Question on the SATA controllers -regular vs Asmedia

[StarFyre]

Hey,

WOndering; want to add more HDs but i'm running out of the SATA ports.

What's strange to me, how the ASmedia SATA ports are listed on their own. IT says no atapi devices (so not my bluray drive), but other than that, is there something special about them?

I'm planning to get 1 or 2 Caviar Green 3 TB drives, and since my other ports are taken up; don't have much choice but to try and use these ASmedia 6 GB ports instead.

Do i have to install any special drivers for them or should they work right out of the box? IT says when using NCQ need to set the bios. I'll check the bios setting (not sure what NCQ is) and see what it shows. WOndering if anything else special about these ports.


regards,

Sanjay

[HiVizMan]

Asmedia are separately controlled that is why they are listed apart. They should work straight out of the box, I tend to use them only for my DVD or Bluray drives and additional storage devices.

Enjoy

[StarFyre]

yay! that should be simple. so may get a new HD tonight. if so, system is running fine (SSD as AHCI), a bluray drive, and 3 regular HDs (from before the upgrade, which i plugged in after win 7 was running fine on the SSD). So this new drive, those extra Asmedia ports; would i set them to AHCI for regular HDs as well in the bios since it's a brand new drive? or keep it as IDE. (don't want to impact the existing regular HDs)

Online, says AHCI supports some other features but not sure how relevant they are for regular HDs. SOme sites i read said it's not a big deal for regular users...

Sanjay

[Dami]

When you can choose, you should always go for AHCI. They are even relevant for your storage HDDs. Some features are only available in the AHCI modus.

There will be no problem when you switch them to AHCI since it is not the system storage. So switch it, Windows will install them and you be glad.

[StarFyre]

i just don't want to lose data on the older storage drives; hence i'll set it for the new drive on the ASmedia port but not fiddle with any of the othe rones (the SSD as primary and game drive already is AHCI)

SAnjay

[AllGamer]

i'm using all of the 8 internal SATA ports

they work fine

if you really run out completely and still want to run more drives, you can always plug them outside with e-sata ports

6 of the internal ones are controlled by the intel chipset
while 2 are from the asmedia

the remaining 4 from asmedia has been re-assigned to the external e-sata ports

[StarFyre]

Ah just read another thread that says switching from IDE to AHCI won't make you lose data; if so, no fear for me 🙂

SAnjay

[AllGamer]

StarFyre wrote:
Ah just read another thread that says switching from IDE to AHCI won't make you lose data; if so, no fear for me 🙂

SAnjay

LOL 😄

i was just having that discussion the last couple of days here http://www.overclock.net/forum/newestpost/675604

[StarFyre]

hehe

my wife would kill me (well, i'd have to leave the country before she got home tonight) if i tried changing a setting for a specific drive, but it caused all the other IDE drives from before my SSD upgrade, to get deleted 🙂

I read somewhere that shouldn't change AHCI for drives that already have data on it in IDE mode so got scared 🙂

Sanjay

[Mik3yD]

Hello,

I just got a RIVE and I am trying to install Windows 7 Ultimate X64.

When I have my OCZ Vertex 3 connected to the Intel controller, I get a BSOD during windows install.

I swapped the SATA cable to the Asmedia controller, and Windows installs just fine.

Any idea what is going on here?

Thanks.