Installation won't detect my PCI adapter for IDE & SATA drives

[tylergard702]

Just built a moderate spec gaming PC from scratch, and all has went according to plan except when I try to install Windows 7, my hard drive won't show up.
My new motherboard doesn't have any IDE slots, but I only have an IDE hard drive. I am using a 'Pluscom Serial ATA PCI Adapter' to connect my hard drive to the computer as it has 1 IDE slot on it. I don't have a disc for drivers and don't know where to start.
I am running Ubuntu on it at the moment so I can download any drivers I may need.
Thanks for any help in advance

 

[alphanumeric]

Does the hard drive show up in the BIOS? That card may have its own BIOS menu that you will have to access to set the correct boot order. My IDE RAID card had its own BIOS setup menu that I had to access during boot up. It had its own drive detection etc. Watch your screen during boot up and you may see a message telling you what key to press to enter its setup menu. Did it come with any documentation or a driver disk?

 

[tylergard702]

Thanks for the reply, my father gave it to me, but he gave me just the card in the original box. No paper's or a disc , as for the second BIOS: In my BIOS the primary boot device is the card, not the hard drive, so your theorybis correct there are a couple of screens that flash past on boot, i will try to catch the last one and access settings

 

[alphanumeric]

I haven't used my old IDE RAID card in ages. It was last used on an XP PC and I had to load the driver from a floppy during the Windows XP install process. Windows 7 can load it from a CD/DVD or even a thumb drive. You might have to go on line to the manufacturers web site and hunt one up. If you can't find a Windows 7 driver have a look for a Windows Vista driver. Hope fully its just a setup glitch and you won't have to mess around with loading a separate driver. Make sure the hard drive drive select jumper is set correctly. CS (cable select) would be what I would set it too. You also want the newer 80 wire 40 pin IDE cable. If you use one of the old 40 wire 40 pin cables you have to set the jumper for Master, cable select won't work on the 40 wire cable.

 

[tylergard702]

I got into the PCI chip's settings and managed to change my hard drive to the computer's boot device. But unfortunately the setup is still not detecting my hard drive. The PCI chip's settings page is as follows:
Create RAID 0 Striping for Performance
Create RAID 1 Mirroring for Reliability
Create JBOD for intergrated Capacity
Strip Size 16K
Delete RAID Settings & Partition
Delete All RAID Settings & Partition
Rebuild RAID Array
Select Boot Drive

Hope this helps / is relevent

 

[alphanumeric]

I would try the "Delete All RAID Settings & Partition" option and start fresh. Then see if it lets you partition the drive the way you want. You don't want the Create Raid 0 or 1 options for a single drive. I believe the JBOD (Just a Bunch Of Disks) option is also for setting up more than one drive. The Select Boot drive option should then just show your one drive. If you still can't get it to work you may have to hunt up a driver for that card. There should be an option listed to load additional drivers during setup on the screen where you select what drive/partition to install to.

 

[tylergard702]

Thankyou, I shall try above suggetions and search for a driver if that doesn't work

 

[alphanumeric]

I'm packing it in for tonight but I'll have a look tomorrow morning to see how things went.

 

[tylergard702]

Ok, thanks for your help so far

 

[tylergard702]

According to my father, windows XP detects the drive and installs. It may be a long-winded way of doing it: but I shall try installing XP and using the 30-day trial to upgrade to Windows 7

 

[alphanumeric]

Keep in mind that you can't upgrade from XP to windows 7. Not in the traditional way anyway. It will still end up being a custom/clean install when finished. I tried to find a tutorial on installing the IDE or SATA driver during install but haven't so far. Here are a couple to look at anyway.

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/131041-upgrade-install-xp-windows-7-a.html?filter
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/171382-clean-install-windows-7-windows-xp-desktop.html?filter
http://www.sevenforums.com/installa...on-installation-problems-their-solutions.html

Found It!!! http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/68505-sata-driver-load-windows-7-vista-setup.html?filter[2]

 

[tylergard702]

Ah, I thought you could upgrade from XP to 7, that makes things more complicated. I have already tried loading drivers in the installation but the hard drive doesn't show up still I have tried about 3 different downloads for drivers but they all appear to be the same .zip file and therefore the same drivers. I attempted every driver in every folder for every download but it has not worked. I am downloading another to try now, but it also seems it may be the same drivers .

 

[tylergard702]

Just got the drivers, but they are the same as before and will not work.

 

[alphanumeric]

Is the Windows 7 you are trying to install 32 bit or 64 bit. If its 64 bit that may be why the drivers won't install. The drivers may be 32 bit drivers. You un-zipped the zip file right? < I had to ask just to make sure So what happens when you try to LOAD the driver during the install? There are adapters that will convert an IDE drive to a SATA. And as far as I know they don't require a driver, they just use the built in Windows SATA driver.

 

[tylergard702]

My apologies for not replying, I have been away from home for a couple of days (attending a cousin's wedding),
I have tried both 32-bit and 64-bit Windows 7, and even 32-bit XP. In the .zip file there are a number of folders for Windows Server, XP, Vista and 7 with 32-bit and 64-bit versions for each OS. however the drivers appear to be fake or just terribly made as none of them work with their corresponding OS.
I think that my only option now is buying a SATA hard drive that can go straight into the motherboard (no third party drivers needed (fingers crossed)). I was planning to buy one anyway as IDE is very slow and holding my computer back from it's full potential, it's just annoying as It may be 2-5 months before I can buy a decent one.

Thank you to every one who has made suggestions and attempted to help
I am still open to any suggestions if people are willing to make them, but at the end of the day this hard drive is outdated and I need a new one.

Thanks again

 

[alphanumeric]

Maybe your PCI controller card got damaged somehow? Was it kept in an anti static bag?