How To Install Windows XP on SATA-II Hard Drive on GA-K8N Motherboard
I recently built a new computer with a AMD Athlon 64 Socket 939 3000 CPU / Gigabyte nForce4SLI GA-K8N Ultra-SLI motherboard, and Samsung 120G SATA-II hard drive. My problem was with setup of Windows XP on the box. Windows XP Home setup would run just fine, install the drivers, format the hard drive, copy the files, but when it went to its first reboot it would start the setup process from step 1 again! I finally tracked the problem down to Windows XP not being able to recognize a Serial ATA-II hard drive on my GA-K8N motherboard. That started a HUGE ordeal on trying get get Windows to install on the SATA hard drive. Below is the process you can use to setup Windows on a single SATA-2 hard drive running on a GA-K8N Ultra-SLI Raid enabled Motherboard. Please note the instructions in the Gigabyte GA-K8N motherboard instructions document are WRONG and the drivers on their CD DO NOT work.
What you will need to install Windows XP on your Serial ATA hard drive and GA-K8N motherboard (other than the stuff listed above).
STEP 1 :: If you only are running one SATA hard drive DISABLE RAID in the BIOS
This sounds eaiser than it actually is in the Award Software BIOS. There are many setting in the CMOS Setup Utility page that say RAID but if you disable some of them you also disable the Serial ATA functionality and then you really won't see your hard drive ever.
STEP 2 :: Download the SATA (Serial ATA) or SATA-II Drivers
In step 3 you will need the SATA drivers so we need to get them on a floppy disk.
If you have a Serial ATA hard drive download the Silicon Image drivers from Silicon Image's site or click here to download the SIL3114 SATA drivers I found that work.
If you have a Serial ATA-II hard drive download the NVIDIA SATA-II drivers from NVIDIA's site or click here to download the NVIDIA SATA-II drivers I used.
Place these files on a floppy and have it ready for the next step.
STEP 3 :: Install Windows XP on your SATA hard drive
CONGRATULATIONS you are almost there. If Windows XP comes up after the initial setup reboot then you have gotten it to recognize your Serial ATA (SATA) hard drive! Hold on though one more got-ya to watch out for.
STEP 4 :: Be Careful when installing your Motherboard provided driver disk.
For my Gigabyte GA-K8N Ultra-SLI motherboard the provided CDROM contains the sound, ect necessary drivers to enable all of the onboard hardware. This CD also contains outdated SATA and SATA-II drivers that if installed will UNDO all your work from above. (Trust me been there done that DOH!)
To prevent the CD from installing bad drivers unclick the box next to installing the SATA drivers when installing the motherboard drivers.
If you do happen to forget this step and install the bad SATA drivers get ready for more painfull work. If Windows reports that you have a bad SATA driver then restart the setup by booting from the Windows Disk and go through STEP 3 but when it asks you during the format drive step if you would like and repair the install click YES. Now you will have replaced the bad drivers with the good one and Windows XP will be OK again.
Hope this helps. This has has been writen for a specific motherboard but the problems have been seen with Serial ATA Windows XP installs on many motherboards and this information should work for most of those also. Just check and see which hardware processors they use for their SATA functionality and therefore which drivers you will need on your floppy disk during the install.
Please let me know if you have any comments or any other tips with your specific setup. I had a horrible time finding accurate information on this so hopefully this "How To Install Windows XP on Serial ATA hard drive" post helps others!
What you will need to install Windows XP on your Serial ATA hard drive and GA-K8N motherboard (other than the stuff listed above).
- A floppy drive in your computer connected to the FDD cable in your motherboard. (NOTE: this is necessary as Windows XP needs to load the drivers you need from the floppy A: I went out and bought a floppy drive for this.) OR A CD burner to create your own installation CD with the drivers pre-loaded on it. (NOTE: Since I did not go this way I can only point you to a How-To Link about Slipstreaming Windows XP SP2 Installation: http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/windowsxp_sp2_slipstream.asp Thanks to Rich N. for the heads up on this method)
- The SATA-II or SATA drivers downloaded from NVIDIA or the Silicon Image SIL3114 drivers OR downloaded from this post and placed on a clean floppy disk. Further in the How To File I have links and descriptions on which driver you will need.
STEP 1 :: If you only are running one SATA hard drive DISABLE RAID in the BIOS
This sounds eaiser than it actually is in the Award Software BIOS. There are many setting in the CMOS Setup Utility page that say RAID but if you disable some of them you also disable the Serial ATA functionality and then you really won't see your hard drive ever.
