UD7 - SATA SSD and HDD recognized as SCSI in bios and in Windows

[ed1]

After a reformat in another computer of my SSD, I reinstalled it into the original UD7 system. In the Peripheral Devices section of the latest bios (F3g), neither the SSD nor the HDD (which was not removed) are listed. They were both listed before I removed and replaced the SSD.

After loading Windows 7 onto the SSD, both the SSD and the HDD work fine. But I noticed that both are listed as SCSI drives in Device Manager. This is incorrect.

I believe I chose to enable AHCI in the bios. When I noticed the yellow icons in Device Manager for a USB and one other controller, I installed the Marvell and NEC drivers obtained from the Gigabyte website. I think one was a RAID driver, but I do not want RAID to run.

How do I correct the drive recognition in the bios and in Windows?

(I am having a very tough time with this new build so far.)

[Psycho101]

Re: UD7 - SATA SSD and HDD recognized as SCSI in bios and in Windows

Being listed as SCSI is not an issue. It is simply a label and doesn't alter the way the drives work or how they are used or the drivers used. When in AHCI mode My X25-M is reported as SCSI by Windows and by AS SSD. This doesn't mean it's being used in a different way, it's still plugged into a SATA port and is being controlled by the Intel ICh in the correct way.

I also use Daemon tools so that I can play my genuine shop bought games without having the DVD in the drive and the simulated DVD drives are labeled as SCSI.

If the quirk first manifested when you installed the Marvel SATA 6G drivers and if you're not using the device you can safely remove the drivers and disable the Marvel Controller in the BIOS. The SATA 6G ports are poorly implemented any way and are only worth using if you run out of Intel ICH ports. The NEC driver was for USB 3.0 and the Marvel one was for the SATA 6G ports. it was not specifically a RAID driver. It's a multi use driver that allows both the use of the ports for RAID and/or as normal ports.

You can't correct anything in th BIOS as everything is fine. The BIOS is not telling Windows that the drives are SCSI, it's impossible for it to be able to do so. Windows has taken it upon itself to call them SCSI. As said, it's just a line of text in a drive list label, it's not anything significant. It's fine the way it is. If it bothers you , and it really shouldn't, but if it does, running the drives in IDE mode will probably make windows call them ATA devices.

You can easily verify that the drives are running fine by loading CrystalDiskMark. it will tell you on the first page that you're running SATA drives in AHCI mode using SATA 300.

[ed1]

Re: UD7 - SATA SSD and HDD recognized as SCSI in bios and in Windows

OK, Psycho, thanks again for all of the info.

I just checked Crystal Disk Info. Previously, both my SSD and HDD were listed. Now only the SSD is listed. Yes, it is shown as SATA/300. The HDD is no longer shown at all.

I don't know why it bothers me, but it does, that:

(1) the bios does not have either drive listed as recognized,

(2) Windows lists them incorrectly as SCSI, and

(3) Windows lists both drives in the Safely Remove Hardware tray icon listing.

Oh, and one more anomaly. When plugging in my external HDD to find some backed up files, immediately a message appears that I need to format that drive (which previously was working fine with this system) before I can use it. Windows doesn't show it at all. What's up with that?

What could have caused both the bios and Windows to misread the drive mode?

Can a user eject these drives through the Safely Remove Hardware mechanism? That just seems wrong if it's true.

I find that all of this to be very flaky behavior for top of the line components and software.

I think I would like to uninstall some of these controller drivers and try installing them again. I am assuming, as you suggested, that those controllers need active drivers if I want to use the corresponding USB ports.

Could this possibly caused by using a beta bios - F3g?

[ed1]

Re: UD7 - SATA SSD and HDD recognized as SCSI in bios and in Windows

And, here's one more anomaly. Plugging in my external USB hard drive, which previously worked fine with the system, now produces an immediate dialogue box stating that I need to format the drive before I can use it. Windows fails to see it at all.

