I’ve an old PC with Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3P Mobo running well with modded BIOS and Win 11 64-bit. The BIOS has the following components:
ICH10R southbridge - v11.2.0.1527 with the TRIM mod
RTL8111C ethernet - rtegrom266.lom
SATA2 chip - j1.08.01
ICHAACHI 1.2 original from a EP45-USB3P
Updated NCPUCODE
The PC runs well with MS AHCI drivers. Now I changed its config: added a PCIe-to-SATA III card and hocked SATA III SSD to it with NeoGrub bootloader and Windows 11 installed. It boots OK in this setup with 2 extra SATA II 128GB SSDs used to store data. However, it does not boot even as the only PC drive in the Mobo RAID mode. Should I create a RAID0 with one drive in it to have it boot? Should I even use RAID Mobo mode in this case, or Intel RST and RAID drivers can create RAID0 from 2 data SSDs after Windows has booted?
Further, I need to combine the 2 SSDs as RAID0, but again Windows stops booting from the SATA III drive once its blue logo appears. Not sure what the reason is, could it be NeoGrub failing with RAID chosen in Mobo? Or what?
I tried installing the above recommended RST(e) v11.7.4.1001 modded drivers, they install but the Intel package won’t run in AHCI Mobo mode saying “Intel RST service doesn’t run” when in fact it does. May be missing Certificate is the problem or AHCI mode chosen?
However, the question is whether Intel RAID drivers are even expected to pick up from the Mobo driver so early in the boot sequence? What driver or other code at that early stage is failing to recognize the RAID mode and blocks Windows boot? Can the PCIe-to-SATA III card be the culprit: I don’t think it is, since it runs SATA III drive in AHCI config very well?
Is there anything you guys can recommend in general? How to troubleshoot this issue?
Also what procedure do you recommend to switch (cleanup and reinstall) between RST and RST(e) driver versions back and force trying to find a fix to boot the system?
@zamar15
The initial post of this thread has been written by me more than 12 years ago and many advices are not valid anymore for users, who are running a modern Windows OS.
The generic in-box MS AHCI driver of Win10/11 is much better compatible than any old AHCI driver, which has been delivered by the manufacturer of the on-board SATA AHCI Controller.
Since the third party AHCI drivers are not updated anymore by the related manufacturer (here: Intel) since several years, these are my recommendations for users of an old system running Win10 or Win11:
The best compatible and rock stable AHCI driver is the in-box MS one.
Since none of the Intel RAID Controllers are well supported by the Win10/11 in-box Drivers, I do not really recommend to set the SATA Controller to „RAID“ (unless it is necessary to get access to an already existing Intel RAID Array).
Users, who are not satisfied with the performance of their system drive, should think about purchasing an NVMe SSD (providided, that the BIOS allows booting off such drive).
My Mobo supports only PCIe 2.0 speeds and no option to boot from NVMe, so I use a riser PCIe-to-SATA III card to boot faster from a SATA III SSD with Windows 11 installed. It may be also possible to boot from an M.2 SSD hocked to a PCIe raiser card. Upon installing the old RST(e) v11.7.4.1001 64-bit driver in Windows as per your Best Driver for a Mobo list that matches my Mobo disk driver ROM version, I was able to boot into Windows 11 from the SATA III drive with 2-SATA II SSD RAID0 Data array also accessible. The old PC works perfectly for my typical office tasks, I don’t use it for Video editing.
However, in Device Manager the RAID0 array is showing with MS 6/21/2006 v10.0.22621.5415 driver, which is default AHCI Windows 11 driver, and there is no option to change it to Intel RAID driver, but the RAID0 works perfect. How is it possible?
The RAID array is recognized as 2 separate SSDs if the Intel RAID driver is not installed. The RST software doesn’t work properly anyway upon install, but the RAID driver seemingly does while not attached to the array??? May be Windows 11 AHCI disk drivers are universal and also support RAID? So installing Intel RST package just switches proper Registry settings to enable Windows own RAID feature?
Also, the system lost the ability to Eject any drive, as they are no longer visible in Taskbar → Drives tool and Control Panel, but still visible in Windows Explorer and by Windows Disks utility. Is there another way to Eject SATA drives and RAID arrays?
Is it possible to boot into Windows in a way that single SATA drives will be supported by MS Windows latest drivers, while RAID volumes be supported by the installed legacy Intel RAID drivers? The reason is to have Eject feature hopefully working.
