A7N8X-SOME PROBLEMS SOLVED?

[t8ar]

BIOS AW1001G.BIN dated 27DEC2002 is now on the ASUS web site
It appears to solve the disappearing devices, CD ROM, DVD, etc., that are on the MB UATA controller when you use a raid controller on the pci bus. An associated problem also appeared to be hangs in loading the operating system. I say "appears" to have solved the problem because I haven't finished installing everything, nor done alot of reboots.

I am not happy with ASUS tech support, because in talking to two different techs I got the wrong story or no story
and clearly someone was working on revising the BIOS to
correct that and who knows what other problems. I had seen
a referance to the "g" BIOS in someones post two days ago, but only saw "c" and "d" on the ASUS's US web site. I specificly asked about that yesterday and was told "c" and "d" were it.

NOT ALL SMOKE IS FROM THE OVER CRANKED CPU

 

[paulj]

Keep us updated.

Why did you want to use a PCI RAID vs the serial ATA raid on board?

<font color=red>The solution may be obvious, but I can't see it for the smoke coming off my processor.</font color=red>

 

[AlphaFox]

probably because its serial

 

[paulj]

que?

<font color=red>The solution may be obvious, but I can't see it for the smoke coming off my processor.</font color=red>

 

[t8ar]

THG had a good article on raid a while back; as I recall, the
author stated that raid setups are more problematical than a
normal UATA drive and that raid controllers on a normal
consumer MB are even more problematical. I had a MB raid
controller (UATA type) go out on me. A USB device crashed the system taking the raid array out. I was able to recover several times, but the "last" time it took out the raid controller, corrupted the "c" drive and left me up the creek (that was on a 266E MB).(I use the "0"/stripe setup).
ASUS replaced that MB, but this time I thought I would go with a card that supposedly is less software dependant and less prone to going belly up and the A7N8X had the SATA contoller. Using a raid contoller on the pci bus, I was able to at least "see" my "c" drive, corrupted as it was, where with the MB raid controller I couldn't even find the drives. Is this fact or or just one man's experiance? Damn if I know.

I ordered SATA to UATA adapters because I didn't think ASUS was going to find a solution, they didn't appear to even know the problem. In that case I would have been back to using a
MB raid cotroller, SATA in this case and using the SATA to
UATA adapters. Even more fragile? An unknown. When I get the adapters, I will hold on to them, I still don't trust that
ASUS has solved the problem with the "g" version of the BIOS, even if it so far appears to have done so. I am assuming that they got the relationship/conflict issues between the two controllers on the MB straight and that it will work without a problem with the adapters to set up a raid array, if I have to go that way. With what I have to left to install on the machine, a lot of hours ( I am old and slow),if it is still ticking with the "g" fix when I finish, I think I can assume they in fact fixed the issue. I would prefer at this point not to use the SATA cotroller and adapters to setup an array.
Nor do I want to spend $260 plus S&H for 2 SATA HD.

 

[paulj]

I will look for that article. I haven't messed around with RAID and would like to learn. I hope you get your issue resolved.

<font color=red>The solution may be obvious, but I can't see it for the smoke coming off my processor.</font color=red>