You problem relates to the hierarchy of the primary and secondary controller assigned during the boot sequence:
If you are using the internal SATA controller as your primary controller; your boot drive, you must leave the HostRaid disabled, to allow the single drive to function as your regular operating system boot drive.
It you installed a PCI SATA controller, to create a Raid 0 with two drives, you will need to configure this controller as the secondary boot controller.
I am not sure if during boot, you are getting a Bios screen for the built-in controller and another Bios screen for the PCI SATA controller: you may be getting one Bios for the entire setup.
At any rate your problem is that you need to define your primary boot controller; the Built in Dell; it’s were your operating system resides and your PCI SATA would be your secondary boot card.
When the built in SATA controller boot-up you need to go into the bios and under boot-sequence tag the built in as your boot & primary controller, the PCI SATA controller will default to secondary, and you should be able to see you two drives attached to the PCI controller.
Also remember to sequence the drives in BIOS. There is a selection on drive boot sequence. Make sure your operating system drive is first followed by the two additional drives installed.
Well I tried those steps but once I turned Raid to "On", the blue screen error comes up during windows start up. In the BIOS I still notice that when Raid is set to on, the boot sequence shows the built in SATA controlled system drive as "not present". I set up the order as follows:
The 670 internal SATA Raid must remain disabled: You originally installed the operating system on a SATA drives that was not part of a Raid configuration. When you enable SATA Raid in the 670 Bios the system no longer recognizes the boot-drive.
So you need to leave the 670 Bios SATA Raid disabled, the boot-order sequence you have is correct:
1) System drive
2) Adaptec Drive 1
3) Adaptec Drive 2
When you boot up you should see the single drive installed and then the PCI SATA controller Bios with the two drives listed, unless you’ve already created a Raid with them.
If not, you will need to enter the PCI card bios and create a Raid configuration using the two additional drives.
If there is an option on boot-sequence on the PCI card, and the 670 controller is listed make sure you select the 670 controller is the default boot-controller and the PCI Raid card as the second.
I work with SCSI drives, it’s very similar, is a question of sequencing the correct drive to boot, and any additional drives, or Raid configuration to default to second or third.
Sometimes after you create a Raid configuration the 670 bios for some reason will move the Raid drive to the front of the boot list. You may need to verify in the 670 bios, after creating the Raid configuration that the system drive is still in the top of the list followed by the other drives.
Well I tired but it's too confusing. When the system starts up, at the very top it now says "Adaptec SATA Controller BIOS and lists the 2 new drives. The system BIOS never comes up displaying the 80GB system drive (it used to). If I hit F2 during start up, it takes me into the BIOS config. So which BIOS am I really in? IfI hit F3, it takes me into to another dos looking screen and askes me to assign or remove 1st HD and the only two that are there are the two new drives. Not sure what this is for so I just get out of that setup.
The only way I can get the start up screen to display both the BIOS for the new drive and the system one, is to turn the raid feature on. Once that happens, upon restart, both BIOS's show up and at the very bottom, it says the BIOS was installed successfully. The only problem; this causes the scary blue screen to show up and I can't load windows. I have to rebbot and then disable the raid function to get back to windows. Thanks for your help but I think I need some live tech help to get me through this so I'll contact Dell during the week.
AvidNut
9 Posts
0
October 7th, 2005 02:00
Here is my service Tag:
DBKPG81
Chipstone
525 Posts
0
October 7th, 2005 11:00
If you are using the internal SATA controller as your primary controller; your boot drive, you must leave the HostRaid disabled, to allow the single drive to function as your regular operating system boot drive.
It you installed a PCI SATA controller, to create a Raid 0 with two drives, you will need to configure this controller as the secondary boot controller.
I am not sure if during boot, you are getting a Bios screen for the built-in controller and another Bios screen for the PCI SATA controller: you may be getting one Bios for the entire setup.
At any rate your problem is that you need to define your primary boot controller; the Built in Dell; it’s were your operating system resides and your PCI SATA would be your secondary boot card.
When the built in SATA controller boot-up you need to go into the bios and under boot-sequence tag the built in as your boot & primary controller, the PCI SATA controller will default to secondary, and you should be able to see you two drives attached to the PCI controller.
Also remember to sequence the drives in BIOS. There is a selection on drive boot sequence. Make sure your operating system drive is first followed by the two additional drives installed.
AvidNut
9 Posts
0
October 7th, 2005 12:00
AvidNut
9 Posts
0
October 7th, 2005 16:00
Well I tried those steps but once I turned Raid to "On", the blue screen error comes up during windows start up. In the BIOS I still notice that when Raid is set to on, the boot sequence shows the built in SATA controlled system drive as "not present". I set up the order as follows:
1) System drive
2) Adaptec Drive 1
3) Adaptec Drive 2
4) Etc...
Any guess?
Chipstone
525 Posts
0
October 7th, 2005 20:00
There are two Bios you are working with:
The 670 internal Bios and the PCI SATA card Bios.
The 670 internal SATA Raid must remain disabled: You originally installed the operating system on a SATA drives that was not part of a Raid configuration. When you enable SATA Raid in the 670 Bios the system no longer recognizes the boot-drive.
So you need to leave the 670 Bios SATA Raid disabled, the boot-order sequence you have is correct:
1) System drive
2) Adaptec Drive 1
3) Adaptec Drive 2
When you boot up you should see the single drive installed and then the PCI SATA controller Bios with the two drives listed, unless you’ve already created a Raid with them.
If not, you will need to enter the PCI card bios and create a Raid configuration using the two additional drives.
If there is an option on boot-sequence on the PCI card, and the 670 controller is listed make sure you select the 670 controller is the default boot-controller and the PCI Raid card as the second.
I work with SCSI drives, it’s very similar, is a question of sequencing the correct drive to boot, and any additional drives, or Raid configuration to default to second or third.
Sometimes after you create a Raid configuration the 670 bios for some reason will move the Raid drive to the front of the boot list. You may need to verify in the 670 bios, after creating the Raid configuration that the system drive is still in the top of the list followed by the other drives.
AvidNut
9 Posts
0
October 8th, 2005 23:00
Well I tired but it's too confusing. When the system starts up, at the very top it now says "Adaptec SATA Controller BIOS and lists the 2 new drives. The system BIOS never comes up displaying the 80GB system drive (it used to). If I hit F2 during start up, it takes me into the BIOS config. So which BIOS am I really in? IfI hit F3, it takes me into to another dos looking screen and askes me to assign or remove 1st HD and the only two that are there are the two new drives. Not sure what this is for so I just get out of that setup.
The only way I can get the start up screen to display both the BIOS for the new drive and the system one, is to turn the raid feature on. Once that happens, upon restart, both BIOS's show up and at the very bottom, it says the BIOS was installed successfully. The only problem; this causes the scary blue screen to show up and I can't load windows. I have to rebbot and then disable the raid function to get back to windows. Thanks for your help but I think I need some live tech help to get me through this so I'll contact Dell during the week.