Computers & Electronics

GSATA Port - how to get them working?

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  • Apr 9th, 2013 7:17 am
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Jul 30, 2001
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Kingston

GSATA Port - how to get them working?

I've got this Gigabyte Motherboard:
http://www.gigabyte.com/products/produc ... 456#manual

It comes with 4 SATA and 2 GSATA Ports.

I've just added a 5th SATA Device (3TB internal SATA drive), so my only ports left to use are the GSATA one's. I've tried both, but the drive acts like it simply isn't there (ie. no detection of it at all).

I've gone through the BIOS setup and I don't see anything in there that references "GSATA". I've looked through the manual and I don't see what needs to be done either.

I've googled it and nothing I have setup seems incorrect.

Clearly, I must be missing something OR the drive is dead. I'd like to proceed with the assumption that the drive is good (brand new and I can feel it spinning). I've tried a different power connector nonetheless and I will grab a different SATA cable tomorrow from work.

I'm reach out to see if anyone might have any experience with using a GSATA port (for standard SATA drive, not RAID) that may be able to give me some tips.

Thanks! :)
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Sep 10, 2004
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spinbot wrote:... OR the drive is dead. I'd like to proceed with the assumption that the drive is good (brand new and I can feel it spinning)...
Before running around fTo test drive,
Refer to page - 8 - of your manual,
Connect to one of the SATAII0 - SATAII4 ports temporarily, for testing.

Refer to page - 24 - of your manual regarding GSATAII0/1 ports.
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Warlock wrote: Before running around fTo test drive,
Refer to page - 8 - of your manual,
Connect to one of the SATAII0 - SATAII4 ports temporarily, for testing.
Simple, but good idea. Just to be sure cable/drive are fine. I'll give that a try to start.

Thanks!
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Dec 9, 2003
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LOL what testing?! Why bother with such labor and additional restarts?!

Why disconnect existing drives when he can use a spare GSATA port, enable the proprietary Gigabyte SATA2 controller and be on his way???
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tmpz wrote: GSATA = Gigabyte SATA ports
You probably just have to enable it in the bios
"Onboard SATA/IDE Device" Enabled
"Onboard SATA/IDE Ctrl Mode" AHCI
The second option wasn't set to AHCI, so I changed that and rebooted.
Oversized Rooster wrote: LOL what testing?! Why bother with such labor and additional restarts?!

Why disconnect existing drives when he can use a spare GSATA port, enable the proprietary Gigabyte SATA2 controller and be on his way???
It was just suggested as I didn't seem to be able to figure out how to get the GSATA port(s) working. As the drive/SATA cable are both brand new, it was just a suggestion to make sure I am not trying to solve the problem at the wrong end.

Sure enough, after setting the "AHCI" setting and rebooting, the drive is now appears to be detected (Windows 7 shows notification of the new drive in the task bar). When I click on that icon it lists 2 of my 4 drives as "ATA Channel 0" and "ATA Channel 1", both "Ready to use". It lists my DVD drive as "Ready to use". It doesn't list my BluRay drive or one of my other data drives. Then it lists "Standard Dual Channel PCI/IDE Controller" as "Installing driver software". Technically, the only IDE drive I have is the DVD drive, the BluRay and 4 harddrives are all SATA connected. Hopefully none of my harddrives are trying to get setup with RAID or anything odd like that. I'll let the "installing driver software" run for a bit longer, but the longer it runs, the more concerned I get as realistically, how long does it take to intall a basic driver?
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12 minutes and still on "installing driver software", which I have to assume is for the new drive to work. I check under Windows Disk Manager and it does not show the new drive in there (which makes sense I guess).

The question now is do I try installing "GIGABYTE SATA2 Preinstall driver (For AHCI / RAID Mode)"
Note: Press F6 during Windows* setup to read from floppy.
http://www.gigabyte.com/products/produc ... 456#driver (windows 7, 32 bit O/S version)

I can't say I've installed this type of driver before. They don't actually list install instructions for it. I don't have a floppy drive, so should I just burn it on disc and boot from my optical drive with it OR would it be installed from windows ?
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spinbot wrote: 12 minutes and still on "installing driver software", which I have to assume is for the new drive to work. I check under Windows Disk Manager and it does not show the new drive in there (which makes sense I guess).

