What are the issues of installing XP on a Raid/Sata controller?

NeilF

NeilF

NeilF

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I've never installed onto a raid controller before?

I simply want two sata drives (not in a raid config), so I assume plug them in, define TWO arrays in the bios, each with just ONE disc?

But then what happens when I install windows? Will it happily (at least) setup and install on the first array/disc?

Doesn't it need the appropriate (Promise) driver to access the discs?


If it's going to be painful I'll just shove an IDE in as the main drive!
 
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You should be able to setup arrays like you suggest although that might be overkill, you might be able to get away with just connecting the drives and leaving them as is. The simple way to find out is to try it.

Either way you'll need to give the OS installer the correct drivers.
 
Regardless of how you configure the disks you'll still need to provide the OS installer with the drivers for the SATA controller before it will be able to access the disks. Either via the F6 & floppy route with XP or on any kind of media for Vista (although Vista may well have built in drivers).
 
NeilFawcett said:
Not entirely sure what that means?
Click to expand...

On the XP installation screen there will be a little block of text appearing at the bottom along the lines of "Press F6 to install Raid/SATA drivers", it is only there for about 5 seconds I think. From there you install the drivers from a floppy disk you have prepared earlier in the best Blue Peter tradition. :)
 
he means that by running off a raid controller you will need to supply windows with the driver on install so it can see and access the drives.

windows has a standard built in ide driver and that why you dont need to supply one when installing to a standard ide port.

most sata controllers are now supported by default by windows as are the more popular raid controllers but as with most things new revisions etc come out so its best supplying the latest drivers.

as has been mentioned hit f6 at the prompt to supply the revelant drivers or if you want to go one better you can intergrate them into an xp install cd.
 
semi-pro waster said:
On the XP installation screen there will be a little block of text appearing at the bottom along the lines of "Press F6 to install Raid/SATA drivers", it is only there for about 5 seconds I think. From there you install the drivers from a floppy disk you have prepared earlier in the best Blue Peter tradition. :)
Click to expand...

Hmmm...

This is all because on my machine my C drive partition has gone a bit screwy (during a defrag). My C & D drives are IDE, my E & F are SATA (via a Promise controller).

So I'm going to replace my IDE drive just incase this is an indication of the drive starting to fail (& not O&O Defrag to blame).

I think I'm going to replace like for like so I'll put another IDE in. Why? Because I do have a disc image of my entire C drive from about 3 months ago and in reality virtually nothing has changed! And it'll save be a lot of time/hassle/agro if I can just go back to that image!

So I don't want to risk putting in a SATA in the IDE's place only to find up this screws up putting that image back!
 
bledd. said:
which OS are you going to use, and which controller is it? (exact name)
Click to expand...

XP Pro on an Asus P4PE MB which uses a Promise FastTrack376 controller onboard.

As I said though, I'll go IDE just to ensure the biggest chance of restoring my C drive image from about 3 months ago!
 
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