Potential motherboard problem: Harddrives not reading correctly

[petrifiednightmares]

I am using Gigabyte P67A-UD3 with intel i5-2500k, which was working well for a few months.

Recently I suddenly started getting system crashes about 10-20 mins after booting up (happens every single time). Applications would suddenly freeze up and crash and windows would bluescreen.

Upon rebooting, the system would report SMART COMMAND FAILURE on either one or both of my drives (sometimes one of them gets it, other times the other drive gets it, and other times both would get it), and then it would say failure to load OS.

My drives are: ADATA 64 GB S599 Sandforce 2.5-Inch SATA II 3.0Gb/s
and a 2 Tb HDD

I'm not sure if this is a problem with the mother board, but I don't believe that two drives (both of which are only half a year old) would fail simultaneously. Especially since sometimes the "smart command failure" message wouldn't show up and I would boot up normally.

Does anyone have any clues?

Now on windows boot it says An unexpected I/O error has occured Status: 0xc00000e9

 

[jaquith]

Welcome to Tom's Forum!

Generally a 'SMART' error is from a bad HDD/SSD, and ditto with E9 error.

Often besides a 'bad drive' is the wrong drivers are being loaded; by Default the BIOS is AHCI but all too often Windows Start = 3 = IDE; instead Start = 0 = AHCI.

I'd try the following:
1. Run 'Fix It' -> http://support.microsoft.com/kb/922976
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\Msahci
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\IastorV

2. Reboot and run BOTH SFC and Recovery, schedule both and reboot:

3. Failure remains - then boot with the Windows DVD, press F8 and select Startup Repair.
ref - http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/What-are-the-system-recovery-options-in-Windows-7

To rule-out the 2TB HDD, shutdown, disconnect its' SATA cable connection to the MOBO and reboot. IF the problem persists then it's fair to assume the ADATA SSD is bad.

 

[petrifiednightmares]

First of all, thanks for such a fast response!

I looked into my BIOS setting and my windows setting and it is set into AHCI. (I had to set this to AHCI a while ago to apply a firmware update on the SSD, and I just checked again and it's still in AHCI, so that's good)


I tried to run Fix it, but now windows is absolutely refusing to boot at all, reporting IO error every time. Same thing happens with safe mode or recovery mode. (I do not have a windows dvd, I installed windows through the microsoft developer alliance program with my school and only have a soft copy of windows =[)


I now yanked out the HDD, and the problem persists.


I had a suspicion that it was caused by the ADATA SSD, as it had problems before. I fixed the prior problems with a firmware update and suspect that this current problem might be caused by firmware issue as well. I found the latest firmware update, but am now unable to boot into windows to apply it, sadly.

Also, I am suspicious why the BIOS would report SMART COMMAND FAILURE on my HDD as well if the problem is purely due to the SSD? I doubt both drives would fail simultaneously.

I emailed Gigabyte about this, and they suspected it has to do with the intel 6 chipset problem: http://www.gigabyte.us/press-center/news-page.aspx?nid=986. Does this seem a likely culprit? I heard that the chipset problem usually only manifests after a couple years. My computer build is less than a year old.

 

[jaquith]

IF you have a P67A-UD3-B2 {bad Intel P67 Chipset} then it's a fair bet it's your MOBO. All of the B2's were recalled. Gigabyte will replace your MOBO.

You can use the unaffected SATA3 ports, just plug the SATA cables into the SATA3 ports.

 

[petrifiednightmares]

Ok I will get gigabyte to give me a replacement, and try the SATA3 ports while waiting for the replacement to come.

Thanks for your help. I'll update this thread with my results after trying the SATA3 ports.

 

[Rogue77777]

First of all, thanks for such a fast response!

I looked into my BIOS setting and my windows setting and it is set into AHCI. (I had to set this to AHCI a while ago to apply a firmware update on the SSD, and I just checked again and it's still in AHCI, so that's good)

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

How soon after changing your drives to AHCI did you start having your problems? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think you should change from IDE TO AHCI once you have the OS installed. That's exactly the reason I haven't updated my ssd firmware.

 

[petrifiednightmares]

Hmm, I changed it into AHCI about a week after I built my computer. I had to update the firmware because my computer was shutting it self down every 48 hours on the dot. Apparently some ADATA drives had a critical issue where the firmware would shut the drive down after 48 hours (or something like that I wasn't too sure exactly what the problem was), and windows would have a hard time trying to read the page table (due to a severe case of "harddriveIsTurnedOffNess").

That was February of 2011.

Around June 2011, I had BSOD problems again, but I assumed it was a software issue and reinstalled windows. It was working fine until now.


Edit: plugged my drives into SATA3 ports and managed to boot into windows. Been up for about 10 minutes now, so far so good, but don't want to jinx it. I'm hoping this is the issue, since it has a pretty easy fix (tell gigabyte to give me a new mobo).


Update: been up for [strike]2.5[/strike] 7 hours now

 

[jaquith]

Yeah, a lot of SSD's have had 'fun' Firmware issues. Hope all is well.

In the past when people were going CrAzY with the B2 recall - to minimize the anguish of the RMA/exchange process I recommended that they allow either a hold on their Credit Card or pay for a new one with the UNDERSTANDING they would get a Refund/Hold removed once returned. Doing it this was you have (2) MOBO's in hand and the downtime is minimal.

 

[petrifiednightmares]

Thanks a lot for your help, I'm really glad that we figured out the problem so quickly.

As for the gigabyte recall/exchange, how necessary do you think it is that I tell them to swap out my mobo? As far as I know, the only problems with my current board is with its SATA2 ports, and everything else is completely unaffected.

After plugging the drives into SATA3, it's been running smoothly. Is it still highly recommended that I swap out my mobo, or does it not matter as long as I don't intend on plugging in more drives (since there's only 2 sata3 ports)?

I'm a bit lazy and don't feel like completely disassembling my computer and reassembling it unless it's necessary. haha (ok well not completely dissembling, but everything is plugged into the mobo, so.. that means I have to rip out my cpu and reapply thermal paste and reattach my heat sink and plug in everything again, it takes a while =/)

 

[jaquith]

The ONLY PROBLEMS are the **INTEL SATA2 PORTS** -- all other ports are fine and UNCHANGED in B3.

So if you're okay with using the SATA3 and have no need now or in the future for the Intel SATA2 then 'Keep It'

I know plenty of folks who felt the same and, knock on wood, are trouble free...

 

[petrifiednightmares]

Best answer selected by petrifiednightmares.