Long complicated issue with nForce2, SIL3112, EPOX, and freezing

Alright, get ready for long, complicated issue that few have solved.

THE SPECS:
EPOX 8RDA3+ motherboard
AMD Athlon 3200+ Barton CPU
Corsair TWINX1024-3200C2PT matched XMS RAM(400fsb, dual channel)
Seagate ST3120827AS SATA 120GB w/ NCQ 7200rpm HDD
XP Pro SP2

Also very important details to this problem:
Motherboard uses nForce2 chipset
SATA Raid adapter is SIL3112r (though on POST screens is says 3112A)


THE PROBLEM:
This problem shows itself by freeze behavior and error log entries.

The freezing is just that, it will seem fine, then boom, it freezes solid and you can't do

jack for a good 40 seconds. Then it unfreezes and comes to life and acts like nothing ever

happened. This appears to be the only problem I know about. That is, maybe it causes other

problems too? But the freezing is the main end result. And this freezes all activity, not just

HDD operations. In other words, if I have an MP3 playing, it freezes silent too. Then starts

playing again where it left off when it comes back.

Also, during the "freeze", keyboard strokes and possibly mouse movements, are still cached. So

when it comes back, letters I was typing will appear, and the cursor will jump around.

Lastly, it is extremely random. Sometimes it will freeze many times in a hour. Sometimes it

will run good for days. I could be playing a game, or just reading a text file and not doing

anything HDD intense. Nothing except the freeze period are timely. I would venture to say that

the freeze time is dang near exactly the same each time. But absolutely random to get there.

Promptly after a freeze an error log entry is created:
Type: ERROR
Source: si3112r
ID: 9
"The device, \Device\scsi\si3112r1, did not respond within the timeout period"

Naturally I've researched this error ID, this error message, and have tried many different

drivers. To no avail. This problem, across different HDDs, and different mobos, creates the

same error log and has the same behavior. Meaning the problem is not just one model

motherboard or HDD. But the Silicon Image chip is the common ground. So people have seen this

same freeze behavior and error log on ASUS, Gigabyte, EPOX, and other motherboards. And on

SATA drives like Seagate and Maxtor, IBM, and I believe one or two have had WDs.

There are two other error log entries that happen occasionally, relating to this problem:
Type: WARNING
Source: disk
ID: 51
"An error was detected on device \Device\Harddisk0\D during a paging operation"

And:
Type: WARNING
Source: disk
ID: 11
"The driver detected a controller error on \Device\Hardisk0\D"

[note these may say "hardisk0" or "harddisk0" with two Ds or not, I've written them down both

ways]

The last warning, ID 11, has only happened once, though this problem has been going on for

weeks. However, because other people online with my problem have had this error regularly,

I've included it here.

Now then, the first obvious thing is, is my drivers and BIOS up to date? Well they are. I have

the latest BIOS from EPOX, and the latest nForce chipset drivers. As well as the latest hard

drive driver, and SIL driver. The SIL driver is from EPOX, not nForce or Silicon Image.

Silicon Image doesn't seem to have any records or files for this chipset anywhere on the site

when I tried searching it.
The SIL driver is even driver signed by MS.
Yet with all the updated stuff, the problem remains.

Now for a list of various things I've done:

-updated drivers and BIOS - duh! BIOS is ver 6.00PG (newest). HDD firmware seems to be version

3.42. SIL driver says version 1.0.0.51 and dated 8/27/04.

-Done all updates and patches for MS

-System is pretty fresh load of XP Pro

-Checked for viruses and spyware and all that jazz

-Changed/removed page file (in reference to error on "paging operation")

-Changed various BIOS settings relating to HDD (not many)

-Changed memory timings to what Corsair says they are on the site (2.5-3-3-6) down from

(3-3-3-8)

-Ran Seatools, all checks on all hardware that it could, no problems

-Changed SATA cable

-System is running cool, temps are fine. PS is fine, 550watts clean.

-Windows actually had a 2nd driver in the section for SCSI/RAID adapters. The SIL one is

called "Silicon Image SiL 3112 SATARaid Controller". The 2nd was called "GXC108P SCSI

Controller" which had a "generic" driver, until I updated it. It then loaded an MS driver and

renamed it just "SCSI and RAID controllers". But then, after taking it apart and changing the

cable. This driver disappeared entirely and now only the SIL shows up.
All through this changing the problem continued.

-Researched like mad. Seems to be mostly, if not ONLY, with SATA HDDs on nForce2 chipsets with

a SIL3112 chip.

-Removed all CD-ROM emulator apps, well, GamesXCopy and Daemon tools.

-I've done lots of small tweaks here and there that I can't think of now.

*******************

Now after saying all that, I have some questions:

- What is the cause of the freeze? Obvious answer is "bad HDD" or "bad mobo". However, I think

it's more of an incompatibility of some kind. What's your thoughts?

- What exactly is this "paging operation" mean?

- What exactly is the "timeout period" that my SIL is "not responding" within? Because this

- What is the significance of all the different names for the SIL? Cause I've seen "SIL3112r", "SIL3112A", "si3112r1" and "si3112r"? And maybe more combos.

