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Questions about GIGABYTE products => Motherboards with Intel processors => Topic started by: IsLNdbOi on March 26, 2011, 08:02:33 pm

Title: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: IsLNdbOi on March 26, 2011, 08:02:33 pm
I've been having problems getting my 600GB VelociRaptor working.  Whenever I would try wiping it with Killdisk I'd get continuous lbacache flush errors.  With DBAN, it would immediately terminate with non-fatal errors.  Windows would freeze and never finish starting up when the VelociRaptor was connected.

Went through three 600GB VelociRaptors thinking they were all defective.  On the fourth one, I tried plugging it into one of the SATA-II ports and it worked just fine.  The previous three were all connected to either of the SATA-III ports.

Is there a BIOS update coming to fix this?

I've already emailed Gigabyte support regarding this issue.
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Dark Mantis on March 26, 2011, 08:31:24 pm
Hi

I haven't heard of this problem before. My Western Digital Black SATA3 drives work fine on the SATA3 ports. I have tried them in RAID0 and singly with no issues at all.

What access mode is it set to and what mode is the controller set to ?

Have you enabled SMART reporting ?
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Lsdmeasap on March 27, 2011, 07:58:56 pm
Do they work fine otherwise?   I mean have you only tried using the 6Gb/s ports to wipe the drives, or have you also tried using them on those ports without success?

It's normal for wipe programs to not work properly unless they are on the SATA 3Gb/s ports, some even need to be in IDE mode to function properly (HDDErase)
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: IsLNdbOi on March 28, 2011, 03:40:49 am
I've tried setting the ports to AHCI and IDE mode then I've tried changing legacy and native IDE mode in both AHCI and IDE modes.  The problem happens all the time no matter what the SATA ports are set to in the BIOS.

During POST (or right after it, I see this regarding SMART):
http://img860.imageshack.us/img860/7810/smartfail.jpg

For those who can't see the picture, it's the part after POST that shows the Serial ATA AHCI BIOS version and lists what's connected to the controller.

The listing for the 600GB VelociRaptor says:
Port-01: Hard Disk, WDC WD600HLHX-01JJPV0
SMART command failed

The drives work fine otherwise in other computers and on the SATA-II ports on this GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3.  The first two 600GB VelociRaptors were rendered unusable though after some time when I was testing to see if any of my wiping programs would work on them (before I found what was causing the problems - not working on the SATA-III ports).
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Dark Mantis on March 28, 2011, 08:01:50 am
Your drive is failing the SMART testing for some reason. I am not sure why at the moment as I have set my WD Blacks to SMART checking and they seem to pass fine. You may have a faulty controller and so maybe an RMA is in order.
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: IsLNdbOi on March 28, 2011, 10:05:32 am
Is it still faulty if I don't get the SMART error when the drive is connected to a SATA-II port?  I also have an Intel 160GB G2 SSD connected to a SATA-III port w/o any problems.
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Dark Mantis on March 28, 2011, 12:30:51 pm
Well the SSD wil be faster I am sure but that doesn't mean that there might be some other reason why it is failing SMART. It could be that the two different SATA2 and SATA3 ports are implimenting the SMART in different ways. :-\
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: IsLNdbOi on March 28, 2011, 12:39:39 pm
I don't know what to do at this point.  Everything seems to be working fine now.  As long as I don't use SATA-III / 6gbps drives on the SATA-III ports...
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Dark Mantis on March 28, 2011, 12:45:23 pm
Yes it does seem stupid I must admit. The thing is as I said the SSD would still be faster then the WD Velociraptor as it is a magnetic platter. It is only the interface that is different. My feeling would be to RMA the board even though I can't explain why.  It is a case of when everything else has been checked there is only one solution.

Just one thing springs to mind you are using the SATA3 cables that came with the board aren't you ?
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Lsdmeasap on March 28, 2011, 04:17:07 pm
I tried to look around and see if SMART is working on 6Gb/s ports yet, and I assume it is and things look that way in Google as well, but I did notice many similar issues with your drive during my search.   And many of those ended up being faulty drives, here is one were a user actually posted back after talking to WD, they confirmed bad sectors.

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/15334-63-sata3-drive

This batch info might also be of interest to you
http://forum.ncixus.com/forums/index.php?mode=showthread&msg_id=2227062&threadid=2227062&forum=103&product_id=50895&msgcount=5&overclockid=0#msg2227062

I know you've been through several of these drives, but looking in Google makes me think many of them may be affected from the factory, so you may want to think about another drive model or see if there is any firmware updates that might help
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Dark Mantis on March 28, 2011, 04:54:19 pm
Yes there have been a lot of faulty drives in the past months. As I mentioned before my WD Black SATA3 6GB/s drives work fine on there with SMART enabled.
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: IsLNdbOi on March 28, 2011, 06:39:50 pm
Just one thing springs to mind you are using the SATA3 cables that came with the board aren't you ?

