ABit AB9 Mobo - Can I install XP Pro ? can i heck....

Tell us about this "windows boot disk".............all versions of XP sold
retail are bootable.
So we assume you do not have a "retail" version of XP but instead you have a
?????version.
peter
<andrewstanton RemoveThis @gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1186764050.301082.293270@d30g2000prg.googlegroups.com...
>I have a new Abit AB9 pro mobo. I have 1 sata drive installed and an
> ide floppy & ide optical drive as well as a 256mb ait graphics. 4gb
> ram and an E6850 processor.
>
> Now, I can boot up from the ABIT supplied CD to a text menu and create
> my RAID driver disks, however whenever i insert a windows boot disk, i
> have tried xp pro, win2k, w2003 server.... the pc boots up, does all
> bios checks, says - hit any key to boot from CD and then..... Nothing,
> screen goes blank, CD drive spins up and then spins down.... And then
> nothing - it hangs and all i see is a blank screen....
>
> I have tried a different graphics card and had the same result, i have
> tried different ram and the same result, I have tried a different cd
> drive and the same result....
>
> The POST code always shows FF on the display - which translates as
> Boot Attempt.
>
> Any ideas what on earth is going on...?
>
 >> Stay informed about: ABit AB9 Mobo - Can I install XP Pro ? can i heck.... 

LOL - if it was that simple i would not have a problem... LOL

I have set the CD as the first boot device and all of the discs i have
tried are genuine Microsoft discs.

All discs work in my laptop and original second desktop - it is just
in the new pc with the abit board that it does not...

All of the components have been checked and swapped....

i will seek an rma for the motherboard....
 >> Stay informed about: ABit AB9 Mobo - Can I install XP Pro ? can i heck.... 

<andrewstanton.DeleteThis@gmail.com> wrote:
|
| LOL - if it was that simple i would not have a problem... LOL
|
| I have set the CD as the first boot device and all of the discs i
| have tried are genuine Microsoft discs.
|
| All discs work in my laptop and original second desktop - it is
| just in the new pc with the abit board that it does not...
|
| All of the components have been checked and swapped....
|
| i will seek an rma for the motherboard....
|


I don't think it's an RMA you're needing here. Every AB9 Pro board is going
to have the same problem you've encountered.

I'll call your problem a "design challenge".

I was curious, so I downloaded the Abit AB9 series manual from The
Mothership and discover that the SATA8, SATA9 and IDE1 connectors utilize
the JMicron controller.

In looking at section 4.11 of the manual, I read the following:

[quote]
This procedure is necessary if there is access to the devices connected to
connectors "SATA8", "SATA9", and "IDE1" during the OS installation:

1. Prepare a 3.5" floppy disk drive and connect it to "FDC1" connector on
this motherboard.

2. Start install operating system.

3. Insert this driver disk into floppy disk drive when the screen
instruction prompts you to install a third-party SCSI or RAID driver.

4. Press <F6> key, and then follow the screen instruction to complete the
installation.

* This procedure is particularly necessary when you want to install
operating system from a CD-ROM drive connected through connectors "SATA8",
"SATA9", or "IDE1".

[/quote]

Obviously a driver is needed by the Windows Text Setup phase to even
identify that there is an optical drive connected to anything connected to
the JMicron controller.

I'm scratching my head as to how to do this because there's no ability to
press [F6] *prior* to starting the Windows install.

I'm wondering if you could create your JMicron driver diskette when booted
to the Abit CD then exit from the Abit utility program to a DOS prompt (I'm
assuming you're booted to a DOS environment with this CD, obviously).

If you can get out to a DOS prompt you could then swap to your Windows
install CD and run the setup program to start the Windows Text Setup phase
a-running. Press [F6] when prompted and have your JMicron driver diskette
in the drive. You may have to search around on the Windows CD to find the
NTSETUP.EXE program, as I believe you need to be booted to a mini-Windows
environment in order to use the GUI Text Setup version that normally
autoruns.

Alternatively you could browse around on the Abit CD, looking for a
Config.sys and Autoexec.bat file to identify the driver needed for the
JMicron controller (and its associated DOS driver files). Copy all this
stuff to a DOS boot diskette and follow my above instructions to run
NTSETUP.EXE on your Windows CD when booted to this diskette.

As a fallback, pay a visit to Abit's peer-to-peer support forum at
http://forum.uabit.com for help.

Hopefully I've helped here. It's been a bit of a head-scratcher as I
haven't built a system which needs a 3rd-party driver for the onboard IDE
channels.

