TeKram Drivers for Win 7. DC-390u3W or alternative work around

[Moffi]

Hello All, Long time reader (mid-late 90's) first time poster. I usually find what I'm looking for on TH but now I'm really at a bit of a loss. I've built a new rig (and thanks to THG I built my first one years ago):

Asus Sabertooth x58
Pi7-950
Corsair 6gbRam
PS:Corsair TX750
Asus GTS450
And drum roll: My beloved and reliable Tekram DC-390u3w with my also solid Seagate Cheetah 15,000rpm Ultra160.

I have Windows 7 on USB boot and you guessed it my whole install comes to a screeching halt because it doesn't recognize the drive because of the absence of a workable driver for the Tekram. Through some fairly extensive research online (I not the only one right?) I found a guy who had the same problems and actually the same card. It seems like a lot and a lot could go wrong. See below:

My hardware setup:
Phenom II x4 955, Asus M4A79XTD EVO
Tekram DC-390U3W PCI SCSI adapter (LSI 53C1010 chipset)
Multiple hard drives attached to an SAS controller, onboard SATA, and one attached to the 53C1010

1. I extracted the LSI drivers from a Vista x64 disk (SYM_U3.INF, SYM_U3.PNF, SYM_U3.SYS, etc.) to a local directory.
2. I extracted all the Windows 7 (x64) files from the ISO file to (another) local directory.
3. Opened up vLite (http://www.vlite.net/) and had that integrate the LSI drivers into the Windows 7 installation directory, then created a new bootable ISO.
4. Burn ISO to DVD, try installing Windows 7

Now here's where it gets interesting. Even though the Vista x64 LSI driver was integrated into the Win7 disc, the drive attached to the controller still wasn't detected by the Win7 setup. I'm not sure if it matters, but I ran the Win7 setup in Test Mode (with F8 at startup).

One thing I did which may or may not matter is I also had the Vista x64 LSI drivers on a USB key and had used Driver Signature Enforcement Overrider (http://www.blogsdna.com/2775/install-unsigned-drivers-on-windows-7-vista-with-driver-signature-enforcement-overrider.htm) to add a digital signature to the SYM_U3.SYS file from another Windows 7 machine. I don't believe it worked since the Win7 setup complained that it couldn't find any drivers with a valid digital signature even while in test mode.

5. Install Windows 7 anyway (to a different partition -- I had intended to install it to the drive attached to the 53C1010)
6. Post-install on first boot, say "Yes" (or whatever to that effect) when Windows 7 asks "Do you want to use the unsigned driver"?

From this point on, this Windows 7 install was able to see the LSI 53C1010 device, and I was able to use the drive after assigning it a drive letter in Disk Management.

Out of curiosity, since I still wanted Windows 7 to run off of that particular SCSI drive -- Atlas 10K V drives are quite snappy -- I ran the Windows 7 setup AGAIN from within the Windows 7 install which successfully loaded the 53C1010 drivers. This setup had no issues; I was able to select the drive attached to the 53C1010 within the Win7 setup and from there it was pretty much a standard install.

Hope that helps.

I've also emailed Tekram for a possible solution this morning. My question is does anyone have the drivers from the 53C1010? (SYM_U3.INF, SYM_U3.PNF, SYM_U3.SYS, etc.) they could send me being that I don't have Vista or point me in the direction where I could d-load said drivers to try out the above technique? Or perhaps you have seen or done something a bit easier to work around this problem. Any leads would be greatly appreciated. I do alot of 3D work and graphic design and don't want to lose this reliable workhorse.

Thanks for all the help and will be checking back soon and will also let you know if I hear anything from TeKram today.

.Jason

 

[Moffi]

No response from Tekram. Their whole website is pretty much non-functional too. I did manage to find LSI 53C1020 drivers from HP by way of their xw5000 workstation that supports LSI Logic 53C1030, 53C1020, and 53C1020A Ultra320. I'll try the 53C1020 and pray still.....