631xESB/632xESB SATA AHCI Controller

Thank you for putting all of this together. I’ve been banging my head against a wall trying to get AHCI to work on my HP ProLiant ML150 G3 since I’d like to use it as a daily driver. In order to use it with all 6 on board (or even more than 2) SATA Ports I need to have AHCI enabled in Bios. But I can’t get Win 8.1 or WIN 7 x64 to work. Instant BSOD anytime I enable it. I’m trying to figure out what modded driver version to use if theres one available. Here’s the spec’s I pulled from a lspci on linux live running in AHCI.

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 5000V Chipset Memory Controller Hub (rev 93) | 00:00.0 0600: 8086:25d4 (rev 93)
00:02.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 5000 Series Chipset PCI Express x8 Port 2-3 (rev 93) | 00:02.0 0604: 8086:25f7 (rev 93)
00:03.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 5000 Series Chipset PCI Express x4 Port 3 (rev 93) | 00:03.0 0604: 8086:25e3 (rev 93)
00:10.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 5000 Series Chipset FSB Registers (rev 93) | 00:10.0 0600: 8086:25f0 (rev 93)
00:10.1 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 5000 Series Chipset FSB Registers (rev 93) | 00:10.1 0600: 8086:25f0 (rev 93)
00:10.2 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 5000 Series Chipset FSB Registers (rev 93) | 00:10.2 0600: 8086:25f0 (rev 93)
00:11.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 5000 Series Chipset Reserved Registers (rev 93) | 00:11.0 0600: 8086:25f1 (rev 93)
00:13.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 5000 Series Chipset Reserved Registers (rev 93) | 00:13.0 0600: 8086:25f3 (rev 93)
00:15.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 5000 Series Chipset FBD Registers (rev 93) | 00:15.0 0600: 8086:25f5 (rev 93)
00:16.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 5000 Series Chipset FBD Registers (rev 93) | 00:16.0 0600: 8086:25f6 (rev 93)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 631xESB/632xESB/3100 Chipset PCI Express Root Port 1 (rev 09) | 00:1c.0 0604: 8086:2690 (rev 09)
00:1d.0 USB controller: Intel Corporation 631xESB/632xESB/3100 Chipset UHCI USB Controller #1 (rev 09) | 00:1d.0 0c03: 8086:2688 (rev 09)
00:1d.1 USB controller: Intel Corporation 631xESB/632xESB/3100 Chipset UHCI USB Controller #2 (rev 09) | 00:1d.1 0c03: 8086:2689 (rev 09)
00:1d.2 USB controller: Intel Corporation 631xESB/632xESB/3100 Chipset UHCI USB Controller #3 (rev 09) | 00:1d.2 0c03: 8086:268a (rev 09)
00:1d.3 USB controller: Intel Corporation 631xESB/632xESB/3100 Chipset UHCI USB Controller #4 (rev 09) | 00:1d.3 0c03: 8086:268b (rev 09)
00:1d.7 USB controller: Intel Corporation 631xESB/632xESB/3100 Chipset EHCI USB2 Controller (rev 09) | 00:1d.7 0c03: 8086:268c (rev 09)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 PCI Bridge (rev d9) | 00:1e.0 0604: 8086:244e (rev d9)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 631xESB/632xESB/3100 Chipset LPC Interface Controller (rev 09) | 00:1f.0 0601: 8086:2670 (rev 09)
►00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 631xESB/632xESB IDE Controller (rev 09) | 00:1f.1 0101: 8086:269e (rev 09)
►00:1f.2 SATA controller: Intel Corporation 631xESB/632xESB SATA AHCI Controller (rev 09) | 00:1f.2 0106: 8086:2681 (rev 09)
01:00.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 6311ESB/6321ESB PCI Express Upstream Port (rev 01) | 01:00.0 0604: 8086:3500 (rev 01)
01:00.3 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 6311ESB/6321ESB PCI Express to PCI-X Bridge (rev 01) | 01:00.3 0604: 8086:350c (rev 01)
02:00.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 6311ESB/6321ESB PCI Express Downstream Port E1 (rev 01) | 02:00.0 0604: 8086:3510 (rev 01)

Any assistance would be very much appreciated.

@ suicid3:
Welcome at WinRAID Forum!

The Intel SATA AHCI Controller of your HP ProLiant ML150 G3 system is the very old "Intel(R) ESB2 SATA AHCI Controller" and has the DeviceID DEV_2681.
Only the meanwhile outdated Intel MSM driver series (latest: v8.9.8.1005 WHQL) do support this sort of Intel AHCI Controller.
So you should succeed with the installation of Win8 and Win8/8.1, when you load at the beginning of the OS installation the related Intel MSM driver.
Attached is the 64bit Intel MSM AHCI/RAID driver v8.9.8.1005 WHQL.

Good luck!
Fernando

64bit Intel MSM AHCI & RAID driver v8.9.8.1005 WHQL.rar (209 KB)

Unfortunately I still get the message that “Windows is unable to install to this drive”. I tried slipping the driver into a Win8x64 build and tried “load driver” at install startup on both Win7x64 and Win8x64. It has the “hide drivers that are not compatible” checked and ths ESB2 driver shows, but for some reason still doesn’t allow me to install. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated. Thanks again.

@ suicid3:
It is a pity, that Windows 8/8.1 Setup doesn’t allow you to load the correct and WHQL certified Intel AHCI driver.
You wouldn’t even need to load/install any Intel AHCI driver, if the generic Win8/8.1 MS AHCI driver named STORAHCI.SYS would support your old Intel SATA AHCI Controller, but it doesn’t.

So I see only the following option to get your HP system running Win8.1 in AHCI mode:

  1. Enter the BIOS and set the Intel SATA Controller to “IDE”.
  2. Install Windows 8.1 (no separate driver needed).
  3. Once the OS is up and running, open the “IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers” section of the Device Manager.
  4. Right click onto the listed “Standard AHCI Controller” and choose the options “Update driver software” > “Browse my computer…” > Let me pick…".
  5. Hit the “Have Disk” button and navigate to the driver I have attached for you.
  6. Hit the file iaAHCI.inf and choose “Intel(R) ESB2 SATA AHCI Controller”.
  7. Ignore all warnings and let the OS install the driver.
  8. Reboot and enter at once the BIOS.
  9. Set the Intel SATA Controller to “AHCI” and store this BIOS setting.
  10. After the next reboot you hopefully will boot into Windows 8.1 running in AHCI mode.

Good luck!