Jef
 >> Stay informed about: ABit AB9 Mobo - Can I install XP Pro ? can i heck.... 

On Sat, 11 Aug 2007 09:20:34 -0700, Bird Janitor® wrote:

> I don't think it's an RMA you're needing here. Every AB9 Pro board is going
> to have the same problem you've encountered.
>
> I'll call your problem a "design challenge".
>
> I was curious, so I downloaded the Abit AB9 series manual from The
> Mothership and discover that the SATA8, SATA9 and IDE1 connectors utilize
> the JMicron controller.
>
> In looking at section 4.11 of the manual, I read the following:
>
> [quote]
> This procedure is necessary if there is access to the devices connected to
> connectors "SATA8", "SATA9", and "IDE1" during the OS installation:
>
> 1. Prepare a 3.5" floppy disk drive and connect it to "FDC1" connector on
> this motherboard.
>
> 2. Start install operating system.
>
> 3. Insert this driver disk into floppy disk drive when the screen
> instruction prompts you to install a third-party SCSI or RAID driver.
>
> 4. Press <F6> key, and then follow the screen instruction to complete the
> installation.
>
> * This procedure is particularly necessary when you want to install
> operating system from a CD-ROM drive connected through connectors "SATA8",
> "SATA9", or "IDE1".
>
> [/quote]
>
> Obviously a driver is needed by the Windows Text Setup phase to even
> identify that there is an optical drive connected to anything connected to
> the JMicron controller.
>
> I'm scratching my head as to how to do this because there's no ability to
> press [F6] *prior* to starting the Windows install.
>
> I'm wondering if you could create your JMicron driver diskette when booted
> to the Abit CD then exit from the Abit utility program to a DOS prompt (I'm
> assuming you're booted to a DOS environment with this CD, obviously).
>
> If you can get out to a DOS prompt you could then swap to your Windows
> install CD and run the setup program to start the Windows Text Setup phase
> a-running. Press [F6] when prompted and have your JMicron driver diskette
> in the drive. You may have to search around on the Windows CD to find the
> NTSETUP.EXE program, as I believe you need to be booted to a mini-Windows
> environment in order to use the GUI Text Setup version that normally
> autoruns.
>
> Alternatively you could browse around on the Abit CD, looking for a
> Config.sys and Autoexec.bat file to identify the driver needed for the
> JMicron controller (and its associated DOS driver files). Copy all this
> stuff to a DOS boot diskette and follow my above instructions to run
> NTSETUP.EXE on your Windows CD when booted to this diskette.
>
> As a fallback, pay a visit to Abit's peer-to-peer support forum at
> http://forum.uabit.com for help.
>
> Hopefully I've helped here. It's been a bit of a head-scratcher as I
> haven't built a system which needs a 3rd-party driver for the onboard IDE
> channels.
>
> Jef

But, Jef, the OP said that he had an ide optical drive, not an SATA
(although he also said he had an ide floppy drive and well, floppy drives
have never run from ide as far as I know):

> I have a new Abit AB9 pro mobo. I have 1 sata drive installed and an
> ide floppy & ide optical drive as well as a 256mb ait graphics. 4gb
> ram and an E6850 processor.

So, if the motherboard will not boot to the optical drive, some
instructions for installing XP from DOS using a Windows98 boot disk can be
found here:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307848/en-us

Or, you can also find out how to obtain Windows XP setup disks here:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310994/

Why his motherboard won't just boot to the ide optical drive, I don't know.
Perhaps an issue with the BIOS recognizing the drive?

Patty
 >> Stay informed about: ABit AB9 Mobo - Can I install XP Pro ? can i heck.... 

On Sat, 11 Aug 2007 09:20:34 -0700, Bird Janitor® wrote:

> Hopefully I've helped here. It's been a bit of a head-scratcher as I
> haven't built a system which needs a 3rd-party driver for the onboard IDE
> channels.
>
> Jef

I just looked at the manual. IF he has an IDE CD-ROM he has to make sure
he doesn't set the boot for SATA CD-ROM (shown in the picture). It'll
never work that way. He must make sure he sets it to boot from the IDE
CD-ROM.

Patty
 >> Stay informed about: ABit AB9 Mobo - Can I install XP Pro ? can i heck.... 

Patty wrote:
|
| I just looked at the manual. IF he has an IDE CD-ROM he has to
| make sure he doesn't set the boot for SATA CD-ROM (shown in the
| picture). It'll never work that way. He must make sure he sets it to
| boot from the IDE CD-ROM.
|

Another good point Patty.

