eSATA setup

SMAndy · 9 Nov 2009 at 13:38

Hi Guys.

One of few questions i've posted... I can't get my external hard disk to work on eSATA.

Internally, i've just plugged the front panel header cable to a spare SATA port. I've got a brand new eSATA cable connecting my pc to the HDD, but its not working. No power, no nothing. I know the drive is fine as it works via USB. There is a power connection on the hard disk, not required when connected by USB... Could it be necessary for using eSATA? I thought there was enough power in the SATA connection to run the disk.

my Motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-MA790XT-UD4P. Does the board need to have an actual eSATA connection on it, or does a standard SATA port work?

Thanks for any help.

lopkinfop · 9 Nov 2009 at 13:56

you need a seperate power supply when using esata. also in the bios you can set it up as ahci or ide, you need ahci for the hotswap to work (rather than having it connected when you turn on the machine)

AbsenceJam · 9 Nov 2009 at 14:15

You don't need AHCI for hotswapping, you can use hotswap!,

SMAndy · 10 Nov 2009 at 07:47

I tried a power supply with the esata cable, and its set to IDE mode... Got nothing.

Tonight I'll try changing those ports to AHCI mode, and see what happens...

Thanks.

*edit*
While i'm on the subject of AHCI... with Windows 7, would I need to install any new drivers to change my main disks over to AHCI? Its supposed to get better performance over IDE mode isn't it?

lopkinfop · 10 Nov 2009 at 08:23

well it allows NCQ and other sata abilities. I'm not sure about windows 7 with the drivers though

AbsenceJam · 10 Nov 2009 at 11:25

AHCI doesn't perform better than IDE mode, either the same or worse (with NCQ enabled).

Rendog · 10 Nov 2009 at 16:27

Just wondering.... would the hard drive enclosure have some kind of switch on it or maybe you need to switch around cables on the inside as that is what I have to do when I want to use either USB or SATA.

SMAndy · 12 Nov 2009 at 17:35

I figured it out. All working now!

What you have to do on this board, and probably all Gigabyte boards with the 'GSATA' ports... is plug the esata cable into the GSATA ports. I don't think the on south bridge ones work for hot swappable.

Thanks for the help though!

tompry · 1 Dec 2009 at 21:01

SMAndy,

I've got the same mobo, but still having problems after using the GSATA ports.

Is there anything else you need to do?

Thanks

Tom