Intel raid and 3TB harddisks

[qrt]

Hi, I have a Asus P8P67 motherboard, Win-7 64-bit, and I want to set up a storage raid-1 with two 3TB Barracuda XT harddisk. Have the latest bios version 1503 and bios is set to raid. However I am not able to acces the Intel Rapid storage Technology (long name for that) boot rom during post.
Have earlier tried an installation with AHCI-mode and formatted the harddisk fine and got all 3TB storage.

I think that there maybe are some limitation in the Intel boot-rom, but are not sure, and I have not been able to find anything on either Asus, Intel or Seagates homepages about this.

Any suggestions??

Thanks Kurt

 

[stingstang]

Finding information about RAID on websites is extremely hard. I once tried to just find out if putting 2x 150gb drives in raid gives me 150gb of disk space, or 300, and every single 'tech' savvy person I talked to from Asus, Gigabyte, Intel...no one could just answer my question.
BUT to answer your question, what you're looking for if your BIOS is set up correctly (and your drives are plugged in to the correct places (because that does matter)) is a list of the two drives during the BIOS boot, and something that says, "To access Raid Configurations, press I, S, or whatever the board tells you" That should get you in to where you want to go. Not working? Try different places to plug in your drives. My board has two different colored SATA connectors. RAID works in one, but not the other.

 

[Supermuncher85]

It's been a while but last time I setup my raid through the Intel matrix software within windows. Unless you are trying to make it bootable there shouldn't be a need to go through the bios to set up the raid. However I don't have a p67 board around so I cannot confirm that.

Anyway...if for some reason it does't work I just grab the manual and use the old saying RTFM. Page 4-19
You must enable the Raid function in the bios setup before creating RAID set(s) using sata HDD's. to do this:
1. Enter the bios setup during post
2. Got to the advanced menu > Sata configuration, and then press enter
3. set the sata mode item to [Raid mode]
4. Save your changes and then exit the bios setup

To enter the intel rapid storage option rom:
1. Turn on the system
2. during post press ctrl and I to display the utility menu

Hope that helps!

 

[qrt]

Thanks to Stingstang and Supermuncher!

I have made certain that I have the correct bios setting to raid (like Supermunchers fine description). But I can not get in touch with the intel rapid storage option rom by pressing ctrl+i, which I have tried a 100 times.

The motherboard has the following sata-connections:

4 X Intel 3gb/s connections (1 used for a 3TB data disk, 2 should be used for data raid-1)
2 X Intel 6gb/s connections (1 used for Intel SSD-510, 120gb boot disk, 1 for e-sata)
2 X Marvell 6gb/s connections (because everybody on the Asus forum have trouble with those I chosed to attach 2 DVD's on that one)

I have the correct and newest drivers in Win-7 64-bit, but Windows do not display any of the 3 X 3TB harddisk, and that is of course because I can not enter the the intel rapid storage option rom during bios-post.

It must be because the intel option rom have a limit probably around 2GB, and therefore refuse me to do anything!

I have tried to set the system up with AHCI disks and that worked fine.

I think that I have the following options:

1. Forget about raid-1 and use AHCI and I get 3 very big disks, and simply use backup program to give me the security I wanted to get from the raid-1
2. Somehow reduce the size of the disks and then make the raid-1
3. Attach the 2 disk that I want to use for raid-1 on the Marvell connectors, and that would in theory be good as both the disks are 6gb/s as is Marvell connector. However it seems like it will give me a lot of trouble (as have lots of people on the Asus forum).
4. Try to attach smaller size disk to the controller to check if it is dead (I will do that first of all).

Thanks for your fine advices
Kurt

 

[qrt]

Thanks to Stingstang and Supermuncher!

I have made certain that I have the correct bios setting to raid (like Supermunchers fine description). But I can not get in touch with the intel rapid storage option rom by pressing ctrl+i, which I have tried a 100 times.

The motherboard has the following sata-connections:

4 X Intel 3gb/s connections (1 used for a 3TB data disk, 2 should be used for data raid-1)
2 X Intel 6gb/s connections (1 used for Intel SSD-510, 120gb boot disk, 1 for e-sata)
2 X Marvell 6gb/s connections (because everybody on the Asus forum have trouble with those I chosed to attach 2 DVD's on that one)

I have the correct and newest drivers in Win-7 64-bit, but Windows do not display any of the 3 X 3TB harddisk, and that is of course because I can not enter the the intel rapid storage option rom during bios-post.

It must be because the intel option rom have a limit probably around 2GB, and therefore refuse me to do anything!

I have tried to set the system up with AHCI disks and that worked fine.

I think that I have the following options:

1. Forget about raid-1 and use AHCI and I get 3 very big disks, and simply use backup program to give me the security I wanted to get from the raid-1
2. Somehow reduce the size of the disks and then make the raid-1
3. Attach the 2 disk that I want to use for raid-1 on the Marvell connectors, and that would in theory be good as both the disks are 6gb/s as is Marvell connector. However it seems like it will give me a lot of trouble (as have lots of people on the Asus forum).
4. Try to attach smaller size disk to the controller to check if it is dead (I will do that first of all).

