GRUB cannot find disks after turning on RAID on ASRock A785GMH/128M

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xen111

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Jul 29, 2016
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I installed a ASRock A785GMH/128M motherboard in this system (AM2) and am trying to turn the motherboard BIOS mode into RAID mode. When I boot Windows 7 installer with it, Windows installer will say that it cannot boot from the JBOD the RAID firmware has created out of the (only) disk I have installed at that point.

Fair enough perhaps that could be solved. The disk is visible though and I can partition it, so Windows is complaining about the disk not being a BIOS Boot device (yet).

But next I try to boot my installed systems. All systems fail (they are all Linux). Even a USB stick fails to boot, saying (Grub) that It cannot find my (hd0).

Fair, but "ls" (that is supposed to list all devices) also returns empty. So GRUB (even from USB) can no longer find ANY devices!!!!.

I mean it's real cute that it turns all my SATA drives to RAID, but now it cannot find my USB stick either! At the same time the Windows DVD *did* boot and I haven't tried any Linux DVD yet.

It feels like I need to get rid of this mobo ASAP but I do not know what is going on.

I mean, what the crap. The only things I can still do are:
- check for BIOS upgrade
- boot from Linux DVD
- hope to find a reason why Grub can't find anything (seems rather pointless)

- install a grub version while RAID is activated (in the BIOS) (IF Kubuntu DVD even boots) and then hope it makes a difference (this renders USB sticks immobile, in-interoperable). There is no solution here.

Has anyone ever heard of anything like this and was there a solution to it?

All I can think of doing now is to use software RAID in Linux (LVM or whatever) and not use anything in Windows.

Or get some cheap PCIe x1 RAID controller and use that (ugh, I wanted to use that free port).

I don't think Windows can do software raid (dynamic disks) on a disk that includes the boot drive. I... am not sure I have encountered these issues on a different AMD motherboard (for sure I have run Linux installer DVDs on that one while RAID was activated, and I could also read the arrays). (I just don't think I ever booted from USB stick back then; and booting the system always failed, but I think it failed *after* the initrd had loaded. So yes I did try to install Linux on that and Linux was not a problem then (in the sense of GRUB not being a problem as far as I could tell).

I have another system I can try to boot this USB stick on after turning it on, but I hate to boot that system now (too far away for me).

So as it concerns Linux and basically everything, (not sure) my system is unusable the moment I turn the RAID on in the BIOS.
 
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helpstar

helpstar

Titan
Dec 25, 2012
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first of all, is the usb stick recognized by the bios?

update the BIOS, could help a lot

install memtest86+ on an empty usb stick and boot from it. Does it boot? (press F11at post if it doesn´t and choose usb to boot)
does it boot in non raid mode?

eventually you need a raid driver to install windows in raid mode


 
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noidea_77

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Jul 28, 2012
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Maybe it helps to know, that it is always a software raid and so you need the raid sata drivers for the amd controller. If you want to boot from the raid, you will need th so called f6 drivers for windows. It seems to be a hardware raid, but it isn't and a cheap pci-e raid controller will be exactly the same.
 
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xen111

Commendable
Jul 29, 2016
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Yes otherwise I couldn't select it or get to the point where Grub (that is installed on it) would load far enough to give its error message and rescue prompt (I had disconnected any other drive containing Grub in the meantime to test).

update the BIOS, could help a lot
Click to expand...

I will have to check, it's a second hand motherboard, the chance there will be new BIOSes is sometimes very low.

install memtest86+ on an empty usb stick and boot from it. Does it boot? (press F11at post if it doesn´t and choose usb to boot)
Click to expand...

Memtest is usually included as a boot option in Grub (I think it is even just a Grub image that gets loaded). I have to find out how to install it by itself.

does it boot in non raid mode?
Click to expand...

The stick boots fine in non-RAID mode.

eventually you need a raid driver to install windows in raid mode
Click to expand...

Windows 8 doesn't need it. I have the driver (hopefully) already on stick. Windows 10 gave trouble, for some reason my Windows 10 ISO back in the day was not able (on another system) to read the arrays. But after installing Windows 8 and then upgrading to 10, it was perfectly able to do everything.

Maybe it helps to know, that it is always a software raid and so you need the raid sata drivers for the amd controller. If you want to boot from the raid, you will need th so called f6 drivers for windows. It seems to be a hardware raid, but it isn't and a cheap pci-e raid controller will be exactly the same.
Click to expand...

I know that but the issue is not Windows here. The issue is (thus far) not being able to boot Linux at all although I haven't checked my DVD yet.

I have now abused an SD-card with memtest86 and will now boot from it. Hang tight. Thanks for the swift responses btw.
 
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xen111

Commendable
Jul 29, 2016
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I had already installed it. Memtest boots fine.

The stick also boots fine when I disconnect all drives. The stick also boots fine when the drives are connected but no array is found; but at that point the devices are not shown in the boot menu either (they are like hidden by the RAID controller) and hence Grub also does not have a problem with them.

The moment either one of them is visible it appears booting is no longer possible. I am not sure I have conclusively done this for the non-bootable drive (harddisk) as well when it was in "JBOD" status but I cannot actually create a JBOD, the controller firmware had apparently done that for me, I cannot create them if they are single disk, I have to use 2 disks for JBOD. And.

I cannot do any form of passthrough. I *have* to define them as an array before the BIOS will even show them. And then Grub has an issue with it, even when booting the USB.

The only thing that is left to do is: boot the Kubuntu DVD, and, write Grub to an SD card AFTER RAID has been enabled (as if that would make a difference). One other thing I can think of is setting a device.map prior to booting but I don't see how that would make a difference either.
 
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xen111

Commendable
Jul 29, 2016
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The Kubuntu DVD boots fine, but reinstalling Grub doesn't make a difference.

On a similar motherboard (that I greatly loved, but I want to get rid of it) it boots just FINE when the similar RAID mode is activated on both harddisk and stick. The BIOS doesn't hide the disk although I haven't added it as a RAID device yet. So it is not conclusive yet but although adding a disk to the raid is not destructive it does add something on the disk.

And I can't risk destroying that disk :p. Not really.

All I know is that *this* motherboard fails completely in this. Anyhow I don't know what else to do but I have to install Windows 10 today, and that's just to bind it to this motherboard, and now this motherboard doesn't do AT ALL what I want it to do :p :(.
 
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TheTechZone

Commendable
Feb 2, 2017
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It means GRUB (The Linux loader) is not loading due to a setting not allowing GRUB to load. Did you have an old MOBO? If so compare the settings and change them to match your old MOBO settings. If not then check one of your other Linux system's MOBOs. This should let GRUB load and then your OS. If this doesn't work try formatting the hard disk. If that doesn't work then I don't know.
 
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