Follow-Up: How to Enable Intel ICH RAID After Installing Windows Vista
An update to this post can be found here
Many people seem to have found my original post about enabling ICH RAID after installing Vista quite helpful, so I thought it would be worth adding a follow-up post to add a few details.
First, some people have suggested that you can simply search for the iastor.sys file instead of navigating to the path I mentioned in the first post. This should be a fine alternative to manually navigating there, but just be sure to pick the right iastor.sys file.
Second, some people mention that right-clicking on the iastor.inf file located in the same directory as the iastor.sys file gives you an “Install” option. I have seen that option, and I tried installing the driver in that manner, but it did not work for me. Your mileage may vary.
Third, there is the question of ControlSet001 vs CurrentControlSet in the registry entries. Without getting into too much detail, the CurrentControlSet value in the registry is simply a pointer to whichever Control Set has been loaded by Windows. For simplicity (and compatability’s) sake, I have changed all entries in the reg file to point to CurrentControSet, rather than to a specific, numbered control set. More often than not, your system will be using ControlSet001, but that might not always be the case.
Finally, Intel has updated their Matrix Storage Manager software as of 3/13, which means changes need to be made to the registry information in my previous post if you want to install the newest version of the software right off the bat. If you would rather stick with the slightly older build, you can find it here.
What I decided to do was take a snapshot of the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE portion of my registry before and after installing the newest version of the Matrix Storage Manager software to see what values might have changed between versions. I suppose I can’t say that this is an absolutely bulletproof way of determining what has changed, but it’s a pretty darn good attempt.
Luckily, not a ton has changed – in fact, only one section of the registry file has been altered in the new release.
The second key in the registry file that adds data to the
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4D36E97B-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}\0001
key has been slightly altered. The changes to that section are on lines 2, 5, 6, and 7, which simply denote driver version changes:
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4D36E97B-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}\0001]
"InfPath"="oem9.inf"
"InfSection"="iaStor_Inst_RAID"
"ProviderName"="Intel"
"DriverDateData"=hex:00,00,97,ae,db,8b,c9,01
"DriverDate"="2-11-2009"
"DriverVersion"="8.8.0.1009"
"MatchingDeviceId"="pci\\ven_8086&dev_2822&cc_0104"
"DriverDesc"="Intel(R) ICH8R/ICH9R/ICH10R/DO SATA RAID Controller"
That’s it – those are the only differences, aside from “Enum” entries that are specific to your computer.
Hopefully this helps some of you looking to switch on RAID in your Vista install.
Grab the NEW registry file here
Grab the OLD registry file updated to reflect CurrentControlSet here
Also, if someone would like to take a registry snapshot of their computer before and after both RAID is configured and Matrix Storage Manager is installed, I would love to see those registry files so I can do a bit of comparison.
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39 Responses to “Follow-Up: How to Enable Intel ICH RAID After Installing Windows Vista”
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Thank you so much!!! What a life saver! You saved me countless hours re-installing Vista and everything. Worked perfectly
Thanks
Glad to help!
Hi DrNathan,
I have tried both methods, i am able to boot into windows but the ICH10R has a device error 10 and cannot start.
I am using a raid 5 array, ASUS P6T, and vista x64. If i boot into AHCI it picks up all the drives and says RAID5 is now available, RAID5 being the name of the array.
Any ideas? Thanks!
Perhaps you could try uninstalling the ICH10R controllers in the device manager and then scanning for new hardware to see if they reinstall properly.
Otherwise, if you are able to boot into Windows in RAID mode, I would download the latest Matrix Storage Manager package from Intel’s site and try the full install now that you have a booting, RAID-enabled Windows installation.
God sent! It worked wihtout any issue.
I am in process of initializing the Mirror for RAID 1 as I am typing.
1) Grab the new registry file.
2) Run it, and confirmed script was good and applied changes to registry.
3) Rebooted.
4) Changed SATA mode to RAID
5) Saved Bios and Rebooted
6) I was 50/50 expecting to see the Vista Blue Screen Error, but nothing!
7) After login in Vista, new setup and RAID that I had already configured was recongnized and drivers installed.
I took the change, it was either this solution, or having to re-install my OS from start with RAID setting ready.
Well done Dr. Nathan…
I have the same problem but with xp pro….. xp pro already installed.. need to incorprate raid drivers in to the installed O/S so that I can set up raid… Any advice please…
mrgeeky,
The same process described above *should* work.
The Control Class structure in the registry should be close enough to work. If you want to give it a try, I suggest the following:
1) Create a system restore point, but also manually back up your registry.
2) Try the procedure and see what comes out of it
If it works, great. If not, you can always roll back to the last known working configuration and continue on from there.
didnt work.. Made back up, restored back up image to spare drive to try your method on.. In the end, failed to boot…. Now going to try slipstreaming raid drivers in to a xp cd with nlite. Then will run a repair on the back up drive that failed to boot.. Will let you know how that goes… cheers for the advice…
That’s a bummer it did not work. Keep us posted on your progress – if you ever get a chance to pull the controller information from your registry, I would gladly post it to help others in the future!
Hi, I am wondering if I stuffed up instructions.. going to give it another go.. I was wondering, would entering the above in to my registery work considering I have an Intel ICH10DO Sata raid controller? I dont see it in the list above..
