Windows 7 & nVRaid - installation guide

[Gabe3]

well I'm not sure what I did wrong. i followed the guide. when I load the sata_ide drive, it detects my raid however it says:
"Windows is unable to install to the selected location. Error: 0x80300001"

1. Did you remove the USB stick or floppy drive after having loaded the driver?
2. What about the "HARD DISK BOOT PRIORITY" option within the BIOS? Has your RAID been set to the first position?

yes to both of those questions. however, I figured out the problem. I have 3 sata drives total, 2 are in raid0. so I unplugged the 3rd drive and that got rid of the error message. I havn't gone through with the install yet, not quite ready for that. when I do I'll let you know the results.

so the v9.98 drivers are the best to use? it was confirmed that v15.35 and .37 don't work?

[Fernando 1]

it was confirmed that v15.35 and .37 don't work?

They do not work with nForce4 chipset mainboards.

[MasterCATZ]

I have an Asus P5nt WS and wanting to make use of the Raid 5 6x HDD for Win 7 x64 Boot Drive

The downside is that no matter the number of drives used with Raid 5 the best Write Rate is only 30 meg

My P5b deluxe does 100 meg Writes ( using intel onboard controller tho with 4x HDD )

is their any Bios mod / Driver that can unlock NVRaid 5 Performance ?

I have 300 meg Reads .. but unless I get 70+ Writes it is just to damn slow
it is an shame NVRaid does not allow splitting the array
( ie 6x HDD's using 10% of the array in Raid 0 then the Remaining 90% in Raid 5 mode )

15.37_nforce_win7_64bit_international_whql
185.85_desktop_win7_64bit_english_whql
cudadriver_2.2_win7_64_185.85_general
1104 Bios

any way to get CUDA working for Raid ??

[howardbut]

Hi All,
I have just installed Windows 7 RC1 (build 7100) on my computer and would like to share my experience here.

My computer configuration:
Asus P5N-E SLI (nforce 570)
Core2Duo 4300 (normally o/c to 3GHz, but I did change freq back to the stock during the windows installation)
3GB Ram
2 x Samsung MLC 64GB SSD in Raid 0 by nvidia mediashield
2 x Samsung F1 SATA HDD
nVidia 8800GS + Creative X-Fi PCI Soundcard + Belkin G+ PCI Card

I have Windows XP installed on one of the Samsung F1 and the two MLC SSD are new purchase recently. Firstly I setup and format the 2 MLC in raid 0 under the existing windows xp (not sure if that helps, but I followed some online guide to set "offsetting" when building the partition and formatted the raid partition in NTFS, 4096 allocation size).

I downloaded the nvraid driver on this thread, unzipped the file on a usb thumb drive, and then restarted the computer. At first I didn't disconnect the two HDD although I was told to. The installation started normally, and to my suprise, all the HDD including the Raid partition were recongized by the Windows Setup Routine without any custom driver. I selected the installation path to the raid parition and the setup ran smoothly, without any bluescreen and asked for restart at last. However, the win7 setup failed to continue after the restart, and the screen was left blank after the "Raid Bios" screen. I restarted the computer again and chose the original HDD as boot drive and my original winxp worked normally. I checked the MBR and it seems like the win7 setup failed to modified the MBR on neither partition (the raid nor HDD). First try failed.

I disconnected all the HDDs before the retry. Win7 setup started fine, and the raid partition was recongized again. However, to save time and risk, I decided to supply my own driver "sata_ide" (nvidia SATA controller). This time the setup ran smoothly, restart without problem, and the win7 bootup itself after the "raid bios" screen in less than 20 seconds. The whole process is less painful than I expected (or heard).

After all the setup progress, I reconnected the two HDD, set the o/c profile back, and the whole setup runs rock solid. The old winxp (and its MBR) has been kept untouched. To boot the XP, I only need to choose the "boot sequence" at the bios screen and all my old settings are kept.

[Fernando 1]

@ howardbut:
Welcome at nForcersHQ Forum and thank you for your detailed report.

The hdd boot configuration you got by your procedure might be ok for you, but not for everyone.
What you now have within your system are 2 Master Boot Records, one on the Samsung F1, where XP is installed, and the other freshly created by Win7 on the RAID. That is the reason why you are still able to boot into Windows XP after having installed Win7, but you have to change the HARD DISK BOOT PRIORITY settings of the BIOS.
So you didn't get a real dual boot system and are not able to choose the OS while booting.
Questions:
1. Why did you disconnect the hdd with the already existing MBR while installing Win7?
2. Why did you load any nForce IDE driver during the Win7 installation?
The Win in-box nForce SataRAID drivers should support your RAID specification.
3. Which SATA_IDE driver version did you load?

Regards
Fernando

[howardbut]

@ howardbut:
Questions:
1. Why did you disconnect the hdd with the already existing MBR while installing Win7?
2. Why did you load any nForce IDE driver during the Win7 installation?
The Win in-box nForce SataRAID drivers should support your RAID specification.
3. Which SATA_IDE driver version did you load?

The non-dual boot configuration actually suits me very well as I don't want to have my original MBR changed in case I found Win7 is not good for me (such as compatiable issue) and I can go back to the WinXP at any time.

The IDE drive I loaded is the one I downloaded on the 1st page of this thread. It works okay during the installation and I have updated the nforce driver pack to 15.37. So far the system is rock solid.

Sorry I have forgotten for this very useful installation guide. It's excellent!

[congo]

My problem is that I could not see my new raid-0 array from the original Win7x64 install on my 1tb drive.

Anyway, after reading this thread, I figured I'd try installing Win7x64 onto the raid-0.

I prepared (as per instructions on the first page here) for my Win7 RC1 install on my nForce4 RAID-0 array (Asus A8N-SLI) and settled in for a long night of frustration.

