Intel 82801GR / GH Sata Raid Controller

[bloort]

Well, this is the first software that i've found to see past the intel raid for at least one of the two drives. I'm impressed so far!!! I even tried something from intel themselves which i figured was the compatible software and it caused my computer to make a nasty nasty noise, crashed flat to power off and didn't want to start again. scary stuff. This is MUCH friendlier... i love seeing the word excellent beside my hard drive!! just say it out loud...excellent. But I would like to see it's raid1 (mirror) friend too if possible.

This is a mirrored raid. Any chance of seeing both before I break my mirrow only to peek at the smart? I would love to have this software monitor both drives. I've had the intel controller on 4 occasions degrade the raid and reporting a bad drive..after software wierdness or power outage..but seeing as i've reinitialized the same supposedly failed drive each time, i tend not believe mr intel, although i hope he's right when he shows me the "all is well" icon in the system tray. So one is great, would love to see both on the mirror Raid..any chances, or is this computer getting too dated to bother?

I'm very tempted to try this on the nforce 590 raid5.
i've only ever found one software to successfully accomplish that.

thank you.
D

[hdsentinel]

Hi,

Thanks for your message and kind words, I'm glad to see that the software is useful for you

Maybe updating the driver for the hard disk controller helps.
I'd recommend to check the "Driver Zone" section (Support -> Driver Zone) at http://www.hdsentinel.com/driverzone.php
and download the latest Intel RAID controller driver.
After installation (and restart) it is possible that further information will be reported in Hard Disk Sentinel.

If you can use Report menu -> Send test report to developer function in the software, I can check the information reported by the disk controller and verify the possibilities to get complete status information.

[bloort]

Thank you for your reply.

I will have to take some time to verify driver compatibily. The last time i tried this, i downloaded 'intel active moniotr' from intel.com and as near as i could figure out, this was the right software for my Pentium 4 / 945 express Dell dimension 9150. Bad BAD BAD... that's what cause my computer to crash like i've never seen before. It didn't even want to power up. So i am, and always have been, leary of intel driver updates..to me they are very convoluted.

A subsequent visit to intel for the 945 express desktop chipset told me that "intel rapid storgae technology' was supposed to be my latest greatest. But the readme didn't list the 82801GR (?) controller, and said minimum CPU was Pentium 2 DUO. My cpu is reported as Pentium D CPU 930 3.00 GHZ. Your driver lists all these ICH versions, and i'm not sure what those are. My spidey sense is kinda tingling, but then again, i'm not done my coffee. But the fact that this thing is a Dell system, kinda makes me want to shy away. Intel matrix console 6 is what is running now...and has been a little unreliable.

I need yoda to tell me either 'aint broke, don't fix' or which intell driver to use with this pentiumD 945 express chipset.!
"Do, or do not do. There is no format C:"

I'm having great fun investigating your software on my drive0, and it detected my NDAS drives too! It's fascinating and reassuring! Very clean looking too! It amazes me how you figure all this stuff out, let alone code it!

peace.
hippydave

[hdsentinel]

Yes, I completely understand if you worry about such updates.
I'd happily check the current drivers used and the information reported by them to find out what would be the best solution.
Please use Report menu -> Send test report to developer option for that and I can check which are the most reliable and best drivers and/or software version which would work and provide as much details as possible.

[bloort]

Well shiver me timbers! it worked!

Dell dimension 9150 / P4 prescott 3.0 / intel 945 express. I upgraded to the intel drivers you recommended (which were the same that intel was pointing me to on their site) and now both drives are represented HDsentinel.. I'm simply amazed. and no signs of magic smoke!

I'm just syncing the Raid1 now, and will reboot in a couple of hours, but everything looks 100%.

Wow, and i read in SO many blogs that even accessing smart info on the other side of a raid controller was impossible.
Don't know how you guys did it, but now do i not only have RAID1 integrety, I have the opportunity for HDsentinel to monitor the drives.

and thank you for the reply and encouragement. Without that, i would probably have refrained from trying the intel driver update. Everything is "excellent" too!

re: spoiffEffodE kr, i'm not sure if your post was directed at me. actually, i'm not clear at all on what you are talking about. i'm a pretty good system guy, and i know my way around XP and MS servers pretty good. maybe slow down a bit, take a breath, and be more specific on what's going on. first rule in the hitchhikers guide to the univers is: don't panic.

[hdsentinel]

I'm glad that now it works

I know how disk monitoring is important, even (or especially?) in RAID situations.
This is the most important: to support as many RAID controllers and arrays as possible in Hard Disk Sentinel - and I'm constantly check new ways to improve hardware support and add further devices

If I can help somehow, please just let me know.

Sorry for the "post" of the other user. I'm fighting hard against spam - but sometimes they hit the forum.
I wonder why they think they're cool or their post will remain. I deleted it of course.

[bloort]

Well, everything seems to work perfectly. Tried it on my other machine with nVidia nforce 590 Raid5, ROM 9.83 and driver 10.0.3.46 and works perfectly there. I'm very impressed.

The only question on my mind is will monitoring a drive (network attached, usb, raid etc) with HDsentinel have any effect on the power management, esp if a disk is set to spin down after timeout? If so, does would that cause a gap in the drive's log? Any diffence in this respect between the pro and home versions?

I'm ready to recommend this on to the IT dept as it sits now.
thank you.

[bloort]

Just a quick note on the 945 chipset and the intel 10.5 rapid storage array driver update.
Somewhere along the way, windows xp3 32 decided that all my cdrom drivers were corrupt; including the virtual drive, and the annoying roxio virtual drive that won't go away. Yeah, all 4 had a yellow yield sign and talked about corrupt drivers.

not sure how i ended up there, i'm pretty sure (squinting like i'm pretty sure i paid for lunch the last time) they were ok before. anyhow, just in case this ever comes up and needs a quick fix, i had to:

Find "UpperFilters" and "LowerFilters" (and "UpperFilters.bak" "LowerFilters.bak", if they exist) value under the following key in the registry, and delete them:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}

of which i only had "UpperFilters" value. none of the others. anyhow, right as rain.. another little mr gates mystery. one quick reboot and all is well.

[hdsentinel]

Glad to hear things are working correctly

The detection of actual disk parameters (including health, temperature and so) works like an other read command for the hard disk, so it resets the idle timer.
If the idle timeout is set to a higher value, it is possible that Hard Disk Sentinel polls the drive more frequently, preventing the drive(s) from sleeping.
In contrast, if Hard Disk Sentinel detects that a drive is actually sleeping, it does not try to poll information, to prevent wake up of the corresponding drive(s). In this case, the last measured information is still displayed, but on the Information page you can see that the drive is sleeping (Power state: sleeping, not active).

Please check Configuration -> Advanced options, where you can adjust the frequency of the detection. Just set it to poll information once per every 30 minutes or every hour (or even use less frequent setting) according the power management setting of Windows.

This is true for all versions, no difference between the standard/Pro/Enterprise versions.

[hdsentinel]

Thanks for sharing the tip!