Hi Fernando.
Thanks for the great site. So useful, and I wish I’d read it before trying to upgrade my drivers. It was a disaster and I hope you can help. I have an ICH10R on a Gigabyte GA-X58A-UD7, with three drives in a RAID5, plus two extra drives. My boot drive is on a different controller, thankfully. All was fine when I installed on Windows 7. I upgraded to Win10 last year, and after upgrading the BIOS Windows could see the RAID volume, but could never get the Intel RST console working (“unknown software error” on launch), so couldn’t check the health. A couple of days ago (a little drunk and reckless) I decided to upgrade (from 14.6.1029 I think) to the latest version 15.7.0.1014). On reboot, Windows could not see anything connected to the ICH10R - not the RAID or even the two independent drives. After playing around a little more, including trying to rollback, Windows would not boot. (No messages, just endless Windows loading spinners.) After hours of waiting and system checks I got into safemode, disabled the Controller completely in Device Manager. I can now reboot fine, and taken a Restore Point, but still have no access to the drives. I’ve uninstalled the IRST console for now.
Not sure what to do next. I really need the files from that RAID… They appear fine in the Ctrl+I Matrix tool in the BIOS, with the RAID listed as status Normal, which gives me hope.
Could you be fantastic and give me some advice? I know you’ve given all the info I need, but I really don’t want to screw things up again… Should I uninstall in Device Manager and reboot? Can that effect the BIOS-level functionality at all? Which driver is best/safest to get access? (I don’t care about performance at this point - I’ll probably get rid of the RAID once I’ve got the data.) Does a System Restore on the system drive properly restore the last state? If I can’t fix it in Windows, is there any other way that could retrieve the files on the RAID and copy them to another drive?
Thank you so much in advance. A donation will be coming your way!
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Thanks Ferrous. I see that now - I went too high. So which is best for me? I can’t work it out and don’t want to make another mistake.
@loxlie :
Welcome at Win-RAID Forum!
Yes, it was a big mistake to install the latest Intel RAID drivers of the RST(e) v15 platform onto your Intel ICH10R RAID Controller.
The latest Intel RST(e) drivers, which natively fully support your system, are the v11.7.4.1001 ones. Since your on-board Intel RAID Controller is running in RAID mode (having the universal external DeviceID DEV_2822), you will be able to use even Intel RAID drivers, which belong to the v13 platform, but the newer platforms v14 and v15 do not work properly with your old Intel ICH10R RAID Controller.
The by far best choice for your hardware configuration would be the Intel RAID driver v11.2.0.1006, but it is not easy to get this old “classical” RST driver (without additional SCSI Filter driver) installed onto Windows 10 and any “downgrade” from your currently installed Intel RAID driver to any driver up to v11.2.0.1006 will end with a BSOD while rebooting.
My advice: Install either the Intel RST(e) RAID driver v11.7.4.1001 WHQL or the v13.2.8.1002 WHQL. By choosing the latter driver you can prevent, that Windows Update will ever overwrite the in-use driver (the in-box Intel RAID driver v13.2.0.1022 is older and has a lower version). You can manually “downgrade” your currently installed Intel RAID driver to any of the named driver versions, but you will have to force the installation by choosing the “Have Disk” button, navigating to the wanted driver and pointing to the file named iaStorAC.inf. Before you start this driver “downgrade”, you should make sure by running the Control Panel > “Add/remove Software”, that no Software named “Intel Rapid Storage Technology” is installed. Once the Intel RAID driver has been successfully “downgraded”, you can run the installer of the related Intel RST(e) Driver & Software Set. This way you will get access to the Intel RST RAID Console and monitor your RAID5 array.
Furthermore I recommend to check the version of the Intel RAID ROM, which is within your mainboard BIOS. You can see it by temporarily enabling the on-board RAID Controller within the BIOS and hitting CTRL+I while booting. If possible, you should get an Intel RAID ROM version into your BIOS, which belongs to the same development branch as the Intel RAID driver you are going to install.
Good luck!
Dieter (alias Fernando)
Thanks Dieter! A beautifully comprehensive message.
