My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

[cliffy]

The problem:
My motherboard, one revision 1.x Gigabyte GA-P35C-DS3R, will not boot from any device. The furthest I can get is the DMI screen on the BIOS and then the computer reboots.

Computer Specs:
GA-P35C-DS3R, now @ F10 BIOS
Intel Q6600
Geforce 8800GTS
4GB DDR2 800 RAM
1 x 300GB SATAII HD (Trying to make it 2x)
1 x 300GB IDE HD
1 x SATAII DVD Burner
Will be Vista 64 when I can get it running again.

Background:
I've had this computer for about 8 months now, and through a couple upgrades, I've had no trouble. Just recently, I decided I would like to take advantage of the motherboard's RAID feature, and since I had a second 300GB SATAII hard drive I thought it would be easy-peasy. I realized that RAIDing the drive would require a format of both drives so I backed up any important files on my original drive and proceeded to install the second SATA HD.

Without any inkling of the trouble I was about to cause myself, I set the BIOS to use the RAID function, slapped the Vista install disk into my DVD drive, and set sail for... failure. Suddenly no drive connected to the motherboard would boot. I chuckled a little and decided to return the BIOS and the drives connected to their respective states. Nothing. Still no booting. Great! Now what?

I've tried reseting the BIOS to its fail-safe defaults, every possible combination of drives connected to the motherboard, updating the BIOS to its latest revision (F10). Nothing works. I can't believe that both my Vista install and my DVD drive have died at the same time. SOMETHING should be able to boot. I'm not sure what to do, I have trouble believing that the motherboard suddenly went bad. Replacing it would be a last resort, but one I'm willing to consider if I can't figure anything else out.

Anyone that has any advice, don't be shy! I just want my computer back. Other than this, its been running great!

[Lsdmeasap]

Re: My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

When trying to install vista did you even get to where it asks for the drivers for raid? I think so you said it saw no disks, that is where you would be hitting the load driver button and load the raid drivers for your disk. If you need them let me know and I will dig you up a link.

And you know right? You must go in and setup the raid array before you can do anything.....If you already know all that excuse me, just had to be sure

I suggest using the Gigabyte raid channels (The 2 purple ones) and trying this again, I have tested both Intel and Gigabyte ones and GA wins IMO. Use these settings for those channels. And there in "First Boot device" you will need to go in and select your RAID(SCSI) after you do create it....Before you can even install or attempt to install vista

[spec]

Re: My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

Do as the above post sayz by lsdmeasap.
Then connect your drives to the Gigabyte controller.
After POST and device detection enter RAID setup screen (Ctrl+G) i think.
Create the RAID array, give it a name, select the disks, type of RAID etc..

Then change the boot sequence to CDROM first, pop the Vista CD in and boot.
Start Vista installation till it gets to a screen where it asks "Where do you want to install Windows ?". At this point it might give a message stating that there are no drives on your system. On this screen, click on the bottom left link "Load Driver" and point to the install time drivers for Gigabyte SATA RAID, this can be located on a Floppy, another CD or even a USB mem stick (I used a USB, it works!). After it loads the driver you'll be able to see your disk. Then click "Drive options (Advanced)" link and click on new partition to create the first partition on your RAID setup. I'm using 50G as the first partition. Only the first is enough, you can create more if you want now, but it will not format them anyway, so I'd suggest just create 1 now the rest after Vista install is complete.
Hope this helps....

[cliffy]

Re: My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

I should've included this in my original post, but I can't get past the 'verifying DMI pool' bios screen, it immediately reboots after that screen. It never seems to try to read from the disk drives when they are connected. The DVD never spins up or anything.

Also, I have tried putting the CDROM drive first and it still wont boot from it.

[Rewl]

Re: My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

Under the circumstance of a choked up controller (for whatever reason) it's quite normal that the other drives connected to the same one won't work either;

Are the HDDs different models or revisions?

edit:
another idea: make sure you actually enable sata-2 on both drives;
On my 250gb seagate drive i had to remove a mini-jumper for that.
(limiting to sata-1 arose from former problems with some via-chipsets i think)

yet another idea:
Did you low-level format the HDDs beforehand with the respective manufacturer's disk-utility?

