gigabyte ga-f2a78m-d3h raid

I used to have two vector 150 240gb drives that I was using in raid on a z97 system. When I go to setup the raid in amd’s raid bios, everything is fine. When I go install windows 8.1 64 bit, I get to to the 1st step where windows (just before copying begins) partitioning, but then the install stops. I let ii seit there for almost 15 mins without response. This also happens when I use AMD’s AHCI driver when installing on a single drive. For AHCI to work, I have to use the MS driver supplied with windows then install the amd driver afterwards. So, AHCI i get and how to fix it. But can someone help me with RAID on this mb? PS. I was using the current drivers from AMD’s chipset/driver package 14.9.

@ wheeljack12:

Questions:
1. In which mode (LEGACY or UEFI) did you try to install Win8.1 onto the AMD RAID array?
2. Are you sure, that the mainboard BIOS contains the required AMD RAID ROM/EFI "Driver" modules?
3. Did the Win8.1 Setup detect your RAID array at all? If not, did you load an F6 driver? If yes, which one?

  1. It was done in UEFI mode meaning using ahci and raid drivers.
    2. That I am not sure of since I don’t have a secondaty drive to test them on although the main bios is UEFI and I can use UEFI mode with the MS ahci drivers.
    3. Yes, windows 8.1 detected the raid array when I had one after installing the latest raid drivers included with the 14.9 chipset drivers.

What means "RAID"? Have you just set the Intel SATA Controller to "RAID" mode or did you create a RAID array at that time? If yes, did you break the Intel RAID array, before you removed the 2 former Intel RAID array members into the AMD system?

What lets you believe, that you have tried to install the OS in UEFI mode?

You don’t need a second drive, when you want to check the modules of your mainboard BIOS.
Note: An UEFI mode OS installation means, that the system partition will have the Guimode Partition Table (GPT) instead of the old Master Boot Record (MBR) one.

because when I chose the storage boot rom mode, I chose UEFI only. Mind you, it’s a little hazy now since I remember seeing the raid bios a few times. Not sure if I changed the storage boot rom to uefi mode after creating the raid array in the raid bios. All i am sure is one of the modes (uefi or legacy) does not take during OS install. I can load the raid driver, choose the raid partition, but I can’t install. And I went to amd’s site and the raid controller although it has amd trademarks on it for the bios is from a 3rd party called DOT HILL, just check this link, the lower end chipsets for fm2/fm2+ apu’ use a promise controller at sata 2 speeds (big surpiise there) and the higher end go with Dot Hill. I don’t know the company dot hill Anyhow, here is the a series chipset page, just check the specs, they show the brand of raid controller.

http://www.amd.com/en-us/products/chipsets/a-series#

anyhow, I am thinking of getting a syba pci-e 2.0 4x raid card with a marvell 9230 chipset on it from newegg canada. I can get it for about $50 before shipping. And it says that the 9230 chipset does hardware raid which for a bargain basement price I will take. That way,I can use the card in ahci (and yes, I know it will probably be legacy) mode until I pick up a second ssd again. I don’t feel like testing motherboard modules with multiple installs of windows. I have installed windows enough last year to make me sick of it. I only reinstall windows now if new hardware demands it.

Does that mean, that you are giving up your work with the AMD RAID system?

no,I actually haven’t given up hope just yet? Would it be a wild guess that my motherboard can only do Raid in legacy mode then since UEFI mode stalls. What I mean is it probably doesn’t have uefi bios sata driver? Is that common for AMD APU boards? Because I am thinking of going full ATX with a ASRock FM2A88X PRO3+ motherboard as my gtx 970 uses 3 slots (it’s the zotac amp edition) and my other pci-e x4 2.0 slot is used by the sound blaster z sound card. Just in case legacy raid doesn’t work, I do want to have a backup in this for my open pci-e 2.0 4x slot on the asrock mb meaning just in case I can’t get raid to work either. I am thinking it maybe tied to my OCZ vector 150 240gb ssd. The gigabyte mb may not like that drive period. Here is the backup RAID card I want to get:

http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.asp…N82E16816124056

as for the motherboard from asrock, it’s $80 with a $15 MIR at newegg. Not bad for full atx.

The UBU tool offers some AMD EFI RAID BIOS modules. They are within the Modules\AMD\FFS subfolder.

I actually got the raid driver to work in UEFI mode with win 8.1 64 bit. The only difference between then and now is a picked up a copy of win 8.1 with update 1 included on the disks. What I am getting at is that update 1 must have fixed it. Anyhow, off to get a second ssd (vector 150 240gb) on friday the 30th.