TA990FXE not detecting SATA hard disks

[jtaylor914]

Hello, I am building a new system with specs as follow:

- Biostar TA990FXE motherboard
- AMD FX-8150 processor
- 2x SeaGate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA HDD
- HP dvd1260i SATA DVD/CD RW disk drawer
- 2x8GB DDR3-1600 RAM
- Nvidia GTX-680 PCI-E video card

My problem is that the BIOS detects only the dvd drawer and will not show either HDD. I originally discovered this when I attempted to install Win7 and it detected these drives, but gave the notification that,

"Windows cannot be installed to this disk. This computer's hardware may not support booting to this disk. Ensure the disk's controller is enabled in the computer's BIOS menu."

I have tried every physical configuration for the drives in the SATA ports and every available BIOS configuration under "SB SATA Configuration" but nothing causes the BIOS to detect the drive(s) or allow them as boot options, but the dvd drawer is detected no matter what port it is placed on and no matter what SATA configuration is active.

Does anyone have a solution to this problem?

 

[rolli59]

It is unlikely that you got two bad drives the optical confirming that the connectors are working. All connection properly inserted?

 

[jtaylor914]

It is unlikely that you got two bad drives the optical confirming that the connectors are working. All connection properly inserted?

Yes, the drives are properly installed. The Windows 7 installer detected them and could format and partition them, but could not install to either as they "can not be booted by the system". (I also performed a CheckDisk with my laptop on them and it came back fine, so it's not likely a problem with them.)

 

[rolli59]

You are not formatting the drives as FAT file system? That would explain it since win7 does not support it on boot disk!

 

[jtaylor914]

You are not formatting the drives as FAT file system? That would explain it since win7 does not support it on boot disk!

The drives were originall formatted in NTFS, but the Windows installer allowed me to format them and edit partitions, but even with a fresh format and no partitions, the error was still present, and the motherboard would still not detect the drives.

 

[rolli59]

NTFS partitions?

 

[jtaylor914]

I've made certain that there are no partitions and reformatted the drive I want to use, so it is just 498GB of Unallocated Space, but the strange thing is, that while Windows Install will detect it, and even add/remove partitions and format it, (only after I press "Refresh" on the drive list,) the BIOS still doesn't detect any SATA devices other than the DVD drive. (In other words, the list under BIOS Setup > Advanced > SATA Configuration looks like this

- SATA1-U : Not present
- SATA1-L : Not present
- SATA2-U : Not present
- SATA2-L : Not present
- SATA3 : HP DVD Writer 1260v ATAPI
- eSATA : Not present

I currently have 2 500GB SeaGate Barracudas connected to ports 1U and 2U (with the list remaining as shown above), but, as I said before, the only difference any change in arrangement makes is that the DVD drive is shown at whatever port it is then connected to.

I have also tried using a 1500GB WD Caviar HDD that is known to work and has an operating system on it, but it is not detected either.


For reference, too, my settings under BIOS Setup > Chipset > South Bridge > SB SATA Configuration are.

- OnChip SATA Channel Enabled
- OnChip SATA Type Native IDE
- SATA IDE Combined Mode Enabled
- SATA 6Gb/s Auto

 

[rolli59]

Try Biostar support and find out what they can do for you.

 

[Mukti Anderson]

Me too...

But i'm tried change SB SATA Configuration > OnChip SATA Type > RAID.

Working but it's not normally.
When I've checked HDD Sentinel, there's not detected.

*I can't speak english carefully.