Gigabyte GA-MA78GM-DS2H and Agility4 SSD

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beppomarx

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Hello all, I am new to posting here, but to preface I would rate my computer building skills about 7/10. Not an expert but I have put together every PC I have ever owned, a few for friends, and keep up to date on Tomshardware religiously lol.

I have had my GA-MA78GM-DS2H since it came out in about 2007. I started with a 250GB SATA drive, added a 750GB SATA drive, and then on another occasion, added 2 2TB SATA drives (all drives have always been running in IDE mode, even the SATA BDRW drive as well). This Christmas I finally got an SSD, an OCZ Agility4 256GB. All I can say is what a nightmare so far.

I understand that the drive will not work in standard IDE mode and/or I will suffer not having beneficial commands like TRIM and such.

I can boot with all drives in RAID or AHCI mode no problem so long as the Agility drive is not the boot drive. IE I can plug it into port 2 or 3 or whatever and boot into an existing install of windows and see the drive, format to it, copy files, partition it etc. It shows up in BIOS and when detected by RAID or AHCI initialization.

If I set the Agility to the primary spot (SATA0) or have the drive as a standalone configuration (no other hard drives installed) and try and boot in AHCI, windows 7 ultimate 64 bit will not install on that drive, as it says the current hardware configuration does not allow booting to this drive. Ok... So I set it to RAID and it allows me to install windows 7 off of a CD or USB drive. after copying, expanding, configuring the install the pc restarts and after POST just before the OS loads (where it would ask to boot from CD if you had a bootable disc in) it says "unable to load os, BOOTMNGR is missing'

So my motherboard will not boot in AHCI or RAID mode with the SSD. It boots fine with the other spinning disk drives in RAID or AHCI. I do not think that I have tried booting and installing win7 on the SSD in IDE mode but this shouldn't be my only option, I would like the benefits of AHCI. I have updated the SSD to the latest firmware 1.5.2 i believe- it came with 1.5.2 but i reflashed over it anyway just to try, and as for the MOBO BIOS I was on the latest official release I believe F11 and tried the beta F12 even though the description didn't address any updates to the controllers or anything.

The OCZ manual says 'hey just plug in the disk and install an OS, have a nice day.' I have been working on this since Christmas (off and on) its starting to **** me off if you know what I mean. I have done a BIOS reset too, I run a mild overclock on an Athlon x2 5000+, 8GB DDR2 800. Using onboard video and a D-link wireless-n card. I do have a floppy drive bolted in there (if needed) but its not plugged in ATM.

At the moment I have tried and went into system repair from the win7 install manager and after loading the AHCI MOBO drivers (in AHCI right now) I can see the 2 installs of windows 7 that are 'available for repair' but when I attempt them it says "this version of system recovery options is not compatible with the version of windows you are trying to repair.' but one install was done with the DVD and the other was done with a USB install (made off the same DVD).

I suppose I could just try and install win7 on the SSD with all drives running in IDE mode but that would suck, as I would take out a chunk of benefit from having the SSD, I would like to figure out why AHCI isn't working or what I need to do to get this done right. Thanks in advance for any help or advice.
 
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cin19

cin19

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1st you download and install the OZC toolbox into the HDD, then connect the ssd to any SATA port and performing Secure Erase.

After that you only plug in the SSD + CD/DVD, not other HDD, try to connect the SSD to SATA1 or 2 instead the SATA0, some time the SATA port don't work or something else.

Go to the BIOS set the AHCI mode like you did before, and re-install the win7.
 
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beppomarx

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so i set my BIOS to ahci. installed win7 fresh on a normal HDD with the SSD plugged in as well (SSD in SATA1, HDD on SATA0).

booted into windows and dled the ocz toolbox, installed, recognized the SSD and did a secure erase. it hung on 66% and i left it overnight. when i came back the ocz toolbox was closed, i thought that was wierd. checked disk manager and see a whole raw disk but left it alone.

rebooted with BDRW on sata4 and SSD in SATA1, was not able to create the partition in windows setup.

rebooted again into HDD windows install and created one primary partition on SSD.

unplugged HDD and successfully installed windows 7 on SSD

upon reboot system hangs at verifying DMI pool data. restarted and it went past that and looked like it was booting windows (starting windows screen appears). then BSOD with a hardware error. restarted numerous times and now always hangs at verifying DMI pool data. when AHCI is scanning for drives very rarely does it find the drives fast, usually takes 45 seconds or so to recognize the drives. it only seems to do this with the SSD plugged in.

methinks i have a bad drive....
 
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RetiredChief

RetiredChief

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You may infact have a Bad SSD ( problem with tool bok doing a secure erease).
However this may have been user induced by so mane attempts are installing OS - NOT your fault. I think this was a compatamility issue initially. OCZ are NOT known as the MOST user friendly SSDs (tend to have a higher user dissatifaction quotion.

