Question Only two SATA-connections (out of 6) working on old ACER ASPIRE M3203

[bsthuis]

I am working on a old ACER Aspire M3203 (motherboard RS780M03A1-8EKSMH with 6 SATA II connectors). SSD on SATA 5 and HDD on SATA 6. That works fine with Windows 10 and even Windows 11! So there is no need to discard this PC now! However when I connect the SSD to one of the other SATA-connectors on the motherboard it does not work. Also when I connect a CDROM (or HDD) to one of the other SATA-connectors ( SSD and HDD still on SATA 5 an 6) on the mainboard the CDROM does not work. The CDROM is recognized in the BIOS (version P01.B2 set to AHCI) but does NOT show up in windows explorer; this is not related to the Windows-version.

I checked the CDROM and SATA-cables on another computer and that works without problems. Also strange is that in the BIOS I see only two SATA-ports (5 and 6).
(here i wanted to add screendumps of the BIOS but did not succeed)
Can it be that those SATA ports are damaged?? Or is it related to some setting like AHCI or RAID in the BIOS?
Help appreciated.

 

[Lutfij]

Welcome to the forums, newcomer!

That works fine with Windows 10 and even Windows 11!
If you're on what I'm assuming is an AMD Athlon II X3 435 then Windows 10, yes. Windows 11, no.

Out of curiosity, your motherboard is on the latest BIOS version, correct? What PSu are you working with and how old is said PSU in your prebuilt?

 

[bsthuis]

Thanks for the quick answer.
The processor is a AMD Athlon II X4 620 2,60GHz
PSU? Power Supply Unit? I do not have the computer at my disposal at the moment. It is my friends and i have been experimenting with upgrading to Windows 11; at first glance that seemed to work much better than expected ..... with no warranty for the future.
So i cannot tell you details about the The Power Supply Unit but it has all SATA-power connectors. And yes it is the most recent Bios (05-19-2010 ..... recent?!)

bsthuis

 

[Misgar]

Or is it related to some setting like AHCI or RAID in the BIOS?

That would be my guess. If the BIOS is set to RAID, you might not see the drives.

AHCI is the recommend setting, but I've just booted up an old Phenom X4 965 and discovered the BIOS is set to IDE:-

OnChip SATA Type = [Native IDE]
OnChip SATS Port4/5 Type = [IDE]
Onboard SATA/IDE Device = [Enabled]
Onboard SATA/IDE Ctrl Mode = [IDE}

With these settings, the BIOS sees the following drives:

An Optiarc DVD RW drive on IDE Channel 0 Master
A Toshiba hard disk on IDE Channel 1 Master
A Samsung hard disk on IDE Channel 1 Slave
A second Samsung hard disk on IDE Channel 2 Master
A Plexstor 128GB SSD on IDE Channel 2 Slave
A Samsung hard disk on IDE Channel 3 Master
A Kingston 128GB SSD on IDE Channel 4 Master

The reason why I set SATA to Native IDE is because this computer started off as a Windows XP machine, which didn't have native support for AHCI without slipstreaming AHCI drivers on to the installation DVD. I couldn't be bothered to add the AHCI drivers to XP at a later date and change the BIOS to AHCI, but instead I kept it on IDE. A few years later I added a Windows 7 boot SSD and finally a Windows 10 boot SSD. I can now start this system up in XP, 7 and 10 with all drives set to Native IDE. A bit slower than AHCI on 7 or 10, but I'm not worried.

Check your BIOS and see if it has an IDE/AHCI/RAID option associated with ports 0, 1, 2 and 3. In my BIOS, I can set ports 0 to 3 independently of ports 5 and 6. I could configure ports 0 to 3 as AHCI (for Windows 7/10) and keep ports 5 and 6 as IDE (to boot from XP).

There's also the possibility that fitting a PCI/PCIe card has robbed the first four SATA ports of lanes on your mobo, rendering them useless.

I'm not sure which way round it is, but I think some of my SATA ports are driven direct from the CPU/chipset and other SATA ports from a third party (Silicon Image) controller.

Check your BIOS and look for IDE/AHCI/RAID and experiment.