- First press the Delete key during post to enter the BIOS setup
- Second Select the Integrated Peripherals menu item on the Award BIOS main menu
- Third go to the 6th menu item "IDE/SATA RAID function" on the next menu and click Disabled. This item is Enable by default which I think is silly because it assumes most people go with a RAID array and the book is not all that descriptive in telling you.
- Fourth go back to the main menu and verify in the "Advanced BIOS Features" menu that your boot order is what you need. Mine is Floppy / CD / Hard Drive.
- NOTE: On some BIOS's you will need to change the boot order to SCSI or the like because they do not recognize the SATA hard drives as a "hard drive" but as a peripheral. For my setup the BIOS recognized the SATA-II hard drive as a hard drive and I did not have the option to select a SCSI or other type of disk and belive me I tried all the options while debugging.
STEP 2 :: Download the SATA (Serial ATA) or SATA-II Drivers
In step 3 you will need the SATA drivers so we need to get them on a floppy disk.
If you have a Serial ATA hard drive download the Silicon Image drivers from Silicon Image's site or click here to download the SIL3114 SATA drivers I found that work.
If you have a Serial ATA-II hard drive download the NVIDIA SATA-II drivers from NVIDIA's site or click here to download the NVIDIA SATA-II drivers I used.
Place these files on a floppy and have it ready for the next step.
STEP 3 :: Install Windows XP on your SATA hard drive
- Insert the Windows XP setup CD into your CDROM drive and start/restart your computer
- Boot from the CD (press any necessary keys your BIOS/Computer might require
- IMPORTANT STEP When Windows is first installing it will ask you to press F6 To install any Third Party SCSI or hardware drivers PRESS F6 when that message comes up. It will continue on and then in about a minute will prompt you to install the extra drivers.
- At the install screen press the Key to Install the extra drivers. Insert your floppy you made in STEP 2 when prompted and press Enter.
- Select the driver you want and press Enter. NOTE: If you have a Serial ATA-II driver then you will need to install 2 drivers, just select the first and press enter then select the second and press enter.
- Continue with Windows XP instillation.
- Make sure to remove the floppy before the reboot and keep it handy because you will need it 1 more time during the next install step
CONGRATULATIONS you are almost there. If Windows XP comes up after the initial setup reboot then you have gotten it to recognize your Serial ATA (SATA) hard drive! Hold on though one more got-ya to watch out for.
STEP 4 :: Be Careful when installing your Motherboard provided driver disk.
For my Gigabyte GA-K8N Ultra-SLI motherboard the provided CDROM contains the sound, ect necessary drivers to enable all of the onboard hardware. This CD also contains outdated SATA and SATA-II drivers that if installed will UNDO all your work from above. (Trust me been there done that DOH!)
To prevent the CD from installing bad drivers unclick the box next to installing the SATA drivers when installing the motherboard drivers.
If you do happen to forget this step and install the bad SATA drivers get ready for more painfull work. If Windows reports that you have a bad SATA driver then restart the setup by booting from the Windows Disk and go through STEP 3 but when it asks you during the format drive step if you would like and repair the install click YES. Now you will have replaced the bad drivers with the good one and Windows XP will be OK again.
Hope this helps. This has has been writen for a specific motherboard but the problems have been seen with Serial ATA Windows XP installs on many motherboards and this information should work for most of those also. Just check and see which hardware processors they use for their SATA functionality and therefore which drivers you will need on your floppy disk during the install.
Please let me know if you have any comments or any other tips with your specific setup. I had a horrible time finding accurate information on this so hopefully this "How To Install Windows XP on Serial ATA hard drive" post helps others!
23 Comments:
I had exactly the same problem as you with the same motherboard (GA-K8NXP-9) and i had narrowed it down to a hard drive problem but couldnt figure out why it kept restarting the win xp setup. The instruction manual is very vague about the face that the SATA drivers have to be installed but i see it now on p.73. Anyway thanks so much u have saved me so much trouble and time of trying to sort out the problem.
I have the exact problem as you have with the same motherboard (K8n-Ultra-SLI). I am using XP Pro 64 bit and I have to use the new 64 bit SATAII drivers (which I did download from Gigabyte). I am running a SATA II Raid configuration. It still goes back to step one on the first reboot. I am out of guesses at this point.
Martin
OMG! I have been pulling my hair out for the past few days trying and retrying to get XP to install on this newly built machine. Every time having the reset and start at step one issue.
Thought it was RAM, the MB itself, the hard-drives, videocard....... Thanks big time for this tip, going to go and try it now. I'll let you know.
GA-K8N Ultra-SLI
4 Gb Ram
2 - 250Gb SATA-II HD's Raid
7800GTX
Thanks heaps for you help richard, I have a different motherboard but some of your more general tips were very helpful indeed! Much Appreciated!