What's up with that?

[Psycho101]

Re: UD7 - SATA SSD and HDD recognized as SCSI in bios and in Windows

Like I said, the BIOS hasn't miss read the drives. it's not capable of reading them as being SCSI drives because the board has no SCSI hardware. The board or BIOS don't even know of the existance of SCSI.

One of the key uses for AHCI is that you can hot swap drives. It is totally normal behaviour for them to be listed as removable devices if you have AHCI set. It's not flakey behaviour, it's intended and a key feature.

Due to the way AHCI works (RAID too) it is also normal for the drives not to be listed as detected in the BIOS. This section is for legacy IDE mode SATA devices and actual IDE devices only, not AHCI or RAID ones. Te detection for your AHCI drives is done dynamically every single time you boot, that's why the AHCI ROM screen appears and the drives are detected. Until that happens, as far as theboards BIOS is concerned the ports are filled but it's not allowed to have anything to do with the drives.

There's no reason why being able to eject drives would be wrong. It's a useful feature and an essential feature in the case of things like running a vital RAID array with redundancy. Having to shut down a 6 drive server just to replace a failed drive is a massive inconvenience. AHCI lets you pull the drive and replace it then start integrating the drive into the array. Same with a Workstation, if you have a finite amount of space for drives and a lot of data you can switch drives as if they were USB keys etc. After all they're only storage devices, the old restricted IDE convention of having to power off is the flakey solution IMO, hotswapping is the present and the future and a big improvement.

As for your External drive, there's nothing currently to suggest that it's the fault of your current PC or any settings. If the drive is formatted in a Linux file system etc then windows won't be able to see it. If not then there are several reasons this may happen such as unexpected removal of the drive or Windows shutting down too soon with the drive still plugged in. Try the drive in another PC. If that rig kicks up the same message then something's happened to the drive. If it detects fine, back up the data on it and then plug it into your Rig and initialise/format the disk, what eve it needs to work. I'd then do a full surface scan with chkdsk in case the drive is failing.

If you want to use the USB 3.0 capable ports then yes you need the driver installed otherwise onlt the ICH supplied ports will work. Same goes for the Marvel controller. I'd say that the USB driver isn't the cause of the issue so they're fine to keep. If it were me I'd disable the Marvel controller and never re-enable it unless I run out of room on the ICH.

Also note that unless your SSD is an Intel X25-M/E then AHCI probably isn't worth it. Intel drives get a performance boost form AHCI's NCQ feature but Indilinx, Samsung, JMicron etc drives don't benefit. There are various guides on the net that show you how to go back to IDE mode. If you just try enabling IDE without altering three registry entries then the PC will BSOD at boot. Altering the registry entries will allow Windows to use the correct driver for IDE mode and give a successful boot.

[ed1]

Re: UD7 - SATA SSD and HDD recognized as SCSI in bios and in Windows

Thanks, Psycho. Now I'm wondering from what you've said if my original problem which caused me to give up and reformat was that I may have updated to the latest bios, loaded optimized default settings (which included setting the drives to IDE mode - not noticed by me), then letting the system boot into Windows.

That is precisely when my BSOD's started - just before Windows loading reached the desktop. I couldn't figure out what the issue was, so I gave up after multiple trial and errors and reformatted the SSD drive in another computer and then reinstalled it. Now Windows thinks I have SCSI drives. . .

I may be nominating you for detective of the year!

By the way, my portable HDD is recognized properly by the other computer. I'll try it again on the system in question.

Thank you again for your help. It is much appreciated.

[ed1]

Re: UD7 - SATA SSD and HDD recognized as SCSI in bios and in Windows

The external HDD now works fine on the UD7 system. One minute the system asks for a reformat before recognizing the drive, 10 minutes later when plugging it in again it is recognized perfectly. No changes to the system or the drive made in the interim. Only plugged it in to test on another build.

Who knows . . .