AHCI drivers not in list during XP install

Thank you in advance for any help.

I'm trying to install AHCI and windows XP on a new system. Motherboard: GA-EP45-UD3R

I have:
1. Set AHCI in bios
2. created a floppy which is supposed to contain both the SATA RAID and SATA AHCI drivers (ive done this 3 different times. downloaded the files from gigabyte, downloaded them from intel-the "32bit floppy disk utility" or whatever, and ran an exe on the motherboard cd-rom that copies the drivers to the floppy. The files on the floppy are iaahci.cat, iaAHCI.inf, iastor,cat, iastor.inf, Iastor.sys, TXTSETUP.OEM. )
3. Everytime time, after I start installing XP and press F6 to get to a list of drivers, my list only has 4 choices, all of which are "SATA RAID" drivers, but the list is also supposed to have AHCI drivers on that list, and it doesn't have any.


Motherboard: Ga-EP45-UD3R
x25-m Hard disk
IDE CD Rom Drive
e8500 cpu

OK, I think is see the file you're using. From 9/15/08
Intel ICH9R/ICH10R Driver (Preinstall driver)
8.5.0.1032

When given a choice of RAID during XP install, choose:
Intel(R) ICH8R/ICH9R/ICH10R/DO SATA RAID Controller

You don't have to install any RAID drives, but this should be the right choice to enable AHCI.

How did I decide this? According to the Giga site, the file is supposed to have the ICH9R/ICH10R driver - and this is the only choice in the INF file with those in it.

I have not installed this myself, I use my SATA drives w/o AHCI because I don't need the additional features. But this is my best advice given what I've studied on the issue.

Wiki used to have a lot of details about AHCI and the issues of drivers, but they've removed it all in favor a simple explanation. I do notice they say that INTEL recommends setting their motherboards to RAID/AHCI rather than AHCI. Might read article.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahci

Remember that enabling RAID or installing a RAID driver does not mean you have to run or setup a drive as RAID. For example, I have an older RAID controller that I've never used for RAID drives, but it gives me the ability to hook up 4 additional IDE hard drives to my system. Has RAID BIOS on it and that's loaded during my POST, but no RAID drives.