I’d already taken action 
1. in Device Manager I uninstalled the SATA controller (which I’d disabled before). 2. Waited a scary half-hour for Windows to reboot. 3. Installed 12.9.4.1000 WHQL as recommended by Ferrous. (I used the Have Disk method to force it.) 4. Reboot - much quicker this time and… it worked! All drives accessible. Now listed as “Intel(R) Desktop/Workstation/Server Express Chipset SATA RAID Controller” with the single driver file iaStorA.
Then I was reading the readme of the IRST installer (same version - 12.9.4.1000 WHQL). (The console is definitely not installed currently.) It says it’s compatible with 5,6,7,8,X79 chipsets, which are later than mine, so checked back here and then saw your message.
So I’ll be leaving things as they are for a few days, and making a full backup. Happy to try upgrading to v13.2 later, but why is v11.2 “by far” the best choice? If it’s a slight performance improvement I’m ok with missing out - I’ve 8 discs in total and use SSDs when I need speed - the RAID is for stability. (I just want stability!! It’s why I went for RAID in the first place! The irony…)
On the OROM - I’ll look into it. I included a photo in my original post - my ROM is back at v8.9.1002. Is there a good guide to updating?
Thanks again.
No, as you can see >here< it is an outstanding performance improvement for older Intel Chipset RAID systems like yours and the driver is working absolutely stable.
This is a RAID module, which belongs to the outdated “Matrix Storage Manager” platform. It should be updated to an Intel RAID ROM, which belongs to the “Rapid Storage Technology” and - if possible - matches the RAID driver version you want to use.
It depends on the BIOS architecture. If it is an AMI BIOS, you should look >here<, if it is an Award/Phoenix BIOS, you can find the related guide >here<.
Hi Loxlie… you have an older X58A board like me and for a lot of Gigabyte MB’s there is a Page on Tweaktown with Modified Bios’s with updated Roms already done for for us, it’s how I got mine upto 11.6 on my X58a_UD3R,… scroll down to about the 4th Post for the X58A boards, just make sure you get the correct revision for your Board.
https://forums.tweaktown.com/gigabyte/48…ified-bios.html
Edit …I forgot to mention you may need to use the windows based @Bios Utility to do the Modified Bios , at least with mine it was the only way to go from a 1mb Bios file to a 2mb Bios file, once it is done once you can then use the Bios Ez-Flash method. I ran into this recently , a power surge corrupted the Bios an after many attempted reboots the Bios finally used the onboard Dual-Bios to repair itself , BUT the Dual bios was an original 1mb Bios so I had to use atbios to upgrade to the newer 2mb file. Apparently there is no way to update the Dual-bios to a newer version , though it maybe possible with a programming clip ? as it is write protected.
KB
EDIT by Fernando: Unneeded parts of the quoted post and blank lines removed (to save space)
Thanks Ferrous
Had I realised at the time what the issue was I may have tried using the Dual Bios myself, the computer would not even boot to the bios after the power surge , so I kept turning it off …that was wrong thing to do , eventually I just left it running to see what would happen as I thought the MB was dead by then but about 20 mins later I heard the familiar post beep and rushed back into the room to see a message about Dual Boot doing it’s thing…It was good to see the MB was not dead but I was unable to access my RAID Disks due to the old 1mb Bios being using to replace the 2mb modded version.
I ended up using a Win10 WinPe Boot Disk (Kyhi Disk) to run @bios as I needed Windows for that. I couldn’t boot to Windows due to the old bios being installed by Dual-Bios, and it not allowing access to my Raid 0 arrays
@Ferrous :
@loxlie :
@Kbird :
As already announced, I have moved your discussion into the “BIOS Modding” Sub-Forum and gave it a hopefully meaningful title.
If you should disagree or have a better idea, please let me know it.
I am using 11.7.4.1001 on my X58A-UD3R system but 12.9.4.1000 is stable too, but since I have an 11.6 series OROM in the Bios, I decided to use the 11.x Driver too.
I am using 12.9.4.1000 on my X99 system too actually as any driver above 13.x.x.x. makes my Raid 0 arrays look like SSD’s when in fact they are WD Black HD’s.
Win10 did not like the 13.x series Drivers provided for the ICH10R when I upgraded to Win10 and since 11.7.4.1001 works in Win 10 I have not changed it again and turned off Driver Updates, so it isn’t updated automatically to avoid corruption issues again, using a reg file from Ten Forums
https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/1598…ndows-10-a.html
or
https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/4827…ndows-10-a.html