"timeout" is undoubtedly the same exact time my system is frozen. A timeout period of about 40

seconds. Note that other people with this problem have had different times. Some more like 20

or 30 seconds. Some for minutes at a time. Some would be multiple freezes over and over

rapidly.

- What is the significance of "\Device\hardisk0\D"? I find it interesting that it uses "D".

Hard drive "0" makes sense, by why D? I only have the ONE HDD in the case on SATA. And one IDE

burner that is all but new.

- Who's fault could this be? If the HDD doesn't like the mobo, do I blame Seagate or EPOX or

Nvidia? If the HDD is not compatible with the SIL, do I blame Seagate or Silicon Image? If

nForce2 and Sil don't like each other, do I blame Silicon Image or Nvidia? Or blame EPOX for

putting the two together?

- If I were to try to get "something" replaced, what would I try first? I don't think

replacing the HDD is my first choice. Because I love the drive, it's wicked fast. Just not

when it freezes up entirely
I'd rather not replace the mobo. It just seems drastic. But do you think a motherboard

manufacturer would just give you a new board because you think it's incompatible? No I think

they'd just tell me to get a new HDD.

- Does is seem to you, after reading this, that a BIOS upgrade of the SIL would be the fix? If

so, how might I go about it? Because SIL doesn't have an update and neither does EPOX. Though

in EPOX' latest BIOS is has this listed: "Update Sil3112A ROM version to V4247(For 8RDA3+)".
Here you can see the reference to "SIL3112A" instead of "SIL3112r" as Windows lists it. Still

not sure what that means.

- What would your next step be? If EPOX put out an update to SIL3112A firmware, would that

require a new driver for Windows to match the new firmware? Or would those be independent of

each other?

- Most people online either gave up or replaced the whole motherboard. I'm sure if I got a new

mobo with a diff SATA chip I may not have any problems at all. But that doesn't mean my mobo

is "bad", so that leads back to the question, who is to blame?

******************

I would have posted this problem on EPOX forum, if, if they had a forum. They don't seem to

have a forum, or a support area, or support E-mail. Or anything really. So I would have to go

forward simply by E-mailing them or calling I guess.

The strange part about this is that it hasn't happened the whole time I've had the box

together. I was on a 40gb Maxtor IDE with this EPOX for months before upgrading, no problems.

After upgrading, I had the Maxtor and the Seagate on at the same time. This seemed to cause

many problems, and this problem started soon after trying to use both drives. And the problem

has remained. I'd say the system worked fine for many days, only until I was doing

backup/restores to/from the Maxtor, using the drives together, that the freezing began. And

not just freezing then, but whole crashes and a few BSODS. Until I disconnected the Maxtor.

When all errors stopped except this freezing.

Where many forums have failed, I hope this one will pull through. Or at least, maybe someone

has a suggestion or two I haven't thought of. I consider replacing the board, or even doing a

reload, a drastic option and want to avoid that. If I wanted to do that, I wouldn't have

posted here first. I'm hoping there may be some possible way to actually find out for SURE,

which part could be the cause of this, and why. Using some kind or tool, or test, or system

monitor, or some other device that can point a finger at the culprit.

In the mean time, I think I'm going to send EPOX an E-mail. Or try to call them. Because this

problem happened on many diff mobos, whenever it was EPOX, it was this model, or very similar.

So thank you if you managed to read through this.
And thank you for your suggestions if you have any.

-vigilante

Found this on the web (but pertaining to SIL3114):

1) There are two different drivers for the 3114 chipset; they depend on which option you have enabled in the BIOS. Have you made sure that you're matching the proper driver to your settings? (SataLink & SataRAID)

2) I'm using the raid driver and setting in the bios, but have only 1 drive. Works fine

3) There should be either Three small Green papers included with Your board Labeled ADDENDUM at the top. One is related to booting to a SATA Drive.
In Case you don't have these (Don't know y u wudn't)
To boot to an SATA you have to use the SATA RAID Driver (Not just the plain SATA Driver), and set SATA, to "SATA RAID" in the GENIE BIOS submenu in BIOS.
If you set it to just SATA, you will get BSOD'd when attempting to load Windows.
I know this because the same thing happened to me.
The default setting for the SATA in the GENIE BIOS is just "SATA" so if u Clear CMOS, you will have to change this back to "SATA RAID".

Click to expand...

From what I also picked up on the web, the NForce4 Standalone Driver package could also work on the NForce2 (at least the IDE-drivers do).

Someone else said to use the WHQL certified SIL drivers from the MS website

Do a Google with epox sil drivers problem

I've gotten away from Epox motherboards . . .

Even since Epox started using nforce chipsets, all hell has broken loose with their MB (at least the Athlon MBs that I've used).
This may seem simplistic, but since I switched to Asus mb's and Seagate SATA drives, all of the problems you (and I) seem to be experiencing have disappeared.
Currently, I'm working with Asus A7N8X and A7N8X-E Deluxe mb's with Seagate SATA HD's and have no problems except for this: You MUST set BIOS to failsafe settings before installing OS (except, of course, for booting into the SATA drive(s).
I don't know what's going on over at Epox; I used to use their products exclusively until I began running into problems too numerous to mention.
Asus and Seagate seem to be the "failsafe" combo at this point in time.
Don't ask me to explain this phenomenon.
It just seems to be the case.