Windows 7 can't find RAID HDD?

[theJman]

When I try to run the installation for the beta build of Windows 7 it tells me that it is incompatible and I need to reboot the computer and install it from there. So I set my DVD drive as primary, ran the installation but it won't find my installed RAID driver (PATA drive installed on PCI card). It lets me put the driver disc in (unlike having to slipstream XP) but I don't think it has Vista support let alone Windows 7.

So essentially it cannot even find my harddrive despite it being installed on XP. Is there anyway around this? or does Sabrent (company who makes my EIDE controller) need to just create a W7 driver before I can run it?

 

[DJG]

The OS needs drivers to see drives that are not on something that appears to be legacy / native ATA. If you're using any RAID controller in RAID mode, then Win 7 needs the driver. It has a whole slew of them, but obviously not everyone. So yes, apparently you'll need a driver from your controller maker. I've good results using Vista RAID drivers in Win 7.

 

[theJman]

^Thanks for the fast response.

I have the Silicon Image Ultra ATA/133 IDE RAID PCI Host Controller Card. I am surprised how the only EIDE PCI card Tiger Direct has is so incompatible.

http://www.sabrent.com/#section=Drivers&itemName=&itemID=0

According to their website they have up to XP and nothing else but I had asked them a question about 5 days ago and have yet to get a reply so it could just be out of date. I couldn't find a driver for Diablotek video card on their website but I could find it on ATIs. Anyone have any ideas as to where to look? or possible ways around this?

To add Vista into the installation source would it be a lot of coding or fairly little? As I have looked into the .inf and .sys files to see the code isn't too long or complicated.

Or do you think I could get optimal performance running the HDD from the ATAPI port even though I'd prefer not to (having to switch EIDE for different partitions everytime would be a hassle).

Thanks for any help (it seems I could have saved a lot of time by just forking over an extra $50 for a SATA HDD).

Edit: Also rather than creating another topic, one quick question I have is can you upgrade from XP 32-Bit to 7 64-bit or do you need to have a fresh install of 7?

 

[DJG]

Unfortunately ATA is not so slowly going away. Hell, my current MB doesn't do either floppy or EIDE/ATA. We're at that crossroads in the technological evolution where software is battling being able to run legacy stuff vs. keeping up with the new. When a legacy product becomes a minority they just drop support because it's not worth their time. I looked at the Silicon Image site, and they have drivers for a chipset that sort of looks like that one, but probably won't work.

If you can get it to run in any way, then do it.

 

[theJman]

Hey, I found drivers from Silicon Image's website. Does anyone know why there is so many sub-divisions of companies that duplicate brand name products rather than the brand name selling their product? For example, I bought a cheap Diablotek videocard and had to find the drivers on ATI, now I bought the only PCI controller I could find and it is by Sabrent but it is just a clone of Silicon Image's device. It is pretty frustrating from the customer's standpoint because neither the Diablotek or Sabrent box specifies that they are based on ATI or SI's design, so the consumer has to scour the internet for hours on end to find potential drivers.

Well, regardless of all that, here is the website
Silicon Image - Support | Search Results

Can anyone recommend which one would most likely be the proper fit for installing a single PATA HDD for Windows 7? Rather than me wasting an additional 5 or so recordable CDs.

Thanks.

 

[zigzag3143]

riad

Hey, I found drivers from Silicon Image's website. Does anyone know why there is so many sub-divisions of companies that duplicate brand name products rather than the brand name selling their product? For example, I bought a cheap Diablotek videocard and had to find the drivers on ATI, now I bought the only PCI controller I could find and it is by Sabrent but it is just a clone of Silicon Image's device. It is pretty frustrating from the customer's standpoint because neither the Diablotek or Sabrent box specifies that they are based on ATI or SI's design, so the consumer has to scour the internet for hours on end to find potential drivers.

Well, regardless of all that, here is the website
Silicon Image - Support | Search Results

Can anyone recommend which one would most likely be the proper fit for installing a single PATA HDD for Windows 7? Rather than me wasting an additional 5 or so recordable CDs.

Thanks.

Ok you 32bit or 64? what rev of win 7? and your sys specs would help
Ken

 

[theJman]

Ok you 32bit or 64? what rev of win 7? and your sys specs would help
Ken

Currently on 32-bit XP trying to go to W7 build 7229 64-bit

P Dual-Core 2.5GHz
2GB DDR2 RAM
ECS P43T-A2 mobo
160GB PATA HDD
8MB Diablotek videocard
and the Sabrent PCI controller

All brand new and I am assuming rev = build.

 

[theJman]

Wow, this is so frustrating, I just burned two CDs, one with all of those drivers on 32-Bit, one all on 64-Bit. Now I tried running them all on the 7 setup, no success, so I tried them all on my 32-bit Vista setup and STILL nothing. I am getting so sick of troubleshooting at this point that it is getting me angry.

The box product ID corresponds with the ID of this product, yet none of these drivers work...

ANY help whatsoever, would be greatly appreciated because I am about ready to give up solely due to frustration.

 

[DJG]

This is what I was warning you about. The drivers SI provides are for people who are embedding their chip in their own product, like Diablotek did. They use some version of those SI drivers themselves when they write the firmware and BIOS for their controller. But the driver you need is the driver that Diablotek has to provide, because they have added functionality and tailoring around the SI chip and their driver gives you access to their controller's full functionality.

 

[theJman]

This is what I was warning you about. The drivers SI provides are for people who are embedding their chip in their own product, like Diablotek did. They use some version of those SI drivers themselves when they write the firmware and BIOS for their controller. But the driver you need is the driver that Diablotek has to provide, because they have added functionality and tailoring around the SI chip and their driver gives you access to their controller's full functionality.

I see.

Well, I conceded and bought a SATA HDD ($60 for 500GB was a pretty good price) anyways, I'll probably try to dual boot XP and 7, 7 on my SATA, XP on my PATA.

Right now, my current problem is Windows 7 is hanging on the "expanding files" at 0%, regardless, I see many methods on google to try before I start inquiring about that.

Thanks for your help.

 

[DJG]

Let me ask you - how come you don't connect the ATA drive to the MB? I just re-read the mobo specs and saw it supports both SATA AND PATA. That should remove the IDE drive not being found problem. For some reason I thought you got the PATA RAID card because you actually needed it to connect your PATA drive. My bad.