[Rewl]

Re: My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

on a sidenote: further reading about how 'great' software raid is.

http://forums.tweaktown.com/showthread.php?t=26073

[cliffy]

Re: My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

on a sidenote: further reading about how 'great' software raid is.

http://forums.tweaktown.com/showthread.php?t=26073

I may forgo RAID as a bad idea now. I was under the impression that RAID provided by the motherboard would be hardware RAID, but I now know otherwise.

Right now I'd like the computer to boot in any way. I've tried just connecting one hard drive and the DVD drive to try to boot from the Vista install DVD, but, like before, nothing happens.

I tried returning the drives to their original SATA ports. The BIOS seems to recognize the drives, but the same behavior is shown. It gets to the 'verifying DMI pool' screen and then promptly reboots without any indication of trying to boot from the hard disk or DVD drive.

This is particularly frustrating because this machine was working fine before, and I can't believe that something I did hosed it, but I guess that is a possibility. Adding a new hard drive should be a routine operation, but I guess not.

[Lsdmeasap]

Re: My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

Can you get in the BIOS with No drives hooked up, at all?

And the onboard RAID, just so you know is faster then not using any RAID at all, and is faster then SOFTWARE raid.

But yes it is not $300 hardware raid by no means

*EDIT*

I see you can get in BIOS, sorry. Yes, did you format the new second disk and are they both primary and active?

[cliffy]

Re: My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

I see you can get in BIOS, sorry. Yes, did you format the new second disk and are they both primary and active?

They may be both primary and active, but regardless, even when I just connect one hard drive, the problem persists. At this point I will consider the problem solved if I can get the computer to boot from any drive, I don't need RAID.

The computer is behaving as though the Southbridge has lost the capability to read from any connected drive. I've seen the BIOS report the correct brand names of drives when connect, but no boot.

[Lsdmeasap]

Re: My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

Well if you setup a raid originally (Which I assume you did to start the vista install) then you wont have a bootable drive again anyway until you delete the raid in the raid screen, or reformat either of those disks

[cliffy]

Re: My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

Well if you setup a raid originally (Which I assume you did to start the vista install) then you wont have a bootable drive again anyway until you delete the raid in the raid screen, or reformat either of those disks

I never got it to boot even into the Vista install DVD, right after I set it to use RAID in the BIOS I started having this trouble, which is what I did right after I installed the second hard disk.

[Lsdmeasap]

Re: My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

Well ok, so you never even went into the "Control + G" page and made a RAID array? If not then that is the first reason why you never got anywhere with installing vista on a raid, you didnt have a raid setup so vista whether you ever got to the load driver page or not would have never seen a raid array.

The setting for raid in the bios is only the settings, you must go into the raid array pages after that and create a raid disk by hitting Control + G on the third page after your bootup screen. The page that shows you disk info and such

[cliffy]

Re: My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

Well ok, so you never even went into the "Control + G" page and made a RAID array? If not then that is the first reason why you never got anywhere with installing vista on a raid, you didnt have a raid setup so vista whether you ever got to the load driver page or not would have never seen a raid array.

The setting for raid in the bios is only the settings, you must go into the raid array pages after that and create a raid disk by hitting Control + G on the third page after your bootup screen. The page that shows you disk info and such

Regardless, I am/was not able to boot with the Vista DVD which makes that moot. If I had gotten the Vista DVD to boot and THEN I didn't see any drives, then what you just said would've helped me, but that never happened. What happened was: I installed the second hard drive, enabled RAID in the BIOS, and then nothing would boot. I have since reset the BIOS to IDE, and STILL nothing will boot. Trying different combinations of drives connected and still nothing will boot. I just want to at least get to the point of being able to boot from the DVD drive.

[techtype]

Re: My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

When I saw this problem, it eventually turned out to be the ide cable that the DVD drive was on. Try disconnecting the cable from the motherboard and see what happens. If it gets past the DMI screen, your DVD drive or cable is the problem.

[cliffy]

Re: My Gigabyte GA-P53C-DS3R won't boot from any device, help!

When I saw this problem, it eventually turned out to be the ide cable that the DVD drive was on. Try disconnecting the cable from the motherboard and see what happens. If it gets past the DMI screen, your DVD drive or cable is the problem.

I have tried booting with no drives attached, and it exhibits the same behavior, it gets to the DMI screen and then immediately reboots. I haven't tried swapping the SATA cable on the DVD drive so I'll try that when I get home tonight, but it seems odd that the cable would suddenly fail in this fashion.