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View Full Version : Windows Setup Cannot Find Any Harddisks Installed!

RWB
19 May 2005, 3:09am
I cannot find an answer to this INCREDIBLY annoying problem I have. I NEED to reinstall Windows, it works right now but I wanna start fresh and all that crap for various reasons.

But Windows Setup will NOT ever find my damned SATA drives, I know they are there, Windows XP is currently installed on one of the two SATA drives I have in the system in question, and it does in fact work.

I no longer have the original disk that came with the motherboard which is a MSI K8T Neo FISR socket 754 with an Athlon 64 3000+. So I have been forced to find the drivers online. But MSI's website SUCKS and I cannot find the correct drivers for my board and I am pretty sure someone here has one of these MB's like mine.

I need whatever drivers I need for a NORMAL SATA installation of Windows XP SP2. I've tried a few different drivers, VIA and Promise(which both are somehow on my board, I don't know whats up with that). I don't have a RAID array, just the one SATA drive needs XP installed.

PLEASE help, it's been a week since I did any work on my computer becuase I transfered my licences so I can put them back on with the new install so now most of the programs I have won't work until I put them back, plus I already backed up my system and I don't wanna have to go through all that trouble again.
mmonnin
19 May 2005, 3:29am
You will have to put the drivers on a floppy and press F6 when prompted at the very beginning of the XP setup. SATA was not around when XP first came out so XP setup will never see SATA controllers or any drives attached to a SATA controller.

The drivers can probably be found on the SM Downloads section. Its Spinners pride and joy, he keeps things up to date.

http://www.short-media.com/download.php?dc=68
RWB
19 May 2005, 3:30am
Yes, I know the floppy thing. I've tried various drivers. Even used a couple different XP disks I have for backups incase something was wrong with one.
RWB
19 May 2005, 4:08am
I just tried more drivers, WHY IS THIS NOT WORKING?! I'd buy a new motherboard if I could cuase this is so damned stupid! But I have a Socket 754 system and if I upgrade I would want to get a socket that is more upgradable which means a new processor too, and possibly a PCI E card as well :(

I almost put this in the emergency forum this is indeed important and I cannot get it to work.
profdlp
19 May 2005, 5:20am
Just so we don't send you running around in circles, list the drivers you've already tried. Maybe we can find something better for you. :)
RWB
19 May 2005, 11:14pm
I thought I came back and mentioned that after an exhaustive google search I found a forum which some dude figured out that you have to install the divers in a specific order before it will work. :shakehead
Spinner
20 May 2005, 2:44am
I thought I came back and mentioned that after an exhaustive google search I found a forum which some dude figured out that you have to install the divers in a specific order before it will work. :shakeheadThese should be the ones for the SB SATA: http://www.viaarena.com/downloads/drivers/RAID/VIA_RAID_V430C.zip (extract the contents, then navigate to the folder \drvdisk\i386 and copy the contents to a floppy.

These should be the ones for the onboard Promise SATA: http://us-download.msi.com.tw/support/dvr_exe/mbd_dvr/378_55.exe (extract the contents, then navigate to the folder \378_55\Driver and follow the instructions in the file makedisk.txt ignoring the CDROM reference)

Hope that helps.