No, I'm using different SATA3 cables.  I don't like having extra cable clutter so I bought cables that are only long enough to reach from each drive to the SATA port it's connected to.

The other SATA3 drive I have is a WD RE4-GP.  I went through three of those drives until I got one that worked, but the problems I had with that drive are different.
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Dark Mantis on March 28, 2011, 06:56:33 pm
Are you sure the cables are SATA3 supportive ?
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: IsLNdbOi on March 28, 2011, 10:19:02 pm
Yes.  This is the cable I'm using for both the Intel 160GB G2 SSD and the 600GB VelociRaptor:
http://www.performance-pcs.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=34_348_831&products_id=28360

My WD RE4-GP is connected via a hard drive dock built into my case that has its own integrated SATA cable.
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Dark Mantis on March 28, 2011, 10:29:08 pm
Those cables certainly seem to meet the requirements.
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Lsdmeasap on March 30, 2011, 07:21:01 pm
SATA 3Gb/s and 6Gb/s cables are the same, unless the 3Gb/s ones are crap they should work fine anyway.
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Dark Mantis on March 30, 2011, 07:39:00 pm
I thought that SATA3 cables had the clip integrated and better shielding ? :-\
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Lsdmeasap on March 30, 2011, 07:50:53 pm
Nope, it's all the same as quality SATA 3Gb/s cables, cheap ones might not work so great though?  Clips were introduced with SATA 3Gb/s


Quote
9: Does SATA 6Gb/s require different connectors and cables to support the higher
transfer speed?

A9: The same cables and connectors used for current SATA 1.5 and SATA 3.0 Gb/s implementations can be used to connect SATA 6Gb/s devices, although SATA-IO recommends quality components be selected to ensure data integrity and robust operation at the faster SATA 6Gb/s transfer rate.  Keeping the existing SATA connector form factor enables SATA 6Gb/s to be designed into the same cost-conscious hardware architectures while minimizing infrastructure changes.  
http://www.serialata.org/documents/SATA-Revision-3.0-FAQ-FINAL.pdf

http://www.serialata.org/technology/6Gbdetails.asp
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Dark Mantis on March 30, 2011, 07:56:40 pm
I bow to you all powerful Intel god! ;)
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Lsdmeasap on March 30, 2011, 08:09:39 pm
Haha, now that's going to far man!

Cheap SATA 3Gb/s cables may cause issues, but I have yet to find any myself.   I've even tested $1.00 ones without any problems, so not sure how cheap you'd have to go to get some bad ones.  ;D
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Dark Mantis on March 30, 2011, 08:20:08 pm
Will you accept demi-god ?
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: IsLNdbOi on March 31, 2011, 07:36:25 am
Still haven't found a solution to this.  I think I'm going to buy a new GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 to see if it has the same problem.
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Lsdmeasap on March 31, 2011, 04:51:18 pm
Will you accept demi-god ?

Haha, ya I suppose that's ok!  Thanks ;D

Still haven't found a solution to this.  I think I'm going to buy a new GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 to see if it has the same problem.

I would look at other drives first instead (As in different brand), I think it's more of a drive issue than board but I could be wrong?
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: IsLNdbOi on April 01, 2011, 12:28:21 pm
Interesting.  The problem seems to be fixed now.

I had another problem with a "phantom" floppy drive controller:
http://forum.giga-byte.co.uk/index.php/topic,4859.0.html

After I installed the beta BIOS, it fixed the floppy drive controller problem AND the SATA-III issues went away too.
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Dark Mantis on April 01, 2011, 02:03:25 pm
Maybe it was something that they fixed in this BIOS update as they knew about the problem.
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: IsLNdbOi on April 01, 2011, 06:43:11 pm
Did they know about the SATA-III issue already?  Other than me emailing them about it, I thought I was the only one having the problem.  I posted about it on multiple tech forums and no one else seemed to respond.
Title: Re: GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 won't work with SATA-III Drives connected to its SATA-III Ports
Post by: Lsdmeasap on April 01, 2011, 07:37:52 pm
They may have been aware by issue reports sent in by other users, or the problem causing the floppy was connected to the SATA issue?

Either was, glad to hear you have resolved this, thanks for the update!