Help to decipher/reset BIOS settings on a GA-H57M-USB3

[Wolters]

I have just bought an "almost new" computer which before was used to showcase some RAID-card. I have put in three new hard disks (Seagate Baracuda ES2.0) and a fresh new Windows 7, 64-bit, OS. The motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-H57M-USB3 (rev. 1.0) motherboard. I have also installed Acronis True Image and it was when I tried to load Acronis  trying to load the Acronis Startup Recovery Manager, which loads prior to OS, just to see if it was working properly, Acronis said that it could not find any hard disks!!! And it was then that I suspected that the settings in BIOS have not been reset after the previous use of the computer (with RAID card). I turned to the Gigabyte manual, but it is written with an implicit knowledge/jargon level which I do not currently hold ;-)

Among other things, I have found in the manual two items that might help me reset the values in BIOS to factory settings, but I am not sure which one to use, AND if there are other settings which I might change!!!

One heading is "Load Fail-Safe Defaults" and the other is "Load Optimized Defaults"

So if anyone out there who can speak and translate BIOS-language, I would be most grateful!!!

[absic]

Hi,
if you just want to return the BIOS to its basic settings then you need to load Optimized Defaults.

If you still have trouble then you can re-set BIOS to factory defaults by clearing CMOS. Dark Mantis has posted how to do this in the FAQ section here: http://forum.giga-byte.co.uk/index.php/topic,2286.0.html

hope this helps

[Wolters]

Thanks, absic115!

I pressed Enter in the BIOS menu when having highlighted the "Load Optimized Defaults" but nothing seemed to happen, but when I rebooted I noticed that, for example, the setting "Delay For HDD (secs) had changed from 15 (which was the value I "inherited") to 0, so I guess it must have been reset!

However, Under Integrated Peripheals, I notice that the value after PCH SATA Control Mode is set to [IDE], and I thought that I had SATA drives?

[Dark Mantis]

After making the changes in the BIOS you must SAVE and exit(F10)
The SATA drives come up as IDE because there are differnt modes of operation for them, IDE and AHCI.
It all appears to have gone ok.

[absic]

As Dark Mantis says the SATA settings returns to Native IDE mode by default. If you want to enable AHCI mode you will need to set this in BIOS before you install your OS. To be honest, unless you are planning to use hot-swap for your hard-drives it is better t oleave it in IDE mode as there is very little performance gain by switching to AHCI.

Hope this helps

[Wolters]

Thanks a lot absic115!!! That did the trick!

[absic]

Pleased to have been able to help! 

Happy computing and you know where we are if you run into any other problems.

[Wolters]

Well now something else occurred!!! After having reset the BIOS SETTINGS using the "Load Optimized Defults", I decided to re-install windows 7 again to be on the safe side.

The computer now boots up fine, but when it tries to install the OS from a bootable USB-stick it ONLY finds two of the three harddrives!!! (Seagate Baracuda ES2.0-drives, all three equal in size). When I then rebooted and looked under Standard CMOS features I see that the first hard drive is listed after "IDE Channel 0 Master, the second drive is listed as "IDE Channel 0 slave" and the third as "IDE Channel 1 Master". Is this really correct?

[absic]

Yes, the way that the Hard-drives are identified in BIOS can be really confusing as they tend to be identified in the style of IDE with Master/Slave which isn't really correct as, being SATA they are all master drives.

When installing the OS in a new build I have always found it easier to just have the main HDD installed in the system. Load the OS then add the other HDD's after the OS is installed, updated and running properly.

[Wolters]

Thanks once more!

I have pulled out the SATA-cables for two of the three drives and will install the OS on the first and then go back and attach the two later.

I am planning to partition the C:-drive and make a "System-partition" on which I will install OS and programmes, and then add two more partions on the C:-drive for different documents and then add the two drives where I will keep all the important files. Should I create the "System"-partition during the OS installation process or do this later?

[absic]

Should I create the "System"-partition during the OS installation process or do this later?

To my mind, it is always best to do this first and with Windows 7 it's really easy to do as you just say what size partition you want during install.

[Wolters]

Sorry to bother you again, but this is becoming really annoying! I disconnected the SATA-cables of two of the drives and booted from the USB-stick, and then the set up programme identifies the "Disc 0" and I clicked "New" and allocated 60 GB of disk space but when pressing the "Next-button" I just says that "Setup was unable to create a new system partition or liocate an existing system partition. See the Setup log files for more information"

[Wolters]

Well, after having tried a couple of times again, the set up programme finally created the "reserved" space for system files and I could go on with the installation!!!

[oggmonster]

You may want to possibly run a HDD diagnostics, just to make sure your HDD is running okay.