I have the same problem and haven't been able to get past it. New setup and clean-install. GA-K8NXP-SLI, 4400+ dc, 7800gt, bequiet 520w power. I've tried these drivers and a few others slipstreamed but always the same problem. Tomorrow I'll get floppies and to use drivers from them in install but after then I'll have to go for defective mb or cpu. Sucks not to be able to even install windows on a brandnew setup.
Oh yeah I have corsairs low-latency 2x512 simms. Tested with memtest - no errors. And tested separately on installing and same fault. Also tested with an external usb-hd with a preinstalled windows setup on it and still it resets. When the reset happens there is a change of state in the setup always. On cd-boot when the setup itself is loading or with the usb-drive when it has loaded the first bar. Any suggestions? If someone has any information about this please email me! Thanks
elias.sajo (at) luukku.com
Praise be with you - I had exactly the same problem with the GA-K8NXP-9 too. I read about the "install any Third Party SCSI or hardware drivers by Pressing F6" step but had no idea that the default bios settings were wrong! I'd been going mad! Thanks again!
i'm trying it on an asus a8n-sli with western digital 250 gb sata II drive....i did all of these steps, but for some reason the install process is soooooo slow...at least an hour for the initial copy of the files, and now i'm still waiting for it to finish...any ideas as to why it is sooo slow???
i'm trying to install on my asus a8n-sli with 250 gb western digital sata II drive. i do the install of the drivers, but the windows install is so god awful slow!! i don't know why, it takes at least an hour for the initial copy of hte files and then the install process is just as long if not longer. i always remember being able to xp up and running within an hour or so...any ideas??
I Had the problem on my GAK8NSLi and ive been looking around and everythings all a bit confusing and the help manual is terrible so thanks for the help!
Usually i dont write stuff but im just happy right now.
Cheers!!!
I had the same exact problem with a ga-k8n-sli. Thanks so much! I can hopefully finally use that £600 of metal and silicon ive got lying around.
Thank You!!! I had the Same problem as well as the Maxtor DMAX 10 Firmware problem. RMA'd the Drive and Mobo and got the Gigabyte Board and WD 250 SATA II drive and was pulling my hair out!!
I have the same problem, but this drivers , I don't know why, doesn't work on my system(MB: ASUS A8N-E HDD 250 GB DESKSTAR)
I have this "could not load the system" error message after the first restart.
When faced with the same problem about 12 months ago (GA-K8N Ultra-SLI), I copped out and set up a JBOD RAID array consisting of my single SATA drive.
Oxymoronic, I know, but it if you don't have a floppy drive, it will get you up and running...
Thank you for saving me many hours of frustration - you're a legend. Cheers, Ju.
3 hours later... Searching the manual I tried the Drivers on the disk first - no luck. Followed your instructions... XP is installing as I blogg.
Thank you, Thank you - I'll be leaving your URL on ebuyer for the next unsuspecting buyer of this motherboard.
Thanks for taking the time to post this info, it helped me too !
Gigabyte K8N-ULTRA-SLI
Thanks heaps mate....xp now installing after fixing bios setting on ga-k8n-sli
Thanks for the help with the BIOS settings. I couldn't follow your directions exactly due to a different BIOS, but it gave me a few ideas to try out and it's formatting the disk now as I type this (on a separate computer of course!). Anyway, just wanted to show my appreciation!
I have laptop but my laptop have no cdrom. Could you help me how to do.
I wish Ihad found your page before.
I have been trying to install winxp home on a new Maxtor DiamondMaxplus SATA 2 250GB - 16 MB with aas rock 939 dual - SATA SKT 939. Must have spent a little short of 30 hours on it tyring what I thought was everything. Have ended up going back to a IDE drive. When I get time and some spare cash I will get a new SATA2 drive and go for it.
There may sometimes be an easier way to fix this issue. I don't have the same mobo as you, but I did encounter the same issue.
In the BIOS, I changed the disk mode from CHS to LARGE, then did a full (not quick) reformat of the drive withing the XP installer. Things worked fine from there.
I don't have any problem installing XP on my SATA II drive, maybe because I flashed the BIOS to F9, but the problem I have is that it REFUSES to boot from the SATA II drive if there are other drives connected. This is because despite setting it to the top of the boot order, which IS committed to the CMOS as a reboot and re-entry to the BIOS will confirm, once the BIOS runs through without entering set-up, it sticks the SATA II drive back at the bottom of the list and refuses to boot from it any more. It has to be the only drive attached to the system. What the hell? Does anyone know a solution or at least have this problem also?
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