Fast forward to section 4.11 of the manual I quoted in my first post on this
thread:

[quote]
This procedure is particularly necessary when you want to install operating
system from a CD-ROM drive connected through connectors "SATA8", "SATA9", or
"IDE1".
[/quote]

These be the JMicron controller where a driver is necessary.

I was reading further that the chipset that the AB9 is built upon doesn't
have the legacy IDE controller present and a 3rd-party solution was made by
a number of motherboard manufacturers to provide this.

As I started out in this thread, I'm scratching my head on the issue and
only posted that an RMA probably wasn't necessary because others have had
fun hoop-jumping in order to get Windows installed on this board.

Jef
 >> Stay informed about: ABit AB9 Mobo - Can I install XP Pro ? can i heck.... 

On Sat, 11 Aug 2007 19:07:23 GMT, Bird Janitor® wrote:

> Patty wrote:
>|
>| I just looked at the manual. IF he has an IDE CD-ROM he has to
>| make sure he doesn't set the boot for SATA CD-ROM (shown in the
>| picture). It'll never work that way. He must make sure he sets it to
>| boot from the IDE CD-ROM.
>|
>
> Another good point Patty.
>
> Fast forward to section 4.11 of the manual I quoted in my first post on this
> thread:
>
> [quote]
> This procedure is particularly necessary when you want to install operating
> system from a CD-ROM drive connected through connectors "SATA8", "SATA9", or
> "IDE1".
> [/quote]
>
> These be the JMicron controller where a driver is necessary.
>
> I was reading further that the chipset that the AB9 is built upon doesn't
> have the legacy IDE controller present and a 3rd-party solution was made by
> a number of motherboard manufacturers to provide this.
>
> As I started out in this thread, I'm scratching my head on the issue and
> only posted that an RMA probably wasn't necessary because others have had
> fun hoop-jumping in order to get Windows installed on this board.
>
> Jef

So, JMicron must be part of the chipset drivers? I think that Abit kind of
messed up here when they put in an IDE controller that wouldn't work on the
basic Windows IDE controller. I have an Asus board right now that may have
the opposite effect. When you upgrade to the chipset IDE drivers things
may not work properly and you have to go back to the regular XP drivers for
the IDE (although mine has worked fine except for the most recent driver
update).

The same for my NF7-S board, now that I think about it. I updated the
chipset drivers to the most recent right after installing XP and my CD-ROMS
would no longer be recognized and I had to go back to the previous version
driver.

At least being able to work off the basic XP IDE drivers would be best
though, especially for install. I agree, there may not be anything wrong
with the board, but just a quirk of the drivers.

Patty
 >> Stay informed about: ABit AB9 Mobo - Can I install XP Pro ? can i heck.... 

Patty wrote:
|
| So, JMicron must be part of the chipset drivers? I think that Abit kind
| of messed up here when they put in an IDE controller that wouldn't work
| on the basic Windows IDE controller. I have an Asus board right now
| that may have the opposite effect. When you upgrade to the chipset
| IDE drivers things may not work properly and you have to go back to
| the regular XP drivers for the IDE (although mine has worked fine except
| for the most recent driver update).
|
| The same for my NF7-S board, now that I think about it. I updated the
| chipset drivers to the most recent right after installing XP and my
| CD-ROMS would no longer be recognized and I had to go back to the
| previous version driver.
|
| At least being able to work off the basic XP IDE drivers would be best
| though, especially for install. I agree, there may not be anything wrong
| with the board, but just a quirk of the drivers.
|

Hi Patty -

I had a similar problem with my old NF7-M with the nForce software IDE
driver. My CD-RW drive would work fine and dandy, but my DVD-ROM drive
would go missing from Device Manager until I rolled back to Microsoft's
default IDE driver. My situation seemed to have been sorted out by one of
the later driver releases, as both optical drives began behaving themselves.

I'm beginning to think that some optical drives will work fine with the
JMicron controller, while others won't, not particularly because of the
controller but, rather, the drive's firmware.

In the OP's case, the BIOS seemed to recognize the drive just fine .. press
any key to boot from CD-ROM, the drive would spin up for a moment as if
things were going to work and then spin back down, with the machine
ultimately hung in the netherworld. This leads me to believe that it was
the drive having difficulties talking to the controller.

