Re: ASUS P5W DH+RAID: Is ASUS joking or is the joke on me?

Filur

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Just installed from scratch an ASUS P5W DH with a Core 2 Duo E6600/Corsair TWIN2X2048-6400PRO/2xSeagate SATA-II 7200.10 320GB.

Very nice board and everything went well except for the RAID setup. I decided to use the Intel ICH7R RAID solution and diligently copied the needed files to a floppy using ASUS utility CD.

I also set the RAID option in the BIOS as specified in the manual. To be double sure I disabled the EZ-Backup and Jmiron RAID options.

During Windows XP Professional installation after pressing F6 and being prompted to insert the floppy I don't get the driver specified in the manual, which is:

Intel® 82801 GH/GM SATA RAID Controller (Desktop ICH7R/DH)

Instead I get four others, including (seemingly best match):

Intel® ICH8R/DO/DH SATA RAID Controller (Desktop ICH8R)

But trying this driver (and the others) leads to no SATAs detected and an early exit from Windows XP setup....

On the Intel homepage I have so far failed to find the exact driver I need...there are all sorts of other ones with names that are nearly the same. But not exactly the right one...maybe trying the best matches and see...

Why would ASUS not deliver the required RAID drivers on their utility CD...or indeed, why would they include drivers that don't work?

Ideas and solutions would be greatly appreciated. Particularly links to the right driver! :D

Many thanks in advance.
Best,
Philip
 

GreenJelly

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First Problem...

You bought a Asus

Second Problem...

Read the manual about making a setupdisk and using a Windows XP with SP2 Installation disk

Third Problem...

You dont have a Windows XP SP2 Disk, so you have to call microsoft and have them send you one...
 

Filur

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Many thanks for the tips....I am glad to report that the problem is solved.
The joke was actually on me..... :D ....I am not used to getting a multitude of RAID drivers to choose from, so after F6 and S all I had to do was to scroll down to a better fit driver (didn't realise that was an option, only excuse was I tried it very early in the morning before my brain was activated)...the exact one still wasn't there, but one of the others came close and worked just fine.

Cheers!
 

Filur

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...not the worst! Perhaps the category of the second worst. You cannot easily see that there are more drivers down the list. There isn't one of those little squares you use to pull to scroll down to see text below....so it looked as if the list contained only four drivers...really! :D

Actually my worst screw up was when I upgraded from an old Pentium board and got an X2 based AMD system...it took me several days to realise that the newer boards have two power connectors...of course it failed to post....only after reading that particular part of the manual I got it sorted out. Initially I thought it was because the board wasn't equiped with a new enough BIOS to support the X2 processor. Very plausible, but entirely wrong!
 

sephtin

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First Problem...

You bought a Asus

Second Problem...

Read the manual about making a setupdisk and using a Windows XP with SP2 Installation disk

Third Problem...

You dont have a Windows XP SP2 Disk, so you have to call microsoft and have them send you one...

First thing, don't listen to the haters. *sigh*.. what is it with brand bashing. :(

Second thing, the disks can also be made by simply booting to the asus setup CD (it IS bootable), and will boot to a menu of choices,
1) Create a jmicro 32 driver disk,
2) Create a jmicro 64 driver disk,
3) Create an intel 32 driver disk
4) Create an Intel 64 driver disk.

Third, get your drivers (including the intel chipset drivers) from Asus, and you'll have better luck.

Enjoy your new board. It rocks!
-John