Boot problem using both SATA and PATA devices with ASUS P5WD2 Premium

Hi,

I have just purchased a new PC with the configuration listed below:

Motherboard: ASUS P5WD2 Premium
Processor: Intel Pentium 4 650 Prescott 3.4 GHz
RAM: 2 x A-DATA 1024MB DDR2 PC4200 533MHz
Hard drive: Maxtor DiamondMax 10 (6V300F0) 300 Gb (SATA)
DVD: NEC ND-3550 DVD +/- RW
Video card: XFX GeForce 7900GT eXTreme 520MHz

Some days ago I started to install Windows XP pro and I kept getting a
boot-up problem. To cut things short (and not list everything done in
order to identify the problem) I have now updated all drivers (at least
what I think including Windows update) and also the BIOS for the
motherboard. When running the system with one hard drive (the drive
listed above which is a SATA drive) everything works fine. The problem
starts when I try to install my two older ATA hard drives on one of the
IDE channels integrated on the motherboard (one Maxtor DiamondMax Plus
9 (6Y200P0) and one Maxtor DiamondMax 10 (6B200P0)).

With all three disks installed when I try to boot after a shutdown
(from Windows not power off during for example boot-up) it usally works
fine and I can use the disks like normal. If I now try to restart from
windows the system always hangs in the black Windows screen with the
little bar going left to right. In this case I have found out that if I
now turn off the power and restart again the system goes into the
screen where I can select to start in fail safe mode, from last working
configuration or a standard boot. If I here select the last working
configuration the system hangs once again. If I however repeat this
same procedure once again I successfully enter Windows. I have tried
this many times and the pattern is there although I have no clue why! I
am quite sure that the problem is related to the ATA hard drives
becuase if I just remove the IDE cable for these drives everything
works fine. If I put back the cable the same problem occurs again. I
have repeated this several times with consistent results. For the
record both of these disks works fine on my old PC.

I am no expert in these kind of issues but from my own research (and
please correct me if I am wrong) the problem seems to be related to the
ITE IT8211 ATA controller on the ASUS motherboard. I have updated the
driver for this controller from ASUS support web but this does not
help. I have also discovered that this has a BIOS of it's own (at least
no update was done when I updated the BIOS using ASUS BIOS update
utility) which I have not updated since there is no more recent version
available on ASUS support web (I am currently running 1.3.1.61). If I
check for a BIOS update for IT8211 at Integrated Technology Express
they have a version available called 1.7.1.56 but it can only be used
for PCI cards and for motherboard chips they refer to the motherboard
manufacturer. I have no idea if the BIOS version issue is relevant but
I thought that I would mention it.

Does anyone know how I can get around the problem without buying new
SATA disks? Is this a BIOS issue? I have never experienced anything
similar but then again it is my first time mixing SATA and ATA disks on
an ASUS motherboard.

Any help would be appretiated!

Regards,
Henrik

 

The latest BIOS on the Asus site Wd2p0709.zip , still has the ITE
support module V1.3.1.61, the same as WD2P0422.

In both cases, the V1.3.1.61 BIOS module is 13312 bytes. If I
download the 1.7.1.56 from the ITEUSA site, that BIOS module is
45056 bytes, and appears to contain a RAID setup screen. Which
does not seem to be quite the same as what Asus is using. Now,
maybe it would work, and maybe not.

One purpose of the BIOS module, is to provide INT 0x13 services.
That allows a device to be used to boot an OS (basically a BIOS
level storage driver). Once the OS is booted, an operating
system level driver is used to access the disk instead. And
that should happen, at roughly the point that the Windows
desktop appears on the screen. I think before that, the BIOS
0x13 service is still being used.

The quickest way to solve your problem, is to buy one of these
and connect your two IDE drives to it. There are other IDE
cards that might be a bit cheaper.

PROMISE ULTRA133 TX2 PCI IDE 66M PCI Controller Card ($32 USD)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/CustRatingReview.asp?Item=N82E16816102007

HTH,
Paul

 

You wrote in thusly:

I would have preferred he went into a little detail. Like, is he using
an 80-pin cable? Is the drives configured for all CS or M/S?

That's a nice card as long as you don't care about contacting Promise. I
have one inside this computer with four drives attached, total of 8
drives inside the computer not including two optical. I would also
consider getting the last driver and firmware that were available for it
and if installing XP for the first time, works fine with F6 extra driver
hardware trick.

 

Pls share with the rest how you solve your problem. Others might light
to know.
Thanks.

 

Hi,

Thanks for the input by I have actually managed to solve the problem.
Thanks anyway.

Regards,
Henrik


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