Others seem to have observed this and have found success by booting to DOS
with the JMicron DOS device driver loaded (which appears as "GIGABYTE
OnBoard SATA IDE CD-ROM"). See Q5 at the following link .. the driver,
autoexec.bat and config.sys items are all included in the .zip file:

http://www.jmicron.com/Support_FAQ.html

Perhaps this driver is embedded in Abit's AB9 CD .. which is why I suggested
booting to the CD (or browsing it) to see what's being loaded. If this
driver does get loaded from this CD (assuming it's a DOS environment, that
is), swapping out the CD for the Windows install CD and then running
NTSETUP.EXE would start things going.

For reference, NTSETUP.EXE is the DOS-based Windows XP Text Setup Phase
front-end.

The Windows driver diskette will be required in advance, as the driver at
the above link is a 16-bit DOS driver only.

Jef
 >> Stay informed about: ABit AB9 Mobo - Can I install XP Pro ? can i heck.... 

Patty wrote:
|
| But, Jef, the OP said that he had an ide optical drive, not an
| SATA (although he also said he had an ide floppy drive and
| well, floppy drives have never run from ide as far as I know):
|

Hi Patty -

I was reading about on the Abit forum that others have problems booting from
certain optical drives on the JMicron controller and it was necessary to get
the driver for the controller loaded before being able to start the Text
Setup Phase of the Windows install.

Buff, on another forum, opined that this may be similar to early SATA
drives, which would only work on the Intel SATA controller.

| So, if the motherboard will not boot to the optical drive, some
| instructions for installing XP from DOS using a Windows98 boot
| disk can be found here:
|
| http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307848/en-us
|
| Or, you can also find out how to obtain Windows XP setup disks
| here:
|
| http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310994/
|
| Why his motherboard won't just boot to the ide optical drive, I don't
| know. Perhaps an issue with the BIOS recognizing the drive?
|

Good idea to use the XP setup disks. It would still be necessary to alter
the Config.sys and Autoexec.bat files to include the DOS driver for the
JMicron controller in order for the computer to see certain optical drives
connected to the JMicron IDE controller. It would also be necessary to
enable the controller for IDE mode in the BIOS before even embarking on the
adventure.

There are also numerous BIOS updates for the board, including mention to
pick up the newer JMicron driver at http://www.abit.com.tw (where there is
also a link to the newer driver).

Jef
 >> Stay informed about: ABit AB9 Mobo - Can I install XP Pro ? can i heck.... 

On Sat, 11 Aug 2007 15:44:23 -0700, Bird Janitor® wrote:

> I'm beginning to think that some optical drives will work fine with the
> JMicron controller, while others won't, not particularly because of the
> controller but, rather, the drive's firmware.
>
> In the OP's case, the BIOS seemed to recognize the drive just fine .. press
> any key to boot from CD-ROM, the drive would spin up for a moment as if
> things were going to work and then spin back down, with the machine
> ultimately hung in the netherworld. This leads me to believe that it was
> the drive having difficulties talking to the controller.

Good point, Jef. If the CD-ROM is having a difficult time communicating
with the controller, then even if the BIOS recognizes it and starts it up,
it may not be able to transmit the info on the CD to the system.

> Others seem to have observed this and have found success by booting to DOS
> with the JMicron DOS device driver loaded (which appears as "GIGABYTE
> OnBoard SATA IDE CD-ROM"). See Q5 at the following link .. the driver,
> autoexec.bat and config.sys items are all included in the .zip file:
>
> http://www.jmicron.com/Support_FAQ.html
>
> Perhaps this driver is embedded in Abit's AB9 CD .. which is why I suggested
> booting to the CD (or browsing it) to see what's being loaded. If this
> driver does get loaded from this CD (assuming it's a DOS environment, that
> is), swapping out the CD for the Windows install CD and then running
> NTSETUP.EXE would start things going.
>
> For reference, NTSETUP.EXE is the DOS-based Windows XP Text Setup Phase
> front-end.
>
> The Windows driver diskette will be required in advance, as the driver at
> the above link is a 16-bit DOS driver only.

The DOS install may work, as will the setup XP floppy disks, and those may
be the only options the OP has other than trying to find a CD-ROM that will
play nice with the JMicron controller. From what I can see, the IDE and
the SATA drivers are not separate as they were with the NForce2 boards, but
they appear to be lumped together to control some of the SATA ports as well
as the IDE port.

Patty
 >> Stay informed about: ABit AB9 Mobo - Can I install XP Pro ? can i heck.... 

Patty wrote:
|
| The DOS install may work, as will the setup XP floppy disks, and those
| may be the only options the OP has other than trying to find a CD-ROM
| that will play nice with the JMicron controller. From what I can see, the
| IDE and the SATA drivers are not separate as they were with the NForce2
| boards, but they appear to be lumped together to control some of the
| SATA ports as well as the IDE port.
|

Hi Patty -

The AB9 Pro has nine SATA ports and one ESATA, on different controllers.
There are Intel and Silicon Image controllers as well as the JMicron
controller (which is connected to SATA8, SATA9 and the IDE1 ports).

