Installing Windows XP on a new SATA HDD

[Cloud Tiamat]

I'm trying to install running Windows XP on my new HDD (since old one appears to have died). There is two problems:

1. When I try to use my motherboard's floppy disk during Windows setup, it won't read the disk. It just keeps asking me to insert disk into drive A: and yet not once is the floppy drive making a sound. Is it dead or is there some other problem there? I don't think the disk controller cable has been tampered.

2. Do I need to do anything special to get it to boot from a SATA drive?

I have an Abit NF7-S motherboard. The only disk drives (that are supposed to be in there) is a floppy drive, SATA Western Digital 80GB HDD, and an IDE DVD-ROM. Thus far the most functional drive is the DVD-ROM.

[Fozzik]

In most cases you shouldn't need to do anything special to get a SATA drive up and running. It should work just like a PATA drive, and should be recognized automatically without installing extra drivers or doing anything fancy.

Is Windows not recognizing that there's a hard drive?

The floppy drive issue may be a loose cable. Unplug the data and power and plug them back in tight, making sure they are oriented the right way (if the data cable is upside-down, the drive won't work but the light will stay on all the time). If the BIOS is recognizing the floppy, then the cables are ok and there's another problem. Also, check and make sure the floppy itself is good if you can.

[Lord_Vyper]

The NF7 line doesn't handle SATA -> IDE emulation, so you will need to have your SATA drivers floppy to install Windows, or a slipstreamed XP CD that has the drivers added.

[Webtroll]

I don't know about your floppy drive in general but some of the older ones I've seen don't have the power or data cable connectors keyed. If you have either one plugged in wrong it's not going to fit. If the power is backwards it'll possibly fry the drive, if the data cable is backwards (if I remember correctly) the read light comes on almost immediately and stays on without ever spinning up the disk. The symptoms could vary.

[Cloud Tiamat]

Turns out it was indeed the Floppy Drive.

[Fozzik]

What was up with it? Just broken?

Thanks for jumping in Lord_Vyper... I did not know that. :D

[Cloud Tiamat]

What was up with it? Just broken?

Thanks for jumping in Lord_Vyper... I did not know that. :D
Yes, it was.

[Fozzik]

Well, of all the things in the computer to break... the floppy drive is a nice one. $10 and your back in business. :D

Hope everything's working good now.

[Cloud Tiamat]

Hope everything's working good now.
Well, now I'm just trying to figure out why my LG GDR8163B DVD-ROM isn't using DMA (or at least I think it isn't since DVD movies are being slow).

I tried looking under the nForce IDE controller only it's not showing up under the section for secondary slave channel where the drive is connected. Even more puzzling, device manager calls it "DVD-ROM GDR8163B SCSI" which can't be right.....

Any ideas on why it's doing or at least how to make it use DMA like it's supposed to?

[Fozzik]

EDIT: bleh. most of that post was pointless... I reread yours and realized you were asking a different question.

There's two things that pop to mind right away... how are the jumpers set on the back of the optical drives? I'm guessing you have two drives, since you said the DVD drive is on the secondary slave. Do you have the manufacturer's most recent driver installed? If the drive isn't showing up in windows device manager on the channel where it's plugged in... check the BIOS to see what's up.

There could be other reasons why DVD's are playing slow... it could be an issue with the DVD decoder software or with video drivers, etc.

[Cloud Tiamat]

No just one optical drive. And the BIOS says it is on the secondary slave channel. Errr....jumpers?

[Lord_Vyper]

Well, now I'm just trying to figure out why my LG GDR8163B DVD-ROM isn't using DMA (or at least I think it isn't since DVD movies are being slow).

I tried looking under the nForce IDE controller only it's not showing up under the section for secondary slave channel where the drive is connected. Even more puzzling, device manager calls it "DVD-ROM GDR8163B SCSI" which can't be right.....

Any ideas on why it's doing or at least how to make it use DMA like it's supposed to?

Sounds like Windows isn't finding proper drivers for the chipset, and is defaulting to SCSI emulation.
Install the latest NForce drivers here (http://www.nvidia.com/object/nforce_udp_winxp_5.10.html).
On the back of the DVD drive, there's a little piece of plastic covering 2 of 6 pins, the pins are labeled something like MA, SL, CS. Move the jumper to MA (should be on SL currently.)
Hope this helps a bit.

[Cloud Tiamat]

Jumpers are still used? Well, there's was nothing telling me that you'd need to change them.......

[Fozzik]

Typically, with a single drive, you wouldn't need to change the jumper because it's set properly already. But there is always the chance that something weird happened with that particular drive, or the way that particular drive interacts with the chipset. Always still good to check the jumpers.

If you only have one optical drive, and it's installed on the end of the ribbon cable (not in the middle), it should be secondary master.

If you do install updated chipset drivers for the Nforce 4 chipset, it's probably best to opt out of installing the nvidia firewall. It causes issues for some people, and I don't think it works that well anyway.

[Cloud Tiamat]

I'm not sure what just happened but it's not claiming it's SCSI now. When I checked the IDE driver, Windows insisted on putting a generic MS driver instead of nVidia's. I decided to just go with it and after reboot it now says Ultra DMA used on Secondary Slave. So I'll go test it and see if it'll play things smoothly.....

Edit: Yep, it's now functioning at decent speeds. I guess the IDE controller driver wasn't set up right.

[Lord_Vyper]

If you do install updated chipset drivers for the Nforce 4 chipset, it's probably best to opt out of installing the nvidia firewall. It causes issues for some people, and I don't think it works that well anyway.

NF7-S has a NForce 2 chipset.. no nVidia firewall to deal with :D

/agree with nVidia's firewall being next best thing to the debil.