X79 Extreme4

[Legolad]

Hey folks,

I've recently replaced my old 120GB SSD with a new 240GB SSD from Samsung. I used the Samsung utility to clone the old drive.

I had a few hiccups along the way, including:
- a damaged SATA power line from the PSU which forced me to buy a new 750W PSU
- a dead CMOS battery which I replaced

Due to these other issues, I ended up with an unbootable system until I came to these forums and found out how to reset the BIOS.

Once I did that, I was able to boot into the BIOS, select the new SSD, and then boot into Windows and I had my old system back - mostly.
Since then, I noticed that some of my HDDs don't show up.

I've updated the BIOS (long overdue), but that didn't help.
My PC still doesn't recognize all the drives I have attached.

First let me say that everything I have is on SATA.
Except for the boot drive (the only SSD) I haven't made any effort to put drives in a specific order or on specific SATA channels.

I have 1 SATA SSD
I have 4 SATA spinning drives
I have 2 SATA optical drives

The All 4 SATA spinning drives are on the same power line that powers the Boot Drive.
The BIOS and Windows can see:
- the SSD Boot Drive
- 2 spinning drives (the same 2 every time)
- the 2 optical drives

2 other SATA spinning drives are missing.

Any ideas on how to troubleshoot this?
I'm a little out of my depth.

Thanks,
David


MY PC

[parsec]

Re: X79 Extreme4

I assume that the two HDDs that are not recognized after you added the new SSD, were formatted and working normally on that PC before you changed to the new SSD, is that correct?

I must ask about "... a damaged SATA power line from the PSU...". Was that cable in use when you discovered the damage? Any idea which drives were connected to that power cable? I'm sure you can imagine why I'm asking about that. Do you think the two unseen drives are starting up but remain unseen? Have you verified that they seem to be spinning up?

It sounds like you may not know which drives are not being recognized. If so, in the BIOS, Storage Configuration screen, all the SATA ports that have drives connected and are running will be shown, even if they are not formatted and unseen in Windows. Do you see unoccupied SATA ports in the BIOS where a drive should be listed?

Sometimes it takes a reboot or two to get drives recognized, if you haven't done that give it a try.

Your board has two SATA controllers, the main Intel SATA controller in the X79 chipset, and the additional ASMedia ASM1061 SATA chipset. The top four black SATA ports are the four Intel SATA II ports. The two gray ports just below the black ones are the two Intel SATA III ports. The two black SATA ports at the bottom are the ASMedia SATA III ports.

It might make a difference which SATA ports the two missing HDDs are connected to, so if you can identify which SATA ports they are using, please post that information. I ask this because usually it is possible to disable the ASMedia SATA ports in the BIOS, and any connected drives would not be seen by the BIOS or Windows if it is disabled.

The two unrecognized drives, are they not shown in the BIOS and in Windows? In Windows, are the drives not seen in Device Manager and Disk Management?

Obvious things to check are the SATA data cables and power connections. Replace the SATA data cables to those drives. I would suggest putting the two unrecognized drives on their own SATA power cable, although that should not be required, isolating them from the other drives might help diagnose the problem.

Are the two unrecognized drives over 2TB in size?

You mentioned updating the BIOS, any idea what BIOS you were using previously, and what version you have now?

In the BIOS in the Storage Configuration screen, check if Aggressive Link Power Management is enabled. If so, set it to disabled.

[Legolad]

Re: X79 Extreme4

THANKS, PARSEC!!!!

All is well now.

TL:DR
A simple reboot was all it took to get the drive back (though I had already rebooted 4 or 5 times before posting here). So, when in doubt, do as PARSEC suggests and reboot a few times. ALSO, CONFESSION: During this exercise, I realized that I was wrong in my drive count. There is no 5th drive. There is just a SATA cable going to the front panel. DOH!

For the record, in case anyone reads this in the future and wants to know how I would have answered all Parsec's questions, here you go.

I assume that the two HDDs that are not recognized after you added the new SSD, were formatted and working normally on that PC before you changed to the new SSD, is that correct?

That is correct, though it was only 1 drive missing (see my notes below for an explanation).

I must ask about "... a damaged SATA power line from the PSU...". Was that cable in use when you discovered the damage? Any idea which drives were connected to that power cable? I'm sure you can imagine why I'm asking about that. Do you think the two unseen drives are starting up but remain unseen? Have you verified that they seem to be spinning up?

Sadly, yes. That cable was the one powering several SATA drives before all this started. That said, I pulled each drive and tested it in another PC before putting everything back together with the new PSU. All drives were functional and responded normally to read/write requests.

