SATA connection/configuration?

[Canuck1]

Hello, I have a Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS3R and currently, 3 hard drives and 1 DVD burner drive in my computer and 1 TB drive in an enclosure hooked up using USB (for now).

I am hoping to obtain some info and recommendations for how to hook up my hard drives. I have them hooked up already but have had some issues and basically, I'm unsure and confused on how these drives should be connected and configured.

I assume the SATA ports are fairly universal for the newer mobos so hopefully, someone can shed some light on the most optimal configuration. I am not using RAID at the moment and there are no immediate plans to do so. But, I would like to know which connections should be used etc. For e.g., the SATA ports are:
SATAII0 / 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 --> so a total of 6 ports or 6 possible connections, right?

I'm talking about the ICH9R controller. I'll worry about this controller and what connections/connectors to use for now and leave the Gigabyte SATA controllers out of the equation for now.

So, factoring in the SATA DVD Burner drive, where should I connect these devices? So, drives/devices are:

320GB OS drive - WD3200AAKS - will use for OS: Windows XP, Linux etc.
500GB 'DATA' drive - Samsung - will use for data
DVD Burner drive - Samsung
120GB HD - Seagate - not sure what to do with it - either another OS drive or another data drive

Currently, there are operating systems on all three SATA hard drives although, ultimately, I'll have a main OS drive being the 320GB WD drive.

I'm thinking I want the 3 hard disk drives plugged into SATAII0, 1 and 2 and the DVD burner drive plugged into SATA connector 3 (i.e. SATAII3)

If I added the 1TB drive into the mix via eSATA, I would plug this drive into SATAII4, perhaps?

I created a slipstreamed Windows XP CD so I can install with the built-in SATA drivers although I receive a text message during boot up (via BIOS) that the disk is not found. What's that about? The SATA AHCI driver sems like it's installed. It is listed in the text (during the boot up) and in Windows, there is reference.

Oh yeah, FYI, I enabled AHCI in the BIOS so that mode is being used (or so, I assume it is). I could go back to IDE-emulation mode but I just thought, since I have a slipstreamed Windows XP CD (that seems to have the SATA Intel ICH9R AHCI drivers integrated onto the CD - I hope!), I might as well try to use it.

Anybody have any info, recommendations, advice and/or other tips?

Thanks in advance.

 

[cjl]

It should be irrelevant which ones you plug the stuff into.

 

[rockbyter]

You can choose which one you boot from, and which order they go in, so you can literally unplug them, play musical chairs and plug them back in, as long as you know which one you are booting from, and it gets set in the bios.

Its a very simple operation these days.

 

[Canuck1]

So, the short answer is.... neither of you know... anyone else have an idea?

 

[SomeJoe7777]

No, the short answer is that they do know. And they gave you the correct answer. Somehow, you just don't want to believe it.

For the ICH9R SATA ports, numbered 0-5, all of them are exactly equivalent. They are enumerated by the BIOS in numerical order, which can make a difference if you are booting to an operating system where the BIOS enumeration order matters (like Windows 98). For OS's like Windows NT/2K/XP/Vista and all Linux variants, it does not matter in the slightest what the enumeration order is.

I personally like to place my main boot drive on SATA 0 just for consistency. But that's just me being a perfectionist. My machines would work identically if I plugged it into any other connector.

Other than setting your boot drive in the BIOS, and making sure that only 1 drive is plugged in when installing an OS are the only rules you need to follow.

If you're having other problems with your system, the ports the drives are plugged into have nothing to do with it (barring a hardware or cabling problem).

 

[Canuck1]

Currently, all three are plugged in to a SATA port. Only two are recognized and I need to trace why one is 'configured' to be the 'boot drive.'

The BIOS doesn't differentiate between hard drives as far as I know. It just has settings for boot order between different devices (HDD, DVD/CD, floppy etc.).

I know partition programs may have 'boot flags' to determine which boots so I guess I need to check this.

 

[Canuck1]

It looks like you guys are correct. Sorry, for my comment. Please accept my apologies. It was my fault for being careless. One of the power cables in one of the drives was not securely fastened (in other words, in all the way). At least, that looks like what the problem was.

Btw, I knew that there is no Master and Slave with SATA and that the switching is IDE configuration. I am not used to AHCI configuration, multiple SATA drives in one computer and the overall process....Anyway, all is good so far.

I had a few more questions if anyone wouldn't mind answering.

I also have a 1TB HDD in an enclosure that I want to use. Right now, I have it connected via USB. If I use it with SATA, I just plug it in through the bracket and then via one of the SATA ports so then 5 would be hooked up, right? It's simple plug in and I'm done, right? I have my BIOS set to SATA AHCI enabled so it will just pick up the 'enclosed' drive? I hope so. It would make it all so much easier.

2nd question: My cables are a mess now! I would like to tidy them up somehow. Do any of you guys or anyone else have any tips for tidiness for your drives? I did a good job previously of moving my cables away from the motherboard so there was a lot of space with no clutter. But, now with three internal drives, I have a mess of power and data cables. Also, my video card is in the way and the power cord into it sticks out a bit (why did the mobo manufacturers build the mobo with the PCI-e slot right in the middle of the board?!? Was that required?!? Sheesh.).

Perhaps, there is little I can do about it. There is space for four 2.5" hard drives in this case (Antec Solo). Therefore, I thought of taking the 500GB drive and putting it in another enclosure. It's going to be a data drive, ultimately, anyway. That might allow for better cooling for the other two or at least, would reduce some of the clutter. Btw, the two older drives were in separate computers and that's why there are operating systems on both of them.

Edit: One more question! I promise! I configured through the BIOS, AHCI mode but when the BIOS is displayed and it's booting up, it shows a lot of info on the screen but it's too fast. It displays the drives and then goes to a new screen. But, the last message it displays is 'no drives found' or detected. Something to that effect. I don't understand that. It shows the drives at the start of the boot process but then displays *that* message. Perhaps, I have to adjust a BIOS setting. I guess I have googling to do. It's doesn't help that the BIOS messages are shown so briefly. I'll try to figure it out.

I appreciate your answers and was just frustrated/confused about what was going on. Thanks for the assistance so far!

 

[SomeJoe7777]

It was my fault for being careless. One of the power cables in one of the drives was not securely fastened (in other words, in all the way). At least, that looks like what the problem was.

Not a problem, happens all the time. That is one huge advantage of the newer SATA power connectors - they have a much more positive feel when they are properly seated than the older Molex connectors.

1. The external enclosure that the 1TB drive is in should not have a SATA connector on the back. It may have an eSATA connector, though. In this case, you will need a bracket that converts an internal SATA port to an eSATA port (electrically the same, but cable plug is a different shape/style). And then you will need an eSATA cable. After that, the external drive will show up just like your internal ones and will work at the same speed as it would if it was mounted internally on SATA.

2. I generally just try to neatly bundle the cables together using twist ties, trying to keep them routed out of the way of fans, etc. There's not a whole lot you can do in terms of making it look precision-neat, given that the cables have a limited length and therefore can't get routed perfectly.

3. The message regarding that no drives were found probably is being generated by and/or referring to an unused interface or controller. Many motherboards have an extra controller on the motherboard (I believe your Gigabyte has an extra RAID controller separate from the ICH9), and it may be reporting that no drives are connected to it. The only way to get rid of this message would be to connect drives to it or to disable it in the BIOS.