The question now is do I try installing "GIGABYTE SATA2 Preinstall driver (For AHCI / RAID Mode)"
Note: Press F6 during Windows* setup to read from floppy.
http://www.gigabyte.com/products/produc ... 456#driver (windows 7, 32 bit O/S version)

I can't say I've installed this type of driver before. They don't actually list install instructions for it. I don't have a floppy drive, so should I just burn it on disc and boot from my optical drive with it OR would it be installed from windows ?
Put the drivers on a USB stick, run Win7 setup and you can load the driver from the USB stick from there.

Unlike older setups (e.g. Win2000 and WinXP), Win7 setup can see USB drives. :)
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spinbot wrote: 12 minutes and still on "installing driver software", which I have to assume is for the new drive to work. I check under Windows Disk Manager and it does not show the new drive in there (which makes sense I guess).

The question now is do I try installing "GIGABYTE SATA2 Preinstall driver (For AHCI / RAID Mode)"
Note: Press F6 during Windows* setup to read from floppy.
http://www.gigabyte.com/products/produc ... 456#driver (windows 7, 32 bit O/S version)

I can't say I've installed this type of driver before. They don't actually list install instructions for it. I don't have a floppy drive, so should I just burn it on disc and boot from my optical drive with it OR would it be installed from windows ?
You only use that driver when you're installing a new OS.

If you're not installing a new OS and wanted to use the drive as a storage drive, then try:
GIGABYTE SATA2 RAID Driver
even though you're not using it for RAID.
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Oversized Rooster wrote: Put the drivers on a USB stick, run Win7 setup and you can load the driver from the USB stick from there.

Unlike older setups (e.g. Win2000 and WinXP), Win7 setup can see USB drives. :)
Forgive me, but the light bulb aint burning to bright tonight. :)

I've downloaded the driver (comes as in an .exe file). I can extract or leave intact. If I extract it, it gives me a folder "32 bit" and then files:
jraid.cat
Jraid.sys
txtsetup.oem
xraid_f.inf

I did leave as .exe and put one copy on a DVD+R and one copy on the USB stick.

The somewhat stupid question is how do I "Run Windows 7 Setup". Seems odd, but that was done once, when I installed a new drive in the PC and made it my main boot drive. Sadly, I know enough to be dangerous :)

Once Upon a time, wouldn't one just use "Device Manager" to add / update drivers?
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spinbot wrote: Forgive me, but the light bulb aint burning to bright tonight. :)

I've downloaded the driver (comes as in an .exe file). I can extract or leave intact. If I extract it, it gives me a folder "32 bit" and then files:
jraid.cat
Jraid.sys
txtsetup.oem
xraid_f.inf

I did leave as .exe and put one copy on a DVD+R and one copy on the USB stick.

The somewhat stupid question is how do I "Run Windows 7 Setup". Seems odd, but that was done once, when I installed a new drive in the PC and made it my main boot drive. Sadly, I know enough to be dangerous :)

Once Upon a time, wouldn't one just use "Device Manager" to add / update drivers?
I downloaded both files. GIGABYTE SATA2 RAID Driver contains the files you downloaded WITH a setup.exe. I suggest downloading that and install it.
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tmpz wrote: I downloaded both files. GIGABYTE SATA2 RAID Driver contains the files you downloaded WITH a setup.exe. I suggest downloading that and install it.
Ok, I will get that one, leave as .EXE on my thumb drive. Its the 'where do I go next', to actually install it. As Oversized Rooster said, I need to run the Windows 7 install and then somewhere in that process, point to the thumb drive to find the driver. What do you actually click on to "run Windows 7 setup" ?
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spinbot wrote: Ok, I will get that one, leave as .EXE on my thumb drive. Its the 'where do I go next', to actually install it. As Oversized Rooster said, I need to run the Windows 7 install and then somewhere in that process, point to the thumb drive to find the driver. What do you actually click on to "run Windows 7 setup" ?
"Run Windows 7 Setup" is when you actually install Windows 7. I assume you don't want to install Windows 7.