It sounds like you may not know which drives are not being recognized. If so, in the BIOS, Storage Configuration screen, all the SATA ports that have drives connected and are running will be shown, even if they are not formatted and unseen in Windows. Do you see unoccupied SATA ports in the BIOS where a drive should be listed?

Good point. I have done a physical drive mapping and I do see empty ports in the BIOS. My mobo has a total of 8 SATA ports. 6 of those are connected to drives. 1 is connected to a front panel port and 1 is empty. Of the 6 that are connected, 1 was not showing up in either the BIOS or Windows. That has now changed. All drives are now showing.

Sometimes it takes a reboot or two to get drives recognized, if you haven't done that give it a try.

Absolutely a good idea. In fact, while doing the drive map below, I found that the missing drive reappeared.

Your board has two SATA controllers, the main Intel SATA controller in the X79 chipset, and the additional ASMedia ASM1061 SATA chipset. The top four black SATA ports are the four Intel SATA II ports. The two gray ports just below the black ones are the two Intel SATA III ports. The two black SATA ports at the bottom are the ASMedia SATA III ports.


It might make a difference which SATA ports the two missing HDDs are connected to, so if you can identify which SATA ports they are using, please post that information. I ask this because usually it is possible to disable the ASMedia SATA ports in the BIOS, and any connected drives would not be seen by the BIOS or Windows if it is disabled.

PHYSICAL DRIVE LOCATIONS
SATA2 2_3, Black = EMPTY
SATA2 2_2, Black = DVD OPTICAL DRIVE [Windows Disk CD-ROM 1 DRIVE E]
SATA2 2_1, Black = BLU-RAY OPTICAL DRIVE [Windows Disk CD-ROM 0 DRIVE D]
SATA2 2_0, Black = Front Panel eSATA Port
(previously thought this was a missing drive, DOH!)
SATA3 3_1, Gray = Seagate 3TB Drive [Windows Disk 3 DRIVE I]
SATA3 3_0, Gray = SSD Boot Drive [Windows Disk 2 DRIVE C]
SATA3 3_A1, Gray = Seagate 2TB Drive [Windows Disk 1 DRIVE H]
SATA3 3_A0, Gray = Seagate 2TB Drive [Windows Disk 0 DRIVE F]
(previously not recognized, but now shows up reliably!)

The two unrecognized drives, are they not shown in the BIOS and in Windows? In Windows, are the drives not seen in Device Manager and Disk Management?

Correct. Turns out it was only 1 missing drive, and it didn't show up at all - not in the BIOS, nor in Windows Device Mgr or Disk Mgmt.
But with a couple more reboots, all drives are being recognized!! HOORAY!!

Are the two unrecognized drives over 2TB in size?

FYI - The drive that wasn't being recognized is 2TB.

You mentioned updating the BIOS, any idea what BIOS you were using previously, and what version you have now?

PREVIOUS: P1.80
CURRENT: P3.70

In the BIOS in the Storage Configuration screen, check if Aggressive Link Power Management is enabled. If so, set it to disabled.

After I got the drive to show up with a reboot, I rebooted again to check this. It as enabled so I disabled it just in case.

[parsec]

Re: X79 Extreme4

Great, glad that worked for you!

I could have saved myself a lot of typing with a one liner... reboot until it appears. That seems ridiculous, and in some cases it would be. Why the restart/reboot works is the question, what really happens with the drive?

Go back five years or more and there was a BIOS option called SATA Detect Timeout, or something similar. It caused POST to wait for drives to start up so they could be detected. One older board I have can set that wait time between 0 and 35 seconds. Older HDDs and optical drives (older than that board, which is from 2010) were slower to get started, and this option accounted for that.

Currently, fast start ups and booting is popular, and considered "better" (I'm guilty of this) so that is what mother board and BIOS/UEFI companies try to provide. HDDs are much faster waking from a cold start than in the past, and SSDs being purely electronic devices, are almost instant on devices.

But I've been seeing more posts like yours for a while now, drives are not recognized that should be. I fortunately see many replies later in those threads that say a restart or two caused the drive to be found and working fine.

I've seen SSDs on my PCs, that are formatted and contain data, that I move to another PC and on the first boot, no sign of it in Windows. Sometimes it appears in the UEFI/BIOS but not in Windows until a restart. Other times it's missing in the UEFI and Windows. So it seems like something might be going on that is causing all this to happen.

Several possible causes, but who knows?