eSata Port not detected in Bios in my Studio XPS 435MT running Windows 7 Pro

Hi Frank,

So is tech support saying your motherboard is defective?

Hi Osprey,

They suggested it might be the cause but wasn't exactly sure based on what I've explained to them, it might be that ONLY the eStata port on the motherboard is defective but I''ve never used it so I couldn't say, but everything else on the motherboard seems to be working fine.  I'm wondering if it might be the intel drivers that need updating, but when I visited intel's site I found only eStata drivers pertaining to Raid.  There was one eStata driver for Windows Vista 64-bit I'm running Windows 7 64-bit but I tried anyhow but it said I didn't have the right hardware for that driver.

I just want to be sure its the motherboard before I go changing it, because its a big job.  Thanks.

You dont need a mother board.  Dell team needs to correct issue with bios and windows 64 bit. I have a Studio XPS 9000 less than a year old on which the esata has never worked.  Dell support in India cant help.  Read various threads in support and you will see you are not alone.  Whatever you do, dont let those pin heads replace your board or re-load windows.  You could end up worse off!  My assumption is there will eventualy be a software fix.

Hi Homer,

I've read a few post regarding the XPS 900/435T which is slightly different from mine apparently and heard the eSata port doesn't supoort drives over 1TB..... can you confirm that? ... unless it was an older model. 

I just wished that the features would work as advertised, but so far I havn't found anyone with the Studio XPS 435MT system that has gotten the eSata port to work properly on Windows 7 64-bit.

I also blame myself for not testing all the ports while the machine was still under warranty and now if I want help from Dell its fee based.  I don't mind if they'll guarantee it'll work but just seems too many unknowns, it could be the drivers, the motherboard, the port the cable, etc.  like people have nothing better to do than to troubleshoot all day long.

Not sure about drives >1TB.  My drive is 1TB.  Interestingly, as I troubleshoot the issue, I boot to setup configuration (F2) and look at the 6 ports, I can see my external drive attached.  It correctly identifies it as 1 TB Western Digital.  But, when I exit setup and boot to Win7 64 bit, it is lost.  Sometimes (rarely) I can go to the device manager in Windows and find the errant external drive, but device manager cannot show accurate drive properties, if anything at all.  And of course the drive never shows up in may computer.

This seems a Windows 64 bit - Dell bios conflict.  My suspicion is it's bios, as i have friends running 64 bit Windows which can utilize e-sata drives in HP units.  I would be very surprised if it turns out to be hardware related.

BTW, there is another, probably not related, bios issue which involves the media reader.  It fails to read SD cards from cameras.  You can correct this temporarily by shutting down PC and unplugging power supply from back and wait about 60 seconds then reattach power and start up PC.  Now media reader works.  Unfortunately, after a short while, it again loses ability to read the memory cards. 

I mention this because this too seems a bios issue.  It might be interesting to try the same maneuver with the e-sata attached.

Good luck,

Homer

I also have an XPS 435MT with Windows 7 64 bit.   I recently purchased a 2TB eSATA drive.  If I leave the external drive switched off when I boot my PC, and then switch the drive on, it will never be detected.  When I boot to Setup (F2) my external drive is not detected if it was not ON when I booted.  I can force detection while in Setup mode, and it detects the drive.  If I boot to Setup with the external drive ON, BIOS correctly detects the drive (although the boot process seems to take longer in this case).  So the eSATA drive doesn't appear to be hot swappable (although I can find no setting in BIOS to alter this).  I am also running BIOS 1.14, so it looks like Dell needs to update the BIOS.  It is really disappointing purchasing a 2TB eSATA drive that doesn't function as I expected.  I can still use the drive by switching it ON before my PC, but Dell should really correct this problem.  It seems common across all the PCs that they build.

  When I boot to Setup (F2) my external drive is not detected if it was not ON when I booted.

idoitss,  

Are you "saying"  you have the same set up ...  435mt i7 920 , with Win7 64-bit  ... and YOU can use the EXTERNAL eSATA port for your external eSATA drive???

What settings in Setup (F2)  needs to be turned ON?   (I looked , but must have missed something)

p.s.  24gb of Crucial CT1418495  Tri-Channel  DDR3 1600  (PC3-12800)  works!  

Had seemed to help  PS CS5  when more RAM is allocated to it ... but  Win7 in general seems the same.

Probably need to  learn how to Optimize Win7 for the 24gb setup.  

Thank you, Ross