Help Bios update advice Gigabyte x58a-ud7

PaulW · 8 Jan 2022 at 11:49

Hi,

i have posted what i am doing on the motherboard section but i have had no reply so far, this maybe a better place for it.

i have a old Gigabyte x58a-ud7 motherboard and i have bought a new Samsung EVO 870 drive. previously i had a 840 in the Sata 2 ports as the Sata3 marvell ports were dodge back then. i have updated that driver and connected the New drive and migrated my OS to it from the pervious 840. Samsung magician however is not recognising the drive in the Sata3 as a Samsung SSD in magican but it does on the Sata2 ports on the MB. i am trying to find out why. i have checked everything and all seems good.

so i am now left with maybe having to update my BIOS so it can recognise it. doing this worries the pants of me as i dont want to brick my PC. Gigabyte has a @BIOS app which can do this i can update directly from the Gigabyte servers but its notifing me of warnings before doing so. is this correct? the model number checks out
but i have to Select the intel X58,AWARD BIOS, VerFD. what about this?

https://imgur.com/jeUuwl2

Thanks very much for any help

P

mickyflinn · 8 Jan 2022 at 12:23

Hi.

Does any drive get recognised on the marvel sata ports ?

That motherboard has dual bios so if something goes wrong the back up bios kicks in. Always back up your bios before flashing.

It's never wise yo update the bios threw windows.

PaulW · 8 Jan 2022 at 12:49

tbh im not to bothered about updating the Bios so it works with Magican, i just want to know if not having it properly recognised with Magican or some other stuff like Trim enbled will over time harm the drive, which i dont want.
i guess this would mostly be handled by windows right?

mickyflinn · 8 Jan 2022 at 13:02

PaulW said:
tbh im not to bothered about updating the Bios so it works with Magican, i just want to know if not having it properly recognised with Magican or some other stuff like Trim enbled will over time harm the drive, which i dont want.
i guess this would mostly be handled by windows right?

You can disable/enable trim in windows.

Just a shame you losing half the speed .

Is the sata 3 ports working with any other drive ?

PaulW · 8 Jan 2022 at 13:10

im in the process of wiping my 840 will try it in the other sata 3 port after that and see.

mickyflinn · 8 Jan 2022 at 13:13

PaulW said:
im in the process of wiping my 840 will try it in the other sata 3 port after that and see.

Let's us know if it works .

Dg834man · 8 Jan 2022 at 13:57

FD is the final bios adds support for xeon processors have a fd version on my ex58-udr3, which doesnt have marvell 6gb sata ports from all the reading online the marvell controller never lived up to its claims and ran slower than the intel 3gb sata ports

PaulW · 9 Jan 2022 at 10:53

mickyflinn said:
Is the sata 3 ports working with any other drive ?

the sata3 port works and its faster than the sata2 ( i think, seems it) but i don't get any info from it in Samsung Magician .

Dg834man said:
marvell controller never lived up to its claims and ran slower than the intel 3gb sata ports

Intresting, so how can i tell what controller the Sata3 port on my motherboard is using? and i whats the best program for benchmarking SSD's? would be good to do one Sata3 vs Sata2 test

Thanks to the both of you for your help here.

Joxeon · 9 Jan 2022 at 11:05

Dg834man said:
FD is the final bios adds support for xeon processors

Definetly worth doing doing this just for one of those Xeons, 6 cores for a tenner is a no brainer.

mickyflinn · 9 Jan 2022 at 12:05

PaulW said:
the sata3 port works and its faster than the sata2 ( i think, seems it) but i don't get any info from it in Samsung Magician .

Try an older version of Samsung magician .

Dg834man · 9 Jan 2022 at 12:49

PaulW said:
Intresting, so how can i tell what controller the Sata3 port on my motherboard is using?

Colour coded, blue ones are intel sata 2(0-5) marvell white sata 3(6-7) gigabyte sata 2(8-9)

PaulW · 9 Jan 2022 at 13:58

thanks DG. i did a bit of hunting round myself and seems that Marvell sata3's are just doomed. People were saying its better to move back to sata2 which i may do. found this

"Intel SATA2 (native) ports will have lower latency, but lower sequential speeds.
Marvell (third-party) SATA ports will have higher sequential, but also slightly higher latency (lower 4K IOPS)."

in real terms what type of a hit would this be? or is it just swings and roundabouts.

also whats the best in terms of which SATA2 port is best to put these in, i have my boot in 6 and storage SSD in 7 now.

whats recommened for Sata2 ports to use, does certain ones make a difference?

whats the difference bettween the intel SATA2 and the gigabyte Sata2 ports?

Dg834man · 9 Jan 2022 at 15:12

PaulW said:
whats the difference bettween the intel SATA2 and the gigabyte Sata2 ports?

Never had enough drives in my ex58 to need to use them, the chipset only supported 6 sata ports the Intel ones, if a manufacturer wanted to add more they needed to add their own controller.

Last time I checked they weren't working on mine because win 10 couldn't find a driver for them.

As for performance don't know, Intel Io is usually top tier so 3rd party controller's have a lot to live up to.

PaulW · 9 Jan 2022 at 17:44

i have moved them all around again back to Sata2. boot in slot 0 storage in slot 1 and the DVD drive in 3.

also put RAPID mode on for the Boot as it supports it on the 870. seems to be ok nice and quick. will see how it goes to keep this on, has anyone else used this mode, any catches?

heatonpkmassive · 10 Jan 2022 at 00:03

RAPID mode is a con, I wouldn't bother with it.

PaulW · 10 Jan 2022 at 18:29

heatonpkmassive said:
RAPID mode is a con, I wouldn't bother with it.

yeah i turned it off after reading it could correupt the drive if the power goes. Not worth it. its fast enough for what i need untill GPU prices come back down to earth and i get a new rig.