SATA DVD drive not recognized in BIOS 1

[gaiamgoat]

Hello all, I've looked through the forums here as well as Googled around, but can't find what I'm looking for. I have a new Dell Inspiron 531, and I want to install a Lite-On DVD drive (via SATA). BIOS does not recognize the drive, so Vista doesn't either. I've reseated the cables and tried different SATA connectors on the board. Still no luck. What am I doing wrong? Any suggestions? Thanks in advance!!

 

[wahnula]

The SATA port you're trying to use might not be available, it might be dedicated to RAID etc. Go into BIOS and look around for "secondary SATA" or SATA 1 (your HDD is probably SATA 0). See if it's set for RAID, or if you have an option for "SATA as IDE" or "Legacy Mode" or the like.

On my mainboard I have several empty SATA ports, but I can't use any of them as they are all "owned" by a RAID controller for expanding my arrays. For example, I'm running RAID 1 but there's (4) ports, with two free. They're available if I wanted to change my array to RAID 5 or RAID 10, but not for another device.

If you're not running RAID of any sort, make sure RAID is disabled in the BIOS, that might free up that port.

Tony

Users helping Users...

 

[gaiamgoat]

Sorry it took so long to get back. I was able to get it working. RAID was not enabled, but the machine had the option of enabling specific SATA ports. I never would have found that setting without your help. Thanks!

 

[wahnula]

Thanks for the update, glad you got it sorted. Too many people neglect this important step...the follow-up.

Tony

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