluxe, version 0901.

I had thought perhaps I should update the BIOS for the SATALink Controller, however it does not appear that this can ( or should ) be done when the Controller is part of an onboard chipset as opposed to a standalone card. The general advice seemed to be that this should only be updated as part of the Motherboard BIOS.


I have seen another post on the internet which describes almost EXACTLY this same problem, however his thread did not seem to imply that he found a solution for it. I have a feeling this is BIOS related, since the OS has not been loaded at this point.

Does anybody have any suggestions at this point? Thanks very much for any help.

 

[FadedAce]

I can't help much beyond giving a vague hint, but I guess that's better than nothing, eh?

I had the exact same problem - same motherboard, same version of SATALink BIOS, etc. I thought I was having hard disk troubles.
I first put in a copy of the Ultimate Boot CD - no idea which corner of the net I obtained that thing from, but it's been useful from time to time. So I fired it up, and tried to analyze my hard drive. You know, just to see what I could see. Didn't see a thing though.

So I disconnected the "problem" drive, and put a different SATA drive in the box. I was thinking I'd install an OS, and try to salvage whatever data I could. Turns out I already had XP installed on the second drive I put in there, and it booted right up.

*blink*

Okay, then. So, I put the original drive back in the box, and it booted right up too - notably, I did not see the SATALink message at all. So either it didn't load, or it was so fast I can't see the message. And my "problem" drive is apparently just fine.

I can't repro the issue, and I have no clue what I did to clear it, but I suspect it has to do with removing the SATALink driver altogether. Kind of wonder whether the SATALink thing is hooked into the MBR somehow, or perhaps very early WinXP loading. I dunno... guessing wildly. Might have to go on a bent to learn though...

Hope the hint helps some - wish I could provide more info.

 

[jujumbura]

Thanks for the response Faded,

I actually took a pretty big hammer to this one. I ended up getting a new motherboard about a week ago, and it's been gravy since then. Seems a bit ludicrous, but the old mobo was also casusing conflicts with my sound card, and required some extra settings for my memory to work properly. It was a pain, and I'm glad to be rid of it, though I wish there were a proper solution.