 

[bsthuis]

This ACER M3203 started off as Windows 7 with a 1TB HDD and two CDROMs. But when I opened this PC it had one 256GB SSD (at SATA5) and two CDROMs (at SATA6 and 1) and the BIOS was set to RAID. The HDD was NOT connected and only one of the two CDROMs was functioning (I do not recall if that was the one on SATA1, but it must have). I tested the non responding CDROM and the cables on another PC and that worked. I changed he BIOS to AHCI and installed Windows 11 on the SSD (SATA5) and then changed the SATA connector from the working CDROM (on SATA6) to the 1TB HDD. And as I I told you before Windows 11 worked really fine and quite responsive!
The Bios on the page "Integrated Peripherals" you can only Enable/Disable "Onboard IDE Controller" and "Onboard SATA Controller". And "Onboard SATA Mode" has 3 options: IDE, RAID (default) and AHCI. No further SATA or IDE settings.
I repeat .... When I connect a CDROM or HDD to one of the SATA ports 1 , 2, 3, or 4 it is recognized in the BIOS under Bootoptions settings but it does not show up in Windows Explorer.
No PCI slot is Used Only a graphic card is mounted in a special slot.
I think I tried setting the BIOS setting to IDE (not sure as i tried so much different things) and if I remember well windows did not boot any more and it did not solve the SATA ports problem.
In the end I mounted an old IDE-CDROM (I had to solder an extra IDE power connector) and finally ended up with an oldie with a more than satisfying Windows 11 and a working SSD HDD and CDROM.
But.... The SATA-problem kept my mind busy..... that's why.

 

[dev_cyberpunk]

The Bios on the page "Integrated Peripherals" you can only Enable/Disable "Onboard IDE Controller" and "Onboard SATA Controller". And "Onboard SATA Mode" has 3 options: IDE, RAID (default) and AHCI. No further SATA or IDE settings.

Then the settings should be:
Onboard IDE Controller: Enabled
Onboard SATA Controller: Enabled
Onboard SATA Mode: IDE

 

[Misgar]

"Onboard SATA Mode" has 3 options: IDE, RAID (default) and AHCI. No further SATA or IDE settings.
I repeat .... When I connect a CDROM or HDD to one of the SATA ports 1 , 2, 3, or 4 it is recognized in the BIOS under Bootoptions settings but it does not show up in Windows Explorer.

If the BIOS in the wrong mode and you haven't installed the correct driver for the controller yourself, it's hardly surprising if you fail to see any drives attached to ports 0, 1, 2 and 3 in File Explorer.

As I described earlier, Windows XP does not support AHCI by default, so you need to set the BIOS to IDE mode. Similarly, Windows 11 may not support your mobo's controller out of the box, when the BIOS is set to RAID (default).

You need to manually install the correct Windows driver for whatever setting you have in the BIOS, i.e. RAID (default), AHCI or IDE. Three different drivers. Get the driver wrong and no disks will be visible in File Explorer, despite their being visible in the BIOS.

Do not leave the BIOS in RAID (default) mode if you don't intend to set up an array. Windows 11 has native AHCI support built in, but probably not your legacy mobo's RAID or IDE controllers. You need to step in and sort out the drivers yourself.

Perhaps this will help to explain the situation better than I can. Where it mentions XP, think Windows 11 instead.

https://www.prime-expert.com/articl...d-drivers-from-usb-only/#WhatsAhciRaidDrivers

1. What is AHCI/RAID drivers? Who needs them?​

Hard Disks (HDD) and Solid State Disks (SSD) are connected to the computer via controller (a chip on the motherboard). Modern disks have Serial ATA (SATA) interface, old generation of disks had ATA interface.

SATA controller can work in two modes: ATA-compatible mode (i.e. look like ATA controller to operating system), or AHCI mode (new mode which enables all features of modern hardware.

From the operating system's perspective, disk controller operates either in ATA mode (old ATA controllers + new SATA controllers in ATA-compatible mode) or in AHCI mode (new SATA controllers in AHCI mode).

If you have SATA disk attached to disk controller in AHCI mode, you need special driver from motherboard vendor in order to make it work in Windows XP.

If you are using ATA disk or your SATA contoller is in ATA-compatible mode, then you don't need any special driver — Windows XP already includes one.

RAID driver is required when you combine multiple disks into redundant array (so if one of them fails, another one persists; or to gain additional speed). Likewise AHCI, operating system can't handle such situation by default, "out of the box", and requires special assistance from you for that case — in the form of driver.

