SATA Hard Disk going PIO Mode
Anybody else experience this? I have a Seagate Barracuda 120GB SATA Hard Disk where I put all my games in for high performance (since SATA technology promises better performance than ULTRA ATA). Thing is, if heavy disk activity happens (like when I play graphic intensive games like Half-Life 2), it goes to PIO Mode ...
Anybody else experience this? I have a Seagate Barracuda 120GB SATA Hard Disk where I put all my games in for high performance (since SATA technology promises better performance than ULTRA ATA). Thing is, if heavy disk activity happens (like when I play graphic intensive games like Half-Life 2), it goes to PIO Mode (something Win2k and WinXP will do if supposedly more than 6 CRC errors are detected), and performance degrades drastically (so much for SATA being faster huh?); in fact Half-Life 2 crashes when it happens. At least it goes back to UMDA-5 if I reboot. Still, this is really fishy, because in the same PC I also have a Seagate Barracuda 200GB SATA Hard Disk (where I store video files in since they're so huge) that never experiences that problem.
My specs by the way:
Intel Pentium 4 3.0 GHz Prescott
Inno3D GeForce FX5600 w/ 256MB Video RAM and VIVO
ASUS P4P800-X Motherboard (Intel 865PE chipset, has provision for 2 SATA devices)
1GB PC3200 DDR RAM
Seagate 30GB 5400RPM Hard Disk (boot disk)
Seagate Barracuda 120GB Hard Disk (primary slave)
Seagate Barracuda 200GB SATA Hard Disk
Seagate Barracuda 120GB SATA Hard Disk (the one that's going PIO mode)
Sony DRU-710 DVD Burner with Dual-Layer writing support
Soundblaster Live 5.1 Soundcard
Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2
My specs by the way:
Intel Pentium 4 3.0 GHz Prescott
Inno3D GeForce FX5600 w/ 256MB Video RAM and VIVO
ASUS P4P800-X Motherboard (Intel 865PE chipset, has provision for 2 SATA devices)
1GB PC3200 DDR RAM
Seagate 30GB 5400RPM Hard Disk (boot disk)
Seagate Barracuda 120GB Hard Disk (primary slave)
Seagate Barracuda 200GB SATA Hard Disk
Seagate Barracuda 120GB SATA Hard Disk (the one that's going PIO mode)
Sony DRU-710 DVD Burner with Dual-Layer writing support
Soundblaster Live 5.1 Soundcard
Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2
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I believe I've finally found the real problem:
http://www.techsupportforum.com/computer/topic/25430-1.html
It seems that there's an issue with SATA Hard Disks with NCQ support (Native Command Queuing). NCQ is a feature in some new SATA drives to improve performance. The problem is that some SATA Controllers (like those found on Mobo's with Intel Chipsets like the 865PE) do not support NCQ, and if a NCQ capable drive is connected to that kind of controller, problems can arise.
I checked with Seagate's website for my particular hard disk, and sure enough, my 120GB SATA Drive has NCQ support, whereas my 200GB SATA drive doesn't. So when used with my ASUS P4P800-X mobo (which uses the Intel 865PE chipset), the 120GB Drive will go postal and either crash Windows or go PIO mode because of the NCQ issue, while the 200GB Disk has no problems whatsoever.
Guess I'll see if I can exchange the 120GB drive with the non-NCQ version. If the retail store won't do that, then a suggestion from that forum above is to buy a Promise SATA controller card, which supports NCQ.
http://www.techsupportforum.com/computer/topic/25430-1.html
It seems that there's an issue with SATA Hard Disks with NCQ support (Native Command Queuing). NCQ is a feature in some new SATA drives to improve performance. The problem is that some SATA Controllers (like those found on Mobo's with Intel Chipsets like the 865PE) do not support NCQ, and if a NCQ capable drive is connected to that kind of controller, problems can arise.
I checked with Seagate's website for my particular hard disk, and sure enough, my 120GB SATA Drive has NCQ support, whereas my 200GB SATA drive doesn't. So when used with my ASUS P4P800-X mobo (which uses the Intel 865PE chipset), the 120GB Drive will go postal and either crash Windows or go PIO mode because of the NCQ issue, while the 200GB Disk has no problems whatsoever.
Guess I'll see if I can exchange the 120GB drive with the non-NCQ version. If the retail store won't do that, then a suggestion from that forum above is to buy a Promise SATA controller card, which supports NCQ.
Originally posted by janfebmar:
Quote:never heard about anything like that... blame it on intel i say
i always go for AMD, never even heard small romours about such a problem with any SATA disks.
heh.
how come the totally equal drive (you say you got two seagate barracuda 120 GB S-ATA drives), dont have the same problem?
They're not the same drives. One is a 120GB SATA model ST3120827AS with NCQ support, the other is a 200GB SATA model ST320822AS with no NCQ support. Since the 200GB disk doesn't support NCQ, it works fine with my ASUS P4P800-X mobo (whose SATA controller is non-NCQ). The 120GB disk has NCQ, so it squawks like crazy.
Quote:never heard about anything like that... blame it on intel i say
i always go for AMD, never even heard small romours about such a problem with any SATA disks.
heh.
how come the totally equal drive (you say you got two seagate barracuda 120 GB S-ATA drives), dont have the same problem?
They're not the same drives. One is a 120GB SATA model ST3120827AS with NCQ support, the other is a 200GB SATA model ST320822AS with no NCQ support. Since the 200GB disk doesn't support NCQ, it works fine with my ASUS P4P800-X mobo (whose SATA controller is non-NCQ). The 120GB disk has NCQ, so it squawks like crazy.
Originally posted by Phalanx-Imawano:
Quote:My specs by the way:
Intel Pentium 4 3.0 GHz Prescott
Inno3D GeForce FX5600 w/ 256MB Video RAM and VIVO
ASUS P4P800-X Motherboard (Intel 865PE chipset, has provision for 2 SATA devices)
1GB PC3200 DDR RAM
Seagate 30GB 5400RPM Hard Disk (boot disk)
Seagate Barracuda 120GB Hard Disk (primary slave)
Seagate Barracuda 200GB SATA Hard Disk
Seagate Barracuda 120GB SATA Hard Disk (the one that's going PIO mode)
Sony DRU-710 DVD Burner with Dual-Layer writing support
Soundblaster Live 5.1 Soundcard
Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2
yes but what about the other drive?
the primary slave one.
Quote:My specs by the way:
Intel Pentium 4 3.0 GHz Prescott
Inno3D GeForce FX5600 w/ 256MB Video RAM and VIVO
ASUS P4P800-X Motherboard (Intel 865PE chipset, has provision for 2 SATA devices)
1GB PC3200 DDR RAM
Seagate 30GB 5400RPM Hard Disk (boot disk)
Seagate Barracuda 120GB Hard Disk (primary slave)
Seagate Barracuda 200GB SATA Hard Disk
Seagate Barracuda 120GB SATA Hard Disk (the one that's going PIO mode)
Sony DRU-710 DVD Burner with Dual-Layer writing support
Soundblaster Live 5.1 Soundcard
Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2
yes but what about the other drive?
the primary slave one.
Oh that one? That's a conventional Seagate 120GB ATA-100 Hard Drive (not SATA; rather the one that uses the familiar 80-wire ribbon cable).
Well after explaining my situation to the retailer, I got it exchanged. But since they didn't have a non-NCQ version of the 120GB SATA drive, they gave me a 120GB ATA-100 drive instead, and even threw in a bunch of DVD-RW's (8 discs, from Imation) as an act of good jesture.