Leard my lesson when I bought two 120 gig Agility III - One worked with NO problems on my desktop, thesecond on I tried every way from sunday to install Windows 7 with NO avail - OCZ at that time was blaming everyone EXCEPT their Firmware. Replaced with a Crucial M4 and installed with NO problems - Quess what after about 9 Months they finaly said OPPS and fixed the FW problem. Since then I have NOT recommended Sandforce SSDs nor OCZ.

My fix would be to return it as defective, BUT also go to a different Brand. My recommendations have NOT changed - Crucial M4's or Samsung 830's (Plextor M3/M4 are fine but generally higher priced. NOTE: DO NOT buy crucial M5

Have 13 SSDs - ALL are still working and OCZ was the ONLY one I've had a problem with. I've even installed a 80 gig Intel G2 on a 10 year old laptop. Also Installed a 8 Gig PATA SSD on a 20 year old system running Windows 3.11
 
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beppomarx

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I think I am going to try to secure erase one more time. The only reason I can deduce that the program was not still open when I came back in the morning was maybe since it was a fresh install of windows, maybe it installed an update and auto-restarted while the tool was still running and did not finalize or whatever. I have to try one more time because this is a Christmas present from my wife (who was against me getting any more junk for the computer anyway) and I hate to tell her that she got me a bad drive. I do have a Samsung 830 in an AMD trinity sleek book that I just plugged in and installed win7 and never had an issue, but that is a 6 month old platform, not 6 years. If I exchange it it would probably be an m4 or a Samsung 840. Thanks for all the advice, will update after my second attempt.
 
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beppomarx

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Did not know I had to delete the partitions before doing secure erase. Thanks for the heads up. So this is a full low level format?
 
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beppomarx

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ok so i deleted partitions, did secure erase, created a new partition and win7 said could not install error 0x000something. booted back ino windows with SSD as secondary and ran ocz toolbox. it deected the drive and i went on doing something else but after 2 or 3 minutes my drive disappeared, not shown in my computer or ocz toolbox anymore. time to RMA... i hope newegg will accept an exchange.
 
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beppomarx

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I notice this.

So I did an RMA with OCZ and finally got my new drive in the mail today. Put it in the computer and SAME ISSUE. in RAID or AHCI mode the files from the windows 7 disc copy to the HDD during installation, and during the 'expanding files' phase I get an error.


[IMG=http://img35.imageshack.us/img35/827/imag0439e.jpg][/IMG]


Now since I have done this I am past my 30 days for return with newegg and stuck with this agility drive that doesnt work. could anyone give some advise???
 
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Dereck47

Dereck47

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See if you can install Windows on the Agility 4 in IDE mode.
Connect the SSD to port SATA2_0 with no other drives connected.
See page 7 of your motherboard manual for the location of the port.

If that works you can then modify your Windows Registry file and then switch SATA modes to AHCI.
This link will show you how to edit the Registry file: http://www.ocztechnologyforum.com/forum/content.php?286-Change-from-IDE-to-AHCI-after-Installation

FYI, if your motherboard model is GA-MA78GM-DS2H Rev.1, then your BIOS versions are F1, F2, & F3J.
If your model is Rev. 2.x then your BIOS versions are FA, FB, FC, & FDD.

Check to see what BIOS version you are currently on by using CPU-Z and update to the latest BIOS version if necessary. http://www.cpuid.com/
 
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beppomarx

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i tried sata 0 and 1 ports standalone in ide, raid, and ahci. same error screen. i have not tried ide on SATA port 2

i did successfully install win7 last night and heres how.

i have now my normal HDD with win7 connected to sata1 and the SSD on sata0, bdrw on sata2. i deleted the ssd partitions to raw data in windows 7 (which had booted from the hdd). then started windows setup with the dvd and when it came to creating the partition i did not set it at max size, i left about 300mb unallocated (i am not sure how over or under provisioning works exactly but i was thinking maybe i was using too much space, just a shot in the dark). but installing to that new ssd partition worked just fine. however on startup it prompts for the dual boot (win7 and another win7).

so now i believe the computer is finding the boot configuration on the HDD and can redirect the OS boot to the SSD, so the problem seems to be that the motherboard cannot correctly initialize or acknowledge the SSD as a boot device.

my motherboard is revision 1.0 as well. (not 1.1). I was on final release f11 and now am on the beta versino f12.

I plan on having all of my hard drives hooked up anyway and if i need to keep the boot config on the one HDD to run windows off of the ssd but that seems like going around your @ss to get to your elbow. booting to the ssd shouldnt be a problem. im still stumped...

**edit**

just looked at the manual, and sata2_0 is port 0. i have tried the drive in standalone on sata2_0 and sata2_1. sorry for the misconception.
 
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beppomarx

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ill have to check once i get home but i am 99% sure i have misposted my motherboard model. i am almost certain it is a GA-MA78GM-S2H not GA-MA78GM-DS2H.

**edit**

yes, it is definitely a GA-MA78GM-S2H sorry about the misconception....
 
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