As I mentioned before, Intel's 965 chipset doesn't have legacy IDE
controllers embedded and any manufacturer who wanted an IDE controller on
their implementation had to go with a 3rd-party solution.

What's odd to me is that many optical drives won't play nice with the
JMicron controller that Abit used for this functionality. It has made for
some adventures installing Windows.

I'm wondering if JMicron's controller isn't simply a SATA controller with
added hardware circuitry, similar to Abit's Serillel2 adapter, which allowed
PATA drives to be connected to the Silicon Image SATA controller on the
NF7-S. In this example it was necessary to provide the Sil3112 driver with
a PATA drive connected to the SATA controller via the Serillel2 adapter.
The AB9 Series manual is *very* specific about how a Master and Slave drive
are to be connected to the cable (Master=black connector, Slave=gray
connector), regardless of whether the drives are jumpered Master/Slave or
Cable Select.

I must be more bored than usual this weekend to have spent so much time
pondering this. After all ... the OP said he was going to RMA the board and
hasn't been back since.

I think I need to go find something useful to do... ;-}

Jef
 >> Stay informed about: ABit AB9 Mobo - Can I install XP Pro ? can i heck.... 

On Sun, 12 Aug 2007 16:19:26 GMT, Bird Janitor® wrote:

> Patty wrote:
>|
>| The DOS install may work, as will the setup XP floppy disks, and those
>| may be the only options the OP has other than trying to find a CD-ROM
>| that will play nice with the JMicron controller. From what I can see, the
>| IDE and the SATA drivers are not separate as they were with the NForce2
>| boards, but they appear to be lumped together to control some of the
>| SATA ports as well as the IDE port.
>|
>
> Hi Patty -
>
> The AB9 Pro has nine SATA ports and one ESATA, on different controllers.
> There are Intel and Silicon Image controllers as well as the JMicron
> controller (which is connected to SATA8, SATA9 and the IDE1 ports).
>
> As I mentioned before, Intel's 965 chipset doesn't have legacy IDE
> controllers embedded and any manufacturer who wanted an IDE controller on
> their implementation had to go with a 3rd-party solution.
>
> What's odd to me is that many optical drives won't play nice with the
> JMicron controller that Abit used for this functionality. It has made for
> some adventures installing Windows.
>
> I'm wondering if JMicron's controller isn't simply a SATA controller with
> added hardware circuitry, similar to Abit's Serillel2 adapter, which allowed
> PATA drives to be connected to the Silicon Image SATA controller on the
> NF7-S. In this example it was necessary to provide the Sil3112 driver with
> a PATA drive connected to the SATA controller via the Serillel2 adapter.
> The AB9 Series manual is *very* specific about how a Master and Slave drive
> are to be connected to the cable (Master=black connector, Slave=gray
> connector), regardless of whether the drives are jumpered Master/Slave or
> Cable Select.
>
> I must be more bored than usual this weekend to have spent so much time
> pondering this. After all ... the OP said he was going to RMA the board and
> hasn't been back since.
>
> I think I need to go find something useful to do... ;-}
>
> Jef

I know that they included a PATA to SATA adapter with my NF7-S board. I
didn't even install the SATA driver, since I'm not using any SATA drives at
this point, only IDE. I know you can also buy PATA to SATA adapters on the
open market, I didn't think you needed to connect to any particular
controller to use them. Is there an advantage to using the PATA adapter
and connecting to SATA, other than the usual "get rid of the bulky IDE
cable issue"?

Yeah, maybe we both need to find something useful to do.

Patty
 >> Stay informed about: ABit AB9 Mobo - Can I install XP Pro ? can i heck.... 

Patty wrote:
|
| Is there an advantage to using the PATA adapter and connecting to
| SATA, other than the usual "get rid of the bulky IDE cable issue"?
|
| Yeah, maybe we both need to find something useful to do.
|

Hi Patty -

Yep, it's that bulky cable thing. You won't get any added speed out of an
ATA100 drive, regardless of whether or not the SATA channel can go faster.
The drive's gonna do what the drive's gonna do.

I've been teasing the birds all afternoon, so I guess I found something else
to do (not that it was really all that useful).

Jef
 >> Stay informed about: ABit AB9 Mobo - Can I install XP Pro ? can i heck....