The goal is to use existing several SSDs removed from my old laptops as a RAID0 array on the old PC instead of buying newer large SSD II hooked to the Mobo SATA II port or SATA III hocked via a raiser PCIe card for use as Data storage like home pictures, videos, docs etc.
@zamar15
To be able to answer your questions I need screenshots of
a) the Device manager with expanded „Disks“, „IDE ATA/ATPI Controllers“ and „Storage Controllers“ sections and
b) the „Advanced Features“ BIOS section, which shows the current configuration of the on-board Intel RST SATA Controller.
By the way - an Intel RAID Array needs an Intel RAID driver and cannot use any other one, but Intel’s related *.SYS file is identical for the AHCI and RAID mode. It is the related *.INF file, which determines during its installation the SATA mode (AHCI or RAID).
But the system shows MS driver attached to the RAID array instead of the Intel RAID one???
The old school Mobo doesn’t have current Mobo’s options, but works well for 20 years.
Windows stack at Logo screen if I choose RAID mode in BIOS settings regardless whether Windows rebooted from Safe or Normal mode before changing that BIOS option. So I use RAID BIOS mode to setup the RAID array, and then switch to AHCI mode to boot the system disk. Once booted, the system properly shows the RAID array and works with it, if Intel RST driver was prior installed.
My main issue now is to enable the Disk Eject feature for drives other than System disk, but other disks nowhere to be found in the Taskbar Eject screen??? May be I need to try the latest Intel RAID driver with Windows 11 to have all drives showing up on the Eject screen? Or latest RAID drivers won’t work with this Mobo or show poor stability and array performance?
@zamar15
It seems, that I cannot help you. I am currently making holidays and have only limited time for the Forum.
Yes, the tool named “HotSwap!” (>LINK<) may help to solve this problem, but I don’t know whether it works with Win11. Edit: According to your posted details your system doesn‘t use any Intel RAID driver. Nevertheless the OS has detected an Intel RAID Volume. I have never seen such configuration before.
But Win 11 “universal” disk driver is expected to show all loaded disks in Eject Tool just like it does without RAID present. Now Windows is able to boot with BIOS AHCI settings while showing the BIOS created RAID upon boot. It couldn’t view that RAID until a matching Intel RST(e) driver was installed despite Windows default disk driver is attached to it upon boot, so there is some co-ordination between these drivers.
Hope you’ll look into it after returning from holidays.
Edit: I looked at AI Overview for Windows 11 RAID: ”Windows uses disk.sys as a foundation for its software RAID capabilities, which are primarily managed through Disk Management or Storage Spaces. These higher-level tools allow users to create and manage RAID 0, 1, and 5 arrays for both data drives and, in some cases, system drives, using the underlying disk subsystem”.
It’s apparent that Windows 11 default disk driver can now recognize RAIDs created by BIOS RST disk ROMs if a matching Intel RST(e) driver is installed. I tried HotSwap! and it works relatively well in Windows 11 with RST(e) RAID with minor issues like some unmounted non-RAID volumes remain visible until Explorer restart while not accessible.
Otherwise, Windows default disk driver and subsystem allow to create a software RAID from several disks in either Disk Management or Storage Spaces (just tried this new tool) and add more drives to it later without reformatting (offering data optimization instead), still without listing them in Windows Eject Disks tool. Write speed of the Mobo created RST RAID0 seems more stable and faster by 30% at copying large files compare to “Spaces” created RAID0 despite using the same Windows driver. The HotSwap! tool gets mixed up by such multidrive “spaces” offering to eject the drives separately that would likely destroy saved data.
I still wonder why I’m unable to boot after setting Mobo to RST RAID mode? Booting that way would allow to use optimized for my Mobo South Bridge Intel RST(e) driver in Windows hopefully resulting in higher write speeds for RAID0. How to troubleshoot that?
@zamar15
You cannot boot after having set the Intel SATA Controller to „RAID“ within the BIOS, because the required Intel RAID driver is obviously not available while booting.
By the way - there is a big difference between a „Software RAID“ (which is never bootable) and a real Intel RAID Array, which has been created by the related Intel RST Software and has to be deleted before their components are usable as separate disks for storage purposes.
Since your problems have nothing to do with the topic of this thread (comparison of different Intel AHCI or RAID drivers), I propose to move our discussion into a separate thread.
