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[Solved] Windows 7 not auto detecting my external esata hdd

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Best answer from Paperdoc.

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Mo786   08-27-2009 at 01:45:54 AM

I didn't have this problem back in XP. I have a 1TB external E-SATA HDD that I have plugged in the computer. The problem is everytime I turn it off then decide to turn it back on later to backup some stuff or to take some stuff out, Windows 7 doesn't automatically detect it.

To make it detect it I would have to go to device manager, right click on "Disk Drives" and click on "Scan for hardware changes" for it to detect my HDD again. This gets annoying.

Back in XP it would detect it right away and show it in "My Computer."

Is there anyway I can make it auto detect it like XP did?

I have this motherboard here http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Support [...] uctID=2442 and I already installed the drivers for it. I installed the vista 32 bit drivers because there weren't any windows 7 drivers.

Also, I asked this question on a another forum and they said its because I don't have AHCI enabled. I tried to look for it in my BIOS to see if its disabled, but I couldn't find it. I took pictures of my BIOS incase its named as something else that I don't know of. Here are the pics:

-[B]Main BIOS Screen:[/B] http://img523.imageshack.us/img523/387/dscn1048.jpg
-[B]Standard CMOS Features:[/B] http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/7271/dscn1049.jpg
-[B]Advanced BIOS Features:[/B] http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/3161/dscn1050.jpg
-[B]Advanced Chipset Features:[/B] http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/1815/dscn1051.jpg
-[B]Integrated Peripherals (Page 1):[/B] http://img195.imageshack.us/img195/5394/dscn1052i.jpg
-[B]Integrated Peripherals (Page 2):[/B] http://img523.imageshack.us/img523/8500/dscn1053r.jpg
-[B]Power Management Setup:[/B] http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/7545/dscn1054.jpg
-[B]PnP/PCI Configurations:[/B] http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/2126/dscn1055.jpg
-[B]PC Health Status:[/B] http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/1674/dscn1056g.jpg
-[B]MB Intelligent Tweaker (M.I.T.):[/B] http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/7263/dscn1057w.jpg

This worked fine in XP without any problems. I don't know why I have to scan for the hard drive everytime I turn it on. I don't know if AHCI was enabled back in XP but I never turned it off or anything.

Thanks in advance.

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Best answer from Paperdoc
What mobo is this? Looking at its manual might help understand where the options are found.

A few notes from your screenshots:
Your IDE Channel 0 has no Master? seems odd.

How is your HDD attached to an eSATA connection? Is there a separate eSATA port on the mobo? It does not seem to show up that way in the BIOS screens. But maybe it is on one of the regular SATA ports through a eSATA adapter?

Usually setting AHCI mode is in the Integrated Peripherals in the details of how each SATA port is managed. But your screenshots appear to indicate that, with each of your two ports set to Enabled, and the SATA RAID Function Disabled, you cannot change any details of the two SATA ports on each of the simulated IDE ports they seem to occupy. That's why I'm thinking the mobo manual may have some clues.

A caution: I have read (no personal experience) that changing a HDD from IDE emulation or Native SATA to AHCI can be difficult. That may not be so in Win7. Or, the notes I've seen may pertain only to boot drives with the OS on them - I don't know. Certainly I would expect that you could un-install a non-boot SATA device, change its port settings to AHCI, and install it that way without a lot of trouble.

AHCI includes hot-swap capabilities, which is definitely involved in auto-detecting the attachment or start-up of an eSATA device. Actually, I understood that a true eSATA controller also provided hot swap capability. BUT a simple adapter plate that converts a SATA port to an eSATA connector leaves you totally dependent on the capabilities of the SATA controller. Some SATA controllers also contain hot swap support, but some don't - that was not required in the SATA spec's, but IS required of a true eSATA controller.
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Bronze Storage badge evongugg   08-27-2009 at 02:31:11 PM

If you don't have AHCI in your bios, you have to reboot to get it detected or scan for hardware changes.


Message edited by evongugg on 08-27-2009 at 02:39:38 PM
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 Reply to evongugg
Bronze Storage badge evongugg   08-27-2009 at 04:05:32 PM

Maybe a fix will come out for Windows 7.

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 Reply to evongugg
Bronze Storage badge Paperdoc   08-27-2009 at 04:48:57 PM
Best answer

What mobo is this? Looking at its manual might help understand where the options are found.

A few notes from your screenshots:
Your IDE Channel 0 has no Master? seems odd.

How is your HDD attached to an eSATA connection? Is there a separate eSATA port on the mobo? It does not seem to show up that way in the BIOS screens. But maybe it is on one of the regular SATA ports through a eSATA adapter?

Usually setting AHCI mode is in the Integrated Peripherals in the details of how each SATA port is managed. But your screenshots appear to indicate that, with each of your two ports set to Enabled, and the SATA RAID Function Disabled, you cannot change any details of the two SATA ports on each of the simulated IDE ports they seem to occupy. That's why I'm thinking the mobo manual may have some clues.