0. Ignore/delete files from GIGABYTE SATA2 Preinstall driver (For AHCI / RAID Mode)
1. Download GIGABYTE SATA2 RAID Driver
2. Run the exe to extract the files.
3. Run setup.exe
4. Go through the setup installation.
5. Reboot
6. Check Device Manager, you should see GSATA controller and the drive connected to it.
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tmpz wrote: "Run Windows 7 Setup" is when you actually install Windows 7. I assume you don't want to install Windows 7.

0. Ignore/delete files from GIGABYTE SATA2 Preinstall driver (For AHCI / RAID Mode)
1. Download GIGABYTE SATA2 RAID Driver
2. Run the exe to extract the files.
3. Run setup.exe
4. Go through the setup installation.
5. Reboot
6. Check Device Manager, you should see GSATA controller and the drive connected to it.
This new .EXE driver I downloaded now makes sense, as it actually includes a setup.exe , as per step 3.

Just extracting, running, installing and waiting for reboot now! Fingers crossed :)
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I suspect I may be a step closer, but still not there unfortunately.

In device manager, I do have an entry under "Storage Controlers" called "Gigabyte GBB36X Controller", howveer no drive listed. All my current drives are listed under the "Disk Drives" section.

I do have 2 GSATA ports. Should one get filled before the other, or is that a non-issue? Any other suggestions?

I check Windows Disk Management Utility (as well as my SeaTools for Windows) and neither of them see it either.
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spinbot wrote: I suspect I may be a step closer, but still not there unfortunately.

In device manager, I do have an entry under "Storage Controlers" called "Gigabyte GBB36X Controller", howveer no drive listed. All my current drives are listed under the "Disk Drives" section.

I do have 2 GSATA ports. Should one get filled before the other, or is that a non-issue? Any other suggestions?

I check Windows Disk Management Utility (as well as my SeaTools for Windows) and neither of them see it either.
Maybe the drive is dead? Windows Disk Management should be able to detect it. You can also try disconnecting one drive from the Intel controller and connect it to the drive you're trying add to make sure the drive is fine.

Can you try plugging into the other GSATA port?
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I will try other GSATA and then if that fails, I will remove one of my other data drives temporarily from my standard SATA ports and see if the drive is at least detected, to be sure it is not faulty. Maybe I should have mentioned this sooner, but the drive is 3TB in size. I figured worse case it would detect and not format over 2.2GB (or whatever the magic limit is in some cases).
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Finally...success! :) Thanks everyone for the help. The final hurdle: NO POWER! The Molex connector that I added the Molex to SATA adapter on doesn't seem to be passing power. I had touched the hard drive and noticed it had no heat to it. I moved the adapter to a different plug and I could fee the drive spin up. After that, it was just the standard partitioning and quick format and I now have another 2.72TB of storage available.

Very frustrating as I've never had this much trouble getting a drive installed (considering this my server has 12 drives and this machine has 4). Granted, I've never used a GSATA port before either :)

The only observation about the way the drive is setup is that Windows almost treats it like an external/usb drive as I have the "safely remove/eject hardware" icon in my system tray. Realistically, I'll never "eject it". Although I manged to just remove it from my list of drives by clicking on it (ya, stupid me, I was just trying to right-click it to see if I could disable that notification). Once I get the drive back visible again, is their a way to change how Windows 7 see's it, so that "eject" option doesn't even appear?
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spinbot wrote: Finally...success! :) Thanks everyone for the help. The final hurdle: NO POWER! The Molex connector that I added the Molex to SATA adapter on doesn't seem to be passing power. I had touched the hard drive and noticed it had no heat to it. I moved the adapter to a different plug and I could fee the drive spin up. After that, it was just the standard partitioning and quick format and I now have another 2.72TB of storage available.

Very frustrating as I've never had this much trouble getting a drive installed (considering this my server has 12 drives and this machine has 4). Granted, I've never used a GSATA port before either :)

The only observation about the way the drive is setup is that Windows almost treats it like an external/usb drive as I have the "safely remove/eject hardware" icon in my system tray. Realistically, I'll never "eject it". Although I manged to just remove it from my list of drives by clicking on it (ya, stupid me, I was just trying to right-click it to see if I could disable that notification). Once I get the drive back visible again, is their a way to change how Windows 7 see's it, so that "eject" option doesn't even appear?
Try this:
http://www.overclock.net/t/974023/fix-a ... e-hardware

GSATA might support SATA hot swapping which is why you see the drive under safely remove hardware.

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