I did install matching driver for my Mobo chipset and BIOS disk driver ROM “Universal 64bit Intel RST(e) RAID driver v11.7.4.1001 mod+signed by Fernando”, and it’s somehow involved after boot, since without such install Windows 11 default disk driver can’t see the BIOS created RAID0. How I can make it available at boot time?
there is a big difference between a „Software RAID“ (which is never bootable) and a real Intel RAID Array
Both seems to be “software RAID” as opposed to using a raiser card with RAID chipset, but I do see big difference speed wise btw Intel RST RAID0 and Windows Software RAID0, so I reverted back to the RST RAID0. Windows Software RAID must also be deleted before its disks can be used independently. AI says one can create a system drive with it “in some cases”, though an independent OS drive is recommended.
move our discussion into a separate thread
This is your forum, so please do as you see fit, and let me know the new link.
I did find the “best matching driver” in this thread in practical terms since other old RST driver releases wouldn’t allow to see via Disk Subsystem the BIOS RAID0 upon boot. Didn’t try newer RST drivers yet, may be they’d allow to boot Windows 11 in BIOS RAID mode?
My system works well with RST RAID0 except I can’t eject it or any other drive hocked directly to Mobo SATA port, or put OS to sleep or hibernation for some reason? I have a Front Panel power switcher for drives and are used to eject the unused ones.
SSD 360GB has drive C: and MBR. Its a non-RAID drive hocked to a PCIe-to-SATA 3.2 bridge raiser card inserted into PCIe 2.0 Mobo slot for faster response compare to the SATA II Intel Mobo controller.
Drive Hardware ID: SCSI\DiskSSD________________360GBFW20
According to HDSentinel, this SSD is managed (via PCIe) by Asmedia 106x SATA Controller (AHCI) [VEN: 1B21, DEV: 0612] Version: 3.3.5.0, 6-24-2020
ASMedia also has 2 SATA 2 ports on the Mobo, but its slow compare to ICH10R, and no drives are connected to these Mobo ports at the moment
When I set Intel Controller to RAID in the modded BIOS RAID OROM, Windows 11 is stack at boot with its blue logo, probably because the system is trying to attach the old installed RST RAID driver to the system disk and it fails to boot.
@zamar15
As you can see here, I have moved our discussion into a separate thread. If you want to change the title, you can do it at any time by editing your initial post.
Please continue your efforts trying to solve the RAID0 problem while running Win11. Example:
Test the mod+signed generic Intel RST driver v11.2.0.1006, which I am offering >here<. Maybe you will succeed, if you do the following:
Force the replacing of the currently running Intel AHCI driver by the mod+signed RAID driver (don’t forget to import the Certificate and to reboot before starting).
During the following reboot press the “Insert” or F2 button, enter the BIOS and change the Intel SATA mode to “RAID”.
Since your RAID0 Array contains neither your system drive nor the boot sector, you should be able to boot into your OS at any time. Nevertheless I recommend to store somewhere outside your current configuration a backup of your current drive C and the boot sector.
As you can see >here<, you are not the first user of an old Intel X58 RAID system, who ran into problems with a modern Windows OS.
I tried various RST driver versions, including attempts to “update” the driver via iaStorAC.inf from Device Manager, but OS refuses to install it that way. Installing it directly from the .inf file completes fine, but it refuses to attach to the created RST RAID0 no matter what I try.
The RST RAID0 created in the modded BIOS works fine with Windows default disk.sys, and I suspect minor glitches like missing Eject disk options won’t be fixed anyway even if RST(e) RAID driver is attached.
So, I’m almost done experimenting, learning a lot in the process and even “discovering” the new for many folks Windows 11 Spaces feature. I still wonder why it wasn’t possible to fully put the PC hardware to sleep or hibernation with RAID0 array mounted?
Really? The Device Management gives a warning, that the driver is not compatible, but it will install the “wrong” driver, if you use the “Let me pick…” option, press the “Have Disk” button, navigate to the iaStorAC.inf file, ignore the upcoming warning and insist in demanding the driver update.
The only problem is, that the OS will give a BSOD, unless the BIOS has been entered and the SATA mode set to “RAID” instantly (before the reboot has been completed).
I’ll try your suggestion later. It looks like my old PC Power Supply started playing games with me suddenly giving not enough voltage to start the BIOS. I replaced CMOS battery to no avail. Probably was playing way too much with the PC while rearranging its many drives to SATA ports and power supply cords. Removed all extra PCI cards, still the same issue.
