GA-EP45-UD3P rev1.6 for 3TB drives

[312BhP]

Thanks Ben, testing now...

Not using any RAID settings but it has all loaded and booted ok.

[rajindave]

I've flashed the modded ROM here to my EP45-UD3P rev.1.6 board but now when set to ACHI mode, as my previous bios set up was, on the intel ICH10R it no longer detects any drives installed but when set to ide or raid it will dectect them. When set to raid though it will crash to bluescreen while loading windows 7 although I have fully finished trying to get that to work yet as I ran out of time last night. Anyone have similar issues with the Intel ICH10R or able to provide any insight? Thanks.

[gto4ben]

Please provide a few more details to answer the following:
What version was the Bios when your system was working? Was the intel RAID enabled prior to flashing and which intel RST driver was originally used?
What year & make is the hard drive? Some of the older Seagate drives required firmware updates or they fail when used in RAID but may get by in a single AHCI config.
After flashing, did you "load optimized defaults" in the bios and then manually setup the bios to your preferences? This is required if you are jumping an earlier bios version to a much higher version. Incremental versions may or may not require it depending on the type of changes made to the bios.
Are you sure your RAM is good by using Windows Memory Diagnostic or Memtest86? Windows will be doing more processing to set itself up after a bios and configuration change so the memory needs to be in excellent shape and not severely overclocked, if at all. I would temporarily set the DRAM to "Standard" instead of performance just to help Win7 boot all the way. In Windows device manager (assuming you can boot up), you may find some peripherals have a Code 10 and not loaded. Usually, a "load optimized defaults" applied in the bios with the rollback to native Win7 drivers will allow all the peripherals to get installed and you can try to reinstall newer drivers.
What version of the intel RAID driver was installed on your Win 7 OS prior to the bios upgrade (or did you even have it installed)? The latest 11.7.1013 RAID driver has caused blue screens and corrupted data on my setup. Use 11.6.0.1030 or the 11.6.2. for stability.
I recall a similar incident on another PC I had where WinXP was configured for IDE in the device manager but I had set the bios to AHCI and it did not boot. Wikipedia says, "Some operating systems, notably Windows Vista and Windows 7, do not configure themselves to load the AHCI driver upon boot if the SATA-drive controller was not in AHCI mode at the time of installation. This can cause failure to boot, with an error message, if the SATA controller is later switched to AHCI mode. For this reason, Intel recommends changing the drive controller to AHCI or RAID before installing an operating system.[1] (It may also be necessary to load chipset-specific AHCI or RAID drivers — from a USB Flash drive, for example — at installation time.)
On Windows Vista and Windows 7, this can be fixed configuring the msahci device driver to start at boot time (rather than on-demand). Setting non-AHCI mode in the BIOS will allow the user to boot Windows, where the required registry change can be performed. The BIOS can then be changed to AHCI"
It may be that the bios config and your OS config do not match for AHCI but do for IDE. Unfortunately, this may require a reinstall of the OS if you truly want to have AHCI.

[rajindave]

Ok. My original BIOS was version FB.
AHCI was enabled and working with this.
I Have Intel drivers 9.1.1.1013 installed.
I have all seagate harddrive - 2 x ST3500630AS (500 GB), ST32000542AS (2 TB) ST31500341AS (1.5TB) and also have an OCZ Agility 3 SSD.
I was in the process of installing a seagate ST3000DM001 3TB drive which ended up being DOA and am awaiting replacement.

Didn't try "load optimized Defaults" but i will try that later and see what happens. But with this modded BIOS trying to use AHCI mode casuses the BIOS to no longer detect any drives at all unless I switch it back to IDE or RAID then the BIOS sees the drives. While set to RAID Win 7 crashes while starting up which i am thinking is likely some driver issue. I had installed Windows 7 on the SSD a couple of months ago and was running using ACHI mode so that part should be good there. I am sure my ram is good and is not currently overclocked.

My biggest problem right now is while having the Intel ICH10R set to ACHI mode I no longer have any drives dectected in my BIOS. I tried both files for ver 1.6 in this thread and had the same problem with both. When I get home I will try loading BIOS defaults and see if that helps anything.

Loading defaults didn't work. Loaded "GA-EP45-UD3P-r1.6-IMR10.6.0-JM1.07.28-RPXE2.39.FFB" from this thread HERE and ACHI mode now works fine.

[gto4ben]

I see that you have an SSD in your setup and that you have had success with modded BIOS version FFB. This makes sense since I have been using version FE for all my BIOS mods. The FFB beta version which was designed to work with SSDs was unstable in my setup so I abandoned it but may be fine for a system with an SSD.

I'll work on an updated FFB BIOS tonight for you with the updated OROMs.

[gto4ben]

I see that you have an SSD in your setup and that you have had success with modded BIOS version FFB. This makes sense since I have been using version FE for all my BIOS mods. The FFB beta version which was designed to work with SSDs was unstable in my setup so I abandoned it but may be fine for a system with an SSD.

I'll work on an updated FFB BIOS tonight for you with the updated OROMs.

Here you go for a GA-EP45-UD3P rev 1.6 with SSD drive working with the FFB BIOS. I needed to update only two items, the Intel RAID ROM and the 8111C ethernet. The AHCI and SATA2 ROMs remained the same. Let us know if this is successful.