A caution: I have read (no personal experience) that changing a HDD from IDE emulation or Native SATA to AHCI can be difficult. That may not be so in Win7. Or, the notes I've seen may pertain only to boot drives with the OS on them - I don't know. Certainly I would expect that you could un-install a non-boot SATA device, change its port settings to AHCI, and install it that way without a lot of trouble.

AHCI includes hot-swap capabilities, which is definitely involved in auto-detecting the attachment or start-up of an eSATA device. Actually, I understood that a true eSATA controller also provided hot swap capability. BUT a simple adapter plate that converts a SATA port to an eSATA connector leaves you totally dependent on the capabilities of the SATA controller. Some SATA controllers also contain hot swap support, but some don't - that was not required in the SATA spec's, but IS required of a true eSATA controller.

Message quoted 1 times
Reply to Paperdoc
Mo786   08-27-2009 at 11:30:00 PM

Paperdoc wrote :

What mobo is this? Looking at its manual might help understand where the options are found.

 

A few notes from your screenshots:
Your IDE Channel 0 has no Master? seems odd.

 

How is your HDD attached to an eSATA connection? Is there a separate eSATA port on the mobo? It does not seem to show up that way in the BIOS screens. But maybe it is on one of the regular SATA ports through a eSATA adapter?

 

Usually setting AHCI mode is in the Integrated Peripherals in the details of how each SATA port is managed. But your screenshots appear to indicate that, with each of your two ports set to Enabled, and the SATA RAID Function Disabled, you cannot change any details of the two SATA ports on each of the simulated IDE ports they seem to occupy. That's why I'm thinking the mobo manual may have some clues.

 

A caution: I have read (no personal experience) that changing a HDD from IDE emulation or Native SATA to AHCI can be difficult. That may not be so in Win7. Or, the notes I've seen may pertain only to boot drives with the OS on them - I don't know. Certainly I would expect that you could un-install a non-boot SATA device, change its port settings to AHCI, and install it that way without a lot of trouble.

 

AHCI includes hot-swap capabilities, which is definitely involved in auto-detecting the attachment or start-up of an eSATA device. Actually, I understood that a true eSATA controller also provided hot swap capability. BUT a simple adapter plate that converts a SATA port to an eSATA connector leaves you totally dependent on the capabilities of the SATA controller. Some SATA controllers also contain hot swap support, but some don't - that was not required in the SATA spec's, but IS required of a true eSATA controller.

I have the hard drive connected with a SATA to an eSATA connector. This one to be exact: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6812104063. My motherboard has hot-swap capabilities or else it wouldn't have worked when I had Windows XP. My motherboard doesn't have an eSATA port and the connector was the cheapest thing so I got that and it was working fine till now. Is something disabled for the SATA ports that maybe causing this?

 

Thanks

 

EDIT: This is the motherboard I have: GA-M55SLI-S4 (rev. 2.0)


Message edited by Mo786 on 08-27-2009 at 11:46:46 PM
Reply to Mo786
Mo786   08-29-2009 at 09:28:36 PM

Problem solved. Thanks anyway

Reply to Mo786
Anonymous   11-13-2009 at 03:32:18 AM

I have exactly the same problem. Hot swaps with the SATA external drive (thru an eSATA connector plate) worked fine with XP Pro but not so with Win7.

How did you eventually solve it? :(

Reply to Anonymous
Silvune   11-14-2009 at 02:57:52 PM

I have the same problem with my e-SATA external HDD not being auto-detected in Windows 7 HP. I will see if I can get a solution here rather than in a new thread first.
I have managed to successfully enable AHCI on my motherboard (Asus M4A77TD Pro), I first went into the registry editor, went here HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\msahci and changed the "Start" Value to 0.

I then restarted, went into BIOS, went into the SATA configuration option on the main page, made sure OnChip SATA Channel was enabled, then changed the OnChip SATA Type to AHCI on both options (SATA 1/2/3 and SATA 5/6 - recalled this info from memory). There is a note in my mobo manual that I should "ensure to install the AHCI driver", I did not ensure that I did this as I am not 100% sure how to do it.
I saved these changes and booted fine, Windows, seemingly, installed all the necessary drivers, then I restarted once more. And then I tested to see if my external hdd would be auto-detected, it still only gets detected when I go to device manager and search for hardware changes. I've changed the policies on the drive from better performance (with "Enable write caching on the device" enabled) to quick removal and back again. I like the quick removal policy because it means that I don't have to go into device manager to remove the device.
I have since checked that the AHCI option is still enabled in my BIOS and that the registry value is still as it should be, and they are. I get no problems reported in device manager and I have what I assume is the AHCI driver installed visible in DM, which is "Standard AHCI 1.0 Serial ATA Controller".

I hope someone can help me.

Reply to Silvune
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