Thanks for your fine advices
Kurt

 

[qrt]

I am really a newcomer, I managed to send the anwer twice! Very good!

 

[WyomingKnott]

I once tried to just find out if putting 2x 150gb drives in raid gives me 150gb of disk space, or 300, and every single 'tech' savvy person I talked to from Asus, Gigabyte, Intel...no one could just answer my question.

That's because "It depends." If you put them in RAID0, you get 300 GB of space and, if one drive fails, you lose all the data on both drives. If you put them in RAID1, you get 150 GB of space and, if one drive fails, the other one goes chugging along happily.

The answer to most of the fun questions is "It depends."

 

[qrt]

Hi WyomingKnott! You are probably right, but how does this help me?

 

[abcarlson]

Hi, I have a Asus P8P67 motherboard, Win-7 64-bit, and I want to set up a storage raid-1 with two 3TB Barracuda XT harddisk. Have the latest bios version 1503 and bios is set to raid. However I am not able to acces the Intel Rapid storage Technology (long name for that) boot rom during post.
Have earlier tried an installation with AHCI-mode and formatted the harddisk fine and got all 3TB storage.

I think that there maybe are some limitation in the Intel boot-rom, but are not sure, and I have not been able to find anything on either Asus, Intel or Seagates homepages about this.

Any suggestions??

Thanks Kurt

When I looked at the BIOS versions on ASUS web site, they do not have a 1503 BIOS version. Did you mean 1305 instead?

Probably a typo.

Are you using the EZ mode BIOS setup or the Advanced Mode. For RAID setup you are going to need Advanced Mode.

Under SATA Configuration the SATA Mode should be "RAID Mode".
The Serial-ATA Controllers should be "Enhanced".

I assume that you plugged the 3TB hard drives into the Intel SATA connectors.

Control-I is only recognized while the Intel Rapid Storage Post messages are displayed, type it too early and you will be ignore, too late and you are ignored also. If you are not seeing the RAID post messages, examine the BIOS settings to make sure that POST messages are being displayed. Migth want to check "Option ROM Messages" and use "Force BIOS".

 

[Supermuncher85]

Well some more research:
http://communities.intel.com/message/112306#112306
http://vip.asus.com/forum/view.aspx?id=20110115005146101&board_id=1&model=P8P67+PRO&page=1&SLanguage=en-us

So apparently 3TB drives are currently not supported in raid supposedly version 10 of their drivers will fix it, but when its done no one knows. Will need a bios update as always yadadad.

There's a reason I've been sticking with 2TB drives! They are also cheaper meaning I can have more of them ^^

 

[qrt]

Hi abcarlson and Supermuncher! Thank you very much for your input!

About the bios version: it's 1503 and that is because the board is a DeLuxe (sorry for that one).

About entering Intel bios-rom: changed 2 X 3TB hdd with 2 smaller ones than 3TB, and I got the possibility to enter the Intel-boot-rom by ctrl + i.

This ASUS P8P67 DELUXE board have these SATA connections:
4 X Intel 3gb/s connectors
2 X Intel 6gb/s connectors
2 X Marvell 6gb/s connectors

And I have these items to plug into the sata connectors:
1 X Intel SSD-510, 120GB (C: for just the system)
3 X 3TB Seagate Barracuda XT hdd's (2 X raid-1 for data, 1 X backup of raid-1)
2 X different external e-sata harddisks (1 X built in hot swap, and 1 at the front panel)
2 X DVD drives

Now, in order to make the fastest boot, and to avoid the Marvell controller (because people at the Asus forum seems to have trouble with that one) I made the following sata setup, INITIALLY:

4 X Intel 3gb/s connectors (2 X 3TB hdd for raid-1, and 2 X DVD)
2 X Intel 6gb/s connectors (1 X SSD for boot, and 1 X 3TB for backup etc.)
2 X Marvell 6gb/s connectors (2 X external e-sata connections)

After having received fine input, I changed that initial setup to:

4 X Intel 3gb/s connectors (2 X DVD, and 2 X external e-sata connections)
2 X Intel 6gb/s connectors (1 X SSD for boot, and 1 X 3TB for backup etc.)
2 X Marvell 6gb/s connectors (2 X 3TB hdd for raid-1)

After connecting the 2 X 3TB to the Marvell controller, I could easy set up a raid-1, and subsequently been formattet in Win-7, 64-bit as GPT and works fine.
But Win-7 do NOT recognise the last 3TB hdd, because I have chosen Intel Raid in the bios.

Now the last problem:
the SATA part of the EFI-bios gives me 3 choices: IDE, AHCI or RAID. and that pertains to all what is attached to the Intel boot rom.
So I have to change - and do another reinstall of Win-7 - from RAID to AHCI, and I should be HOME AND DRY!

MANY THANKS FOR YOUR HELP!
Kurt