ICH10R southbridge - v11.6.0.1702
8111C ethernet - rtegrom252.lom
SATA2 chip - jmb362_C_1.07.28 (was already updated)

[rajindave]

Here you go for a GA-EP45-UD3P rev 1.6 with SSD drive working with the FFB BIOS. I needed to update only two items, the Intel RAID ROM and the 8111C ethernet. The AHCI and SATA2 ROMs remained the same. Let us know if this is successful.

ICH10R southbridge - v11.6.0.1702
8111C ethernet - rtegrom252.lom
SATA2 chip - jmb362_C_1.07.28 (was already updated)

Sorry I haven't replied soonner but ive been busy at work. I loaded the updated FFb BIOS and checked it out and all seems to be working perfectly. Thank you very much.

[gto4ben]

If anyone is interested, I also updated the GA-EP45-UD3P rev 1.6 with the latest Realtek 8111C ROM. No noticeable improvement in performance or stability but appears to work fine.
ICH10R southbridge - v11.6.0.1702
8111C ethernet - rtegrom252.lom
SATA2 chip - jmb362_C_1.07.28
Gigabyte SLIC

If anyone is interested, I also updated the GA-EP45-UD3P rev 1.6 with the latest Intel OROM 12.0.0.1783. No noticeable improvement in performance or stability but appears to work fine. I'm testing it with RST 11.6.2.1002. If anyone is brave enough to try the new RST 11.7.1.1001 or the new RST beta 12.0.0.1083, let us know how that works out.
ICH10R southbridge - v12.0.0.1783
8111C ethernet - rtegrom252.lom
SATA2 chip - jmb362_C_1.07.28
Gigabyte SLIC

[gto4ben]

If anyone is interested, I also updated the GA-EP45-UD3P rev 1.6 with the latest Realtek 8111C ROM. No noticeable improvement in performance or stability but appears to work fine.
ICH10R southbridge - v11.6.0.1702
8111C ethernet - rtegrom252.lom
SATA2 chip - jmb362_C_1.07.28
Gigabyte SLIC

If anyone is interested, I also updated the GA-EP45-UD3P rev 1.6 with the latest Intel OROM 12.0.0.1783. No noticeable improvement in performance or stability but appears to work fine. I'm testing it with RST 11.6.2.1002. If anyone is brave enough to try the new RST 11.7.1.1001 or the new RST beta 12.0.0.1083, let us know how that works out.
ICH10R southbridge - v12.0.0.1783
8111C ethernet - rtegrom252.lom
SATA2 chip - jmb362_C_1.07.28
Gigabyte SLIC

If anyone is interested, I also updated the above GA-EP45-UD3P rev 1.6 FE BIOS with the latest Intel OROM 12.5.0.1815. and I'm testing it with RST 12.5.0.1066. Also included in the new Realtek 8111C rtegrom 2.53. After one day of testing, boots and sleeps fine. No issues so far. I really like the RST 12 series. The performance tab makes it easy to review your cache and link power management settings
ICH10R southbridge - v12.5.0.1815
8111C ethernet - rtegrom253.lom

[Doofly]

If anyone is interested, I also updated the GA-EP45-UD3P rev 1.6 with the latest Realtek 8111C ROM. No noticeable improvement in performance or stability but appears to work fine.
ICH10R southbridge - v11.6.0.1702
8111C ethernet - rtegrom252.lom
SATA2 chip - jmb362_C_1.07.28
Gigabyte SLIC

If anyone is interested, I also updated the GA-EP45-UD3P rev 1.6 with the latest Intel OROM 12.0.0.1783. No noticeable improvement in performance or stability but appears to work fine. I'm testing it with RST 11.6.2.1002. If anyone is brave enough to try the new RST 11.7.1.1001 or the new RST beta 12.0.0.1083, let us know how that works out.
ICH10R southbridge - v12.0.0.1783
8111C ethernet - rtegrom252.lom
SATA2 chip - jmb362_C_1.07.28
Gigabyte SLIC

If anyone is interested, I also updated the above GA-EP45-UD3P rev 1.6 FE BIOS with the latest Intel OROM 12.5.0.1815. and I'm testing it with RST 12.5.0.1066. Also included in the new Realtek 8111C rtegrom 2.53. After one day of testing, boots and sleeps fine. No issues so far. I really like the RST 12 series. The performance tab makes it easy to review your cache and link power management settings
ICH10R southbridge - v12.5.0.1815
8111C ethernet - rtegrom253.lom

I've had this motherboard for a while in my HTPC and ran without a hitch. I've recently repurposed it for a server and have a 3TB drive...hence how I finally found this site a couple days ago.

Anyway...I've been trying to re-flash the BIOS with this latest build you posted, but it seems as if the flashing program isn't working at all. I followed the directions as posted here for the AWARD BIOS. Unfortunately, all I get is a screen with a flashing "Please Wait"...it just sits there. After 30+ min, if I reboot the machine, it boots with the original BIOS intact.
   
Is there an updated instruction set to flash this motherboard? Can I use the Gigabyte flash utility (FLASHSPI.EXE) instead with the posted file?