I booted from the Win7 x64 CD install media, and my OS simply installed normally on my RAID-0 with no further action required on my part. No mess, no fuss.

Someone at MS finally got it right, congrats!

This was not my original problem though. I wanted to install XP to my RAID-0 array and use that as a backup drive for my 1tb system drive. I just dropped/killed my nice 640gb drive, so I only have 2 x 320gb drives to use for backup.
I figured a 600gb raid-0 would be the best option for fast backup transfers.

It seems odd that my Win7 will install onto my array straight off the disk, yet the same installation on a single disk refuses to see the raid array. The array was not set when the original Win7 install was done though, so that may explain it?

[bgeneto]

PS... I am contemplating rolling back to 10.3's, but since I have not encountered an issues yet am holding off. Any suggestions?

I suggest that you stay with the Windows 7 in-box RAID drivers v10.6.0.xx (RTM: v10.6.0.16) since it seems to be pretty stable for NF4 systems. Also I've got start-up reboots after downgrading to Fernando's modded "NF4-7 RAID Performance Packs" version v10.3.52.4, it was not even possible to use these drivers from scratch (clean install from DVD) following your "recipes".

But the steps posted by Poser (in the first page of this thread) works like a charm (loading sata_ide folder only) for me with Fernando's "Special NF4 RAID WHQL Drivers" v9.99.0.9 and Windows 7 x86 build 7600. I suppose (by trial and error) that v9.99 is the latest driver version that works fine with NF4 systems and Windows 7. BTW, don't forget to (BIOS) disable any other SATA controllers (onboard, like SiI 3114, or not) before attempt to install Windows 7 by the methods described here.

Finally I would like to thanks Fernando for his hard work in providing those great modded Vista/Win7 drivers!

[Drago]

Just another success story...

As a few of you already know I have a DFI LanParty UT nF4 Ultra-D mainboard and tried to install Windows 7 (x64) two days ago. I've read the guide and tried to install Windows 7 without any driver... as you imagined it was not working (my 70GB RAID [2x Raptor 35GB] was not recognized, instead only a single disk with 35GB free space was shown).

Second try: I downloaded the customized driver of Fernando (v11.1.0.23) and tried to install Windows 7 using that driver. @ Fernando: There is STILL the same problem as with Windows Vista SP2 (x64): No user is able to load unsigned drivers, only WHQL drivers can be loaded. Well...

Third try: Used the original driver from nVidia (v11.1.0.23 WHQL) and try to load that driver resulted in an error message: "Please ask the vendor for an updated driver." LOL! nForce4 is end of life I should ask nVidia for a driver... yeah, right!

Fourth try: v9.98 WHQL driver, which I always used to install Vista. Loaded the drivers (first Raid Controller and Raid Device, then the 2 SATA Controllers) and as soon as my RAID array SHOULD have been detected the single disk with 35GB free space disappeared and NO other partition had been shown. Now I really thought: "s***...". Started to read the pages here... and found the post of user "aksal" in the fourth page of this thread (thank you mate!).

Fifth try: Created a "LEGACY Patch Boot" floppy disk (the cd would also work) and used it to start the installation... now the RAID array was shown even without any driver loaded! To be on the safe side I also loaded the v9.98 WHQL drivers (because Windows needs drivers if the built-in are not working and I'm not using the boot patch cd / floppy disk on every single boot of Windows 7, for sure...), which indeed was a nice idea. Installed...
On the first boot when the Windows 7 installation should have been resumed, my computer simply restarted. Again... "s***"... tried another time and still the same thing. Well... again inserted the legacy patch boot disk and resumed the installation. It was working!!!
From the second reboot on... Windows 7 started WITHOUT the legacy patch boot disk.

After the installation I checked which driver versions Windows uses the boot Windows 7 (checked the raid devices, sata controllers and raid controller). And guess what? Yes, ONLY the v9.98 is used to boot this machine...

From a happy Windows 7 (x64) user...

[Fernando 1]

@ congo and bgeneto:
Welcome at nForcersHQ Forum and thank you for your reports

Here is my comment:

I prepared (as per instructions on the first page here) for my Win7 RC1 install on my nForce4 RAID-0 array (Asus A8N-SLI) and settled in for a long night of frustration.
I booted from the Win7 x64 CD install media, and my OS simply installed normally on my RAID-0 with no further action required on my part. No mess, no fuss.

You are just a lucky nForce4 SLI chipset RAID user. If you would try the same thing with an nForce4 Ultra-D chipset RAID system, the installation would fail unless you load the SATA_IDE drivers v9.98 or something similar.

It seems odd that my Win7 will install onto my array straight off the disk, yet the same installation on a single disk refuses to see the raid array. The array was not set when the original Win7 install was done though, so that may explain it?

I am not sure about that, but it should be not a big problem to get the RAID detected by "installing" the in-box nForce RAID driver and - if needed - by replacing the "Standard Dual Channel PCI IDE Controllers" by the "NVIDIA nForce Serial ATA Controlers" from within the device manager.

the steps posted by Poser (in the first page of this thread) works like a charm (loading sata_ide folder only) for me with Fernando's "Special NF4 RAID WHQL Drivers" v9.99.0.9 and Windows 7 x86 build 7600.

Little correction: This package contains the nForce IDE drivers v9.98. Unfortunately the WHQL signed v9.99.09 ones do not support NF4 chipsets at all.

I suppose (by trial and error) that v9.99 is the latest driver version that works fine with NF4 systems and Windows 7.

You might be right regarding this point, if you are talking about nForce RAID systems.

BTW, don't forget to (BIOS) disable any other SATA controllers (onboard, like SiI 3114, or not) before attempt to install Windows 7 by the methods described here.

That's a good advice.