 

[bsthuis]

In response to Misgar:
1)A service manual i found on the internet shows a block-diagram of the motherboard and that shows that the 6 SAT ports a linked to a SB780 chip. I would like to add a copy of that diagram but do not know how to on this forum.
2)In the manual i found the following info:
Chipset:
AMD RS780 + AMD SB700
PCI:
PCI Express Slot Type: x16
PCI Express x16 Slot Quantity: 1
PCI Express Slot Type: x1
PCI Express x1 Slot Quantity: 1 PCI Slot Type: PCI 2.25V slots
PCI Slot Quantity: 2
IDE:
Slot Type: 40pin PATA IDE slot
Slot Quantity: 1
Transfer rate support:
PIO Mode: 0/1/2/3/4
ATA mode: 33/66/100/133
Storage Type support:
DVD ROM/DVD SuperMultiPlus
SATA
Slot Type: SATA slot
Slot Quantity: 6
Storage Type support:
HDD/BD /DVD-ROM/ DVD SuperMultiPlus

SATA Interface:
SATA controller: RS780 (this I find strange because the blockdiagram shows the SATA ports are connected To SB780)
SATA controller resident bus: PCI bus
Number of SATA channel: SATA X 6
Support bootable CD-ROM: YES

3)Referring to Misgar's response..... I should find a "AHCI-driver" for the AMD RS780 (or SB780). is that something like:
ATI I/O Communications Processor SMBus Controller ATI SMBus ??
which I found on:
https://www.driverscape.com/manufacturers/phoenix/laptops-desktops/rs780+sb700/33301

 

[bsthuis]

One more remark for Misgar:
Does not the fact that a SSD and a HDD is functioning on SATA ports 5 and 6 respectively with BIOS set to AHCI mode suggest that the operating system (Windows11 or 10) is accepting AHCI operation? So it is not a AHCI driver problem?

 

[Misgar]

Does not the fact that a SSD and a HDD is functioning on SATA ports 5 and 6 respectively with BIOS set to AHCI mode suggest that the operating system (Windows11 or 10) is accepting AHCI operation? So it is not a AHCI driver problem?

You're correct in as much as Windows 11 has loaded an AHCI driver for the chipset associated with ports 5 and 6, but it hasn't loaded a driver for the other chipset associated with ports 0, 1, 2 and 3.

If your motherboard is similar to my old Gigabyte motherboards, running a Phenom II X4 965 and a couple of 955s, you'll have two independent SATA controllers. One controller is associated with ports 0 to 3 and has options RAID, IDE and SATA in the BIOS. The other controller can be set to SATA or IDE.

Each controller must be set up correctly in the BIOS (my 965 settings are both Native IDE) AND you must install the correct driver, otherwise Windows will not see the drives.

It's pretty obvious you've set ports 5 and 6 to AHCI and Windows 11 has automatically loaded a compatible driver for that chipset, so you can boot into Windows from port 5 or 6.

It appears you've set ports 0 to 3 in the BIOS to AHCI which is the obvious choice, but in case it's something different:-

If the controller for ports 0 to 3 is set to RAID, you must install the RAID driver.
If it's set to IDE, you must install an IDE driver.
If it's set to AHCI, you must install an AHCI driver.

Bearing in mind this is an old board designed in the Windows 7 era, when you shoehorn Windows 11 on the system, it may fail to load the appropriate driver for legacy hardware, namely the port 0 to 3 chipset.

If you go to the Acer web site, you might be able to find three different Windows 7 drivers for RAID, AHCI and IDE. If you're lucky, they might have Windows 8 or 8.1 drivers. If you're very lucky indeed, they might have Windows 10 drivers, but I very much doubt they'll have Windows 11 drivers.

If the Acer site lucks out, identify the manufacturer of both SATA controllers and start hunting for motherboards with the same chipsets and hope they've got drivers.

With ports 0 to 3 set to AHCI in the BIOS, search mobo websites for for a compatible storahci.sys download, or similarly named files.
https://batcmd.com/windows/11/services/storahci/

You could check under IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers in Control Panel and see if there are any unrecognised devices that don't have a valid driver. If you do find a device without a driver, it's likely to be the chipset associated with ports 0 to 3.

 

[bsthuis]

Lutfij, Misgar and dev_cyberpunk thanks for your responses.

The PC we are discussing about is not available to me at this moment. It is my friends and because he is completely satisfied with how the PC is functioning now there is no need to interfere at this moment. As I said before: "The SATA-problem kept my mind busy..... that's why".
BUT .... I have stored all your information .... and when I get hands on the PC in the next future I will give it a new try to solve the SATA ports problem.

So... thanks again for now!