PDA

View Full Version : Installing XP and NF4 RAID on Asus Mobo


Mediocre
08-19-2006, 05:51 PM
I've got an Asus A8N-E with the latest bios (1013), and some shitty oem recovery cd. I'm trying to setup a raid 0 with 2 sata300 Hitachi 80GB's. One is brand new and the other had XP on it.

PC Is:
AMD 64 socket 939 3800+ dual core (@ 2.1GHz)
Asus A8n-E
2gb (4x512mb) Corsair Value Select
Nvidia 6800GS
2 x 80gb Hititachi SATA300

I setup the bios and Endabled the RAID and only the devices I wanted to use (sata channel's 1 and 2).
Setup the RAID utility - made it bootable (read on, I might try with it off).

When it boots I hit F6, install the mfg supplied floppy with the drivers. I install both. But each time it tells me the windows version is newer and I should use it (but it won't just regognize the hdd's unless I hit F6).

I choose the ones on the floppy and it will see one hdd, let me format, but then the install fails when it goes and looks for the driver on the floppy drive. nvraid and like 8 other files it doesn't see them on the floppy

I choose the to use the two drivers on the recovery CD and it goes all the way through the intial install but locks at the blue rebooting screen, or it goes into installation and freezes with 39 minutes (it froze here twice).


NF4 Raid has some issues??

I learned real quick how to make a slipstream? copy of a sp1 windows xp cd, update the sp on the cd to service pack 2, install all the patches/fixes, install the NEW NF4 drivers, make it bootable, and burn it.

Anyone else had these issues with NF4 Raid? Somewhere I read to not make the raid bootable during the nf4 raid setup (F10 at post).

Here's what I did:
http://www.short-media.com/forum/showthread.php?t=32751

Again, anyone else had this much trouble with nf4 raid?

Poisonsnak
08-20-2006, 02:21 AM
Have you put the drives together in the raid manager? It sounds a little like they might be separate if it only formats one of the drives.

Also you'll need it to be bootable or you will never get to that 39 minutes screen.

I've used nF4 raid, never had any problems, but never used it for a boot drive.

Mediocre
08-20-2006, 05:03 AM
nah all the raid management was setup. Alot of different places I was reading said that NOT making it bootable is one of the little tricks.
I left it bootable.
I bet it was the shitty drivers that were on the recovery cd.
The updated (and slipstreamed) CD did the trick no problems (didn't even have to press f6!!!). Very cool program recommend checking it out to anyone who formats a couple times a year