Series 520 480GB SSD, Sabertooth X79, i7 3930K ..... Toolbox not recognising SSD Model - but listing Firmware Version and Serial No.

[idata]

I have justy received my system which is a

Sabertooth X79 socket 2011 R.O.G.

I7-3930k Processor,

32GB Quad DDR RAM,

Geforce GTX690 GPU,

520 480GB Intel SSD (Boot)

2 x Corsair Black 2TB HDD's (not RAID - 1 for User files, 1 for Backup)

The tool box sees the SSD, Firmware (400i) and the SSD Serial No - BUT NOT the Model No, and that Drive details and Smart Drive details are greyed out also.

I've updated all the drivers on the Motherboard - but the Tool box doesn't Recognise the drive .....

UPDATE - the following Motherboad drivers are installed :-

Intel Rapid Storage Technology enterprise oftware V3.0.0.3011)

Asmedia SATA Controller Driver V1.3.1.0 for Windows XP/Vista/7

Marvell SATA 6G Driver V1.2.0.1014 for Windows XP/Vista/7 32bit & 64bit.(WHQL)

Dave mentioned about Series 11 Drivers working in another post thread - and that installing these can be complicated!! (which probably means beyond my expertise)

And other dfiscussion threads talk about reverting to MS SATA controller drivers, also some mention of problems with the Marvel Drivers on the Sabertooth motherboard!! ...... to be honest I'm a bit lost!!

Anyone got any advice?

Kind regards

Roy

Message was edited by: Roy Jackson

Message was edited by: Roy Jackson

[idata]

As I wrote earlier, the result you now have is fine, the result is exactly what should happen when you uninstalled RSTe, including the reboot.

The listing of the SATA controllers in Device Manager is simply the way Windows organizes them. It does not mean they are broken or gone, and as mistermokkori said, your PC would not boot if something was wrong with your SATA controllers. Some are listed under Storage controllers, others under IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers.

Speaking of which, don't worry about the Marvell SATA controller. Your board has two separate SATA controllers, one in the Intel X79 chipset, and another being a Marvell SATA chipset. They are not related in any way, and each has it's own driver.

The Marvell driver will not work with the X79, and RSTe will not work with the Marvell chip. Both of them can use msahci, but you don't need to install it on the Marvell chipset unless you want to. BTW, the SSD Toolbox will not find drives connected to the Marvell SATA chip.

[idata]

I have a related problem to that of Roy's.

I recently purchased the intel 520 480GB SSD for my SONY LAPTOP which has 128GB SSD as drive C and 500GB drive D. I downloaded the ACRONIS installation software and connected the SSD using the SATAWire SATIII to USB connector. the ACRONIS refuses to run as it cannot see the INTEL DRIVE and neither can the WINDOWS 7 64 bit machine. SATAWIRE cable is recognised but ACRONIS refuses to run and is asking me to purchase INTEL SSD and install it before running the application??? What is happening. I have already purchased it and trying to istall it.

I am trying to replace the 500GB HD with the INTEL SSD but the WIN7 64 bit OS does not recognise the drive and ACRONIS does not want to run to copy the D drive so that I can install the INTEL SSD drive. I intent to later upgrade the 128GB SSD C Drive with 256GB SSD as my C drive.

Anyone got a solution please. thank you

[idata]

The problem is the SATA to USB adapter, it's not providing the appropriate protocol to communicate the SSD information to Acronis so it can recognize the Intel SSD. That is not uncommon with these adapters.

If your 520 is new and not formatted, Windows will not see it. You must go to Device Manager to initialize and create a volume on the 520. That is standard with any drive in Windows 7. I don't know if that will make a difference with your SATA to USB adapter, probably not.

[PPapp]

Is Intel aware of this? I have an X79 board and no access to S.M.A.R.T. information due to the RSTe drivers. Their own Toolbox doesn't even recognize my 520. This is ridiculous.

[idata]

How could they not be aware of it. I highly doubt this was a surprise to them. But they could have mentioned it.

The X79 chipset is the only Intel chipset used in PC mother boards that cannot (officially) use Intel's PC AHCI/RAID driver, IRST. Some users have been able to manually install the IRST driver used with the other Intel 7-series chipsets (IRST 11...), although I'm sure some of the unique features of the other 7-series chipsets will not work with the X79. But there must be good reasons why Intel did not do this, so do that at your own risk.

Although it seems Intel has been using some of the same CPU support chipsets in both PCs and enterprise computing hardware, the migration of X79 from the enterprise world to PCs had a rare glitch, due to RSTe.

IMO, the bottom line is, if you want RAID with X79, use RSTe. The SSD Toolbox functionality is already very limited with SSDs in RAID volumes, besides the SMART data and the drives details. Not much of a loss there, as there are other ways to read SMART data. No need for RAID, use msahci, and the Toolbox works on X79.