Motherboard cannot detect SATA drives

[TCMGO]

I am trying to rebuild an older computer with an Abit NF7-S motherboard. All the hard drives were removed, except the cd and dvd drives, which the motherboard detects and are functional. My problem is that the MB cannot detect SATA drives, only IDE drives. It does have two onboard SATA plug-ins. I have used SATA drives in the past on it with no problems, but that was through a Promise Raid card, which eventually died and caused irreparable damage to the MBR of the hard drive with the OS (Windows XP). This is why I am starting over. I have never used the onboard SATA plug-ins. I read the MB manual, but it says very little about SATA, except that it is set up for two SATA drives which includes a onboard SATA controller, which I made sure was enabled in the bios settings. I have searched the web for several hours and found no solutions. I am hoping that perhaps somebody on this forum uses or is familiar with the NF7-S and can help me figure out the problem.

Thank you

TCMGO

 

[Mark56]

You need to install the SATA/RAID drivers for the motherboard. Windows XP does not have support for SATA so you would need to reinstall XP and use a floppy disc to install the drivers during the installation. This is done early in the install process when a message appears at the bottom of the screen asking you to hit F6 to install additional drivers.

This guide will show how to integrate the SATA drivers with XP if you do not have a floppy drive

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Install-Windows-XP-On-SATA-Without-a-Floppy-F6-47807.shtml

 

[Lokalaskurar]

If you're running RAID, go with Mark65's suggestion.

From what I can recall, some versions of Abit-motherboards have limited "southbridge-partitioning", meaning that you can only use the SATA-ports if you're not using any IDE-ports. Keep in mind that "SBP-theft" is also common among memory-banks, thus some types of RAM will not work with Abit-motherboards, even though everything seems just fine on paper.

My advice, provided that you don't want to run some kind of onboard (or external) RAID: try to boot up the machine without the IDE-ribbon even plugged-in, use only devices on the SATA-ports.

Are the drives detected now - or are they not?

 

[kiencon]

sata controller is dead

 

[Trillionsin]

In the bios there should be an option that you change from sata to ide. Or try Mark56's suggestion.