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Other questions related to GIGABYTE => RMA and service => Topic started by: runn3R on February 03, 2011, 10:33:01 pm

Title: 6 Series (Sandy Bridge) Motherboards SATA Check utility
Post by: runn3R on February 03, 2011, 10:33:01 pm
GIGABYTE releases 6 Series SATA Check utility to help optimize performance of P67 & H67 mobos
 
The news of the SATA 2.0 issues with Intel 6 series chipsets has sparked a lot of uncertainty about how this will affect those of us who upgraded to the new Sandy Bridge architecture. Essentially, if you’re using 1 or 2 SATA devices then this chipset issue need not affect you at all because you can connect your devices to the 2 white SATA 3.0 ports. However, if you’re using 3 or more SATA devices, you may want to prioritize your more important devices on the white SATA 3.0 ports (e.g. hard drive with your operating system on it) and the less important devices on the Intel PCH SATA 2.0 ports (e.g. a DVD ROM).

To help our customers optimize SATA performance on their 6 series mobos, GIGABYTE has created an easy to use utility called the GIGABYTE 6 Series SATA Check (http://download.gigabyte.eu/FileList/Utility/mb_utility_6_series_sata_check.exe.ZIP) that tells you if the SATA ports that you are using are in fact the affected Intel PCH SATA 2.0 ports. It also recommends that you change your SATA devices to the white SATA 3.0 ports. The utility is a simple program that will work on any 6 series chipset based mobo, and has 3 possible scenarios that offer different advice for users to configure their SATA devices. Please copy this utility to P67/H67 system’s Windows desktop and unzip, double click the “67sfck.exe” file.

The 1st scenario is where there are no devices connected to the affected Intel PCH SATA 2.0 ports, and the utility will let you know that your “SATA configuration (is) OK”.
(http://forum.giga-byte.co.uk/upload/files/2011-02%20sata%20ok.jpg)

The 2nd scenario is where your devices are all connected to the affected Intel PCH SATA 2.0 ports, and the utility will advise you to “Please move 1 or 2 devices from (the) Intel PCH SATA 2.0 ports to the free SATA 3.0 ports".
(http://forum.giga-byte.co.uk/upload/files/2011-02%20sata%20move.jpg)
 
The 3rd scenario is where you have devices connected to the affected Intel PCH SATA 2.0 ports and the SATA 3.0 ports are also populated. Here the utility will advice you that “Use of (the) Intel PCH SATA 2.0 ports is not recommended”.
(http://forum.giga-byte.co.uk/upload/files/2011-02%20sata%20not%20ok.jpg)
 
The GIGABYTE 6 Series SATA Check utility is already available from the GIGABYTE website (http://download.gigabyte.eu/FileList/Utility/mb_utility_6_series_sata_check.exe.ZIP).

You can also contact us for any questions about GIGABYTE motherboards based on 6 series (P67/H67/P65/PH67/B65) chipsets which have this issue (based on B2 stepping) under this special email address (SandyBridgeB2@giga-byte.co.uk) (for UK & IRL residents only). Users from different countries are free to contact us through GGTS (http://ggts.gigabyte.com).
Title: Re: 6 Series Motherboards SATA Check utility
Post by: Dark Mantis on February 03, 2011, 10:49:07 pm
Thanks runn3R.

That should make life a little safer and easier for owners especially ones that didn't build the systems themselves and maybe don't know what ports their drives are on.
Title: Re: 6 Series Motherboards SATA Check utility
Post by: runn3R on February 03, 2011, 10:58:43 pm
Definitely.

P.S. We have also announced useful matrix of SATA ports (http://forum.giga-byte.co.uk/index.php/topic,4383.msg34345.html#msg34345) and Q&A regarding Intel 6 series chipsets issue (http://forum.giga-byte.co.uk/index.php/topic,4432.msg34771.html#msg34771).
Title: 6 Series (Sandy Bridge) Motherboards SATA Check utility
Post by: runn3R on February 04, 2011, 08:02:26 pm
9 Feb: added special email address
Title: 6 Series (Sandy Bridge) Motherboards SATA Check utility
Post by: runn3R on February 28, 2011, 01:27:15 pm
New version of utility checks and shows versions of the stepping (B2 or B3), the link for download is the same.