Jump to content

I915 SATA in Windows 98


Sfor

Recommended Posts

I do have a HP DC7100 convertible minitower computer. It does have i915 ICH6 chipset with i82801FB IO controller. The board does have 4 SATA and 1 IDE connector. The BIOS allows to set "combined" mode, in which the OS is presented with a standard Primary/Secondary dual IDE controller architecture. The Windows 98 seems to be working fine in such a situation, but it has an access to just 2 SATA channels and the IDE controller. The remaining 2 SATA channels are disabled. Since the HP/Compaq BIOS naming is quite different from other releases, I can only suspect the "combined" is equal to "compatibility" mode.

The other from the "combined" BIOS setting adds a separate SATA controller. It appears, the Windows 98 fails to boot in such a case. It could be possible to go around the problem, by using DOS compatibility mode disk access, but it does not seem to be an efficient way.

So, I would like to know, why Windows 98 behaves as it does. Also, is there a way of getting the full potential of the 4 SATA channels?

Link to comment
Share on other sites


I do have a HP DC7100 convertible minitower computer. It does have i915 ICH6 chipset with i82801FB IO controller. The board does have 4 SATA and 1 IDE connector. The BIOS allows to set "combined" mode, in which the OS is presented with a standard Primary/Secondary dual IDE controller architecture. The Windows 98 seems to be working fine in such a situation, but it has an access to just 2 SATA channels and the IDE controller. The remaining 2 SATA channels are disabled. Since the HP/Compaq BIOS naming is quite different from other releases, I can only suspect the "combined" is equal to "compatibility" mode.

The other from the "combined" BIOS setting adds a separate SATA controller. It appears, the Windows 98 fails to boot in such a case. It could be possible to go around the problem, by using DOS compatibility mode disk access, but it does not seem to be an efficient way.

So, I would like to know, why Windows 98 behaves as it does. Also, is there a way of getting the full potential of the 4 SATA channels?

Windows 98 does not properly support SATA controllers that do not appear as legacy controllers. I have a Patch that adds support for Native mode SATA controllers that should allow you to use all of the channels.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...