This entry was written by DrNathan , posted on Monday March 09 2009at 11:03 am , filed under Technology, Tips, Walk-throughs and tagged Blue Screen RAID, Dell XPS, ICH10, ICH10R, ICH8, ICH8R, ICH9, ICH9R, Intel, Matrix Storage Manager, RAID, RAID BSOD, Vista BSOD, Vista RAID, Windows RAID . Bookmark the permalink .
I was reading this from this site here..
http://drnathan.teamhackaday.com/2009/03/09/how-to-enable-intel-ich-raid-after-installing-windows-vista/
so would the reg entry on the above link work considering my controller… cheers…
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4D36E97B
-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}001]
“InfPath”=”oem0.inf”
“InfSection”=”viasprid”
“InfSectionExt”=”.NT”
“ProviderName”=”VIA Technologies, Inc.”
“DriverDateData”=hex:00,c0,7c,66,79,b4,c3,01
“DriverDate”=”11-27-2003″
“DriverVersion”=”5.1.2600.100″
“MatchingDeviceId”=”pci\\ven_1106&dev_3249″
“DriverDesc”=”VIA VT6421 RAID Controller”
the other thing Im scratching my head over, is I have a Intel board! Data that came with it shows that I have a ICH10DO Sata raid controller. So why does my registery show a via raid controller?
Hope Im not confusing things here, but my O/S was copied over from another system by using a hardware independent install.. Kept all proggys in place etc.. Just wondering if the above is hang over from the other board? Maybe theres another reg key with Intel controller info? .
Jeeze I hope I’m making sense… lol
It should work just fine with your ICH10DO controller, as you can see it mentions the DO in this line from the reg file above:
“DriverDesc”=”Intel(R) ICH8R/ICH9R/ICH10R/DO SATA RAID Controller”
I would bet that part of your problem stems from that VIA information still being stored in the registry.
What motherboard do you have?
When the computer is booting, look closely at the BIOS messages that appear, specifically the messages pertaining to your raid controller. Usually a “CTRL + I” key press when the controller is loading will take you into the Intel ICH controller configuration. Just double-check that you do indeed have an Intel controller on board.
If you are 100% sure that you do have the Intel controller, you could always try removing the registry key that contains the VIA information and starting my process again.
Also, the registry entry in the link you found to my first post should work as well, the difference between that post and this is merely the version of the Intel Matrix Storage Manager used.
thanks for the help DrNathan… Its really appreciated… My motherboard is an Intel board, DQ45CB I had another go at your fix..
After going in to BIOS and changing controller to raid, then booting in to windows, it blue screened.. Changed back to boot from IDE (sata emulation) controller it still bluescreened…
going to restore another copy of my O/S to play with before going any further so will be off line for a little while…
I will delete the via controller registery keys on my other ( back up ) system once I have it up and running and will give it another crack…
Cheers for the advice…
Unforunately, no go.. I deleted all the VIA reg entries, and gave it another go.. Wont boot unless Im in IDE mode…
Oh well, it was worth a shot…
cheers for your help.
You are the man. Thanks for this … saved me a lot of pain (and I’d already been through some!). 1.5Tb mirror now up and running!
Hi,
I tried the methods listed above with the new reg file and latest iastor.sys. However I’m getting a weird problem. I can boot into windows xp but after 10sec, i get the bsod with an error to check for adequate disk space. I don’t get that error in safe mode.
Also when I switch back to ide mode in the bios, i get the same error. and no problem in safe mode. Does this issue ring a bell? Any help would be great.
I am running xp home 32bit, if that helps.
Kevin
Kevin,
I have not seen that error at all before. It almost definitely has to do with the new registry data and the drivers, but it is not something I have come across. I would try rolling back Windows to the “Last known good configuration” and see if it remedies the problem. Once you get there, we can move forward.
I found this most useful however after just adding the registry entries I still got BSOD on boot in both Vista X64 and WIndows 7 X64. I found that I had to alter the startup of the drivers in the registry to autostart from disabled. The following entries in currentcontrolset/services needed to be modified. iastor, iastorv and iirsp. After changing the start parameter to 0 for all of these everything worked great. I now have raid on both VistaX64 and Windows 7. I should not the original O/S had AHCI enable to the intel matrix manager and drivers were already installed so it was a bit easier for me.
I followed the instructions from the previous post and everything works great. EXCEPT the latest windows update causes bluescreens. I also cannot uninstall VM Workstation. I get the bluescreens when I do that too. What I think is happening is they are undoing the disk drivers. Does anyone have an idea of what I can do?
johnnycrash,
Are you referring to my first post regarding this issue, or the most recent comment in this post?
I would try rolling windows back to the Last Known Good configuration and then try the instructions from the comments section here: http://drnathan.teamhackaday.com/2009/03/09/how-to-enable-intel-ich-raid-after-installing-windows-vista/#comment-1447
This should set you on your way to a problem-free RAID configuration, even after applying Windows updates.
Thanks! Works perfectly.
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Hi Everyone,
I took a completely different approach.
I moved my boot (C:) drive from the ICH10R over to the GSATA connector.
I adjusted the BIOS setup (boot sequence, etc) until I could get Windows Vista-64 to boot from (drive-5 Master in my case)
Rebooted several times to insure this was solid!
Then, in BIOS setup, I changed the ICH10R to enable RAID.
After booting into WindowsV64, I installed the Intel-MxMgr (8.9.0.1023)
I have since defined several RAID-0 configurations on data drives connected to the ICH10R
I have not yet tried to move the boot drive back to a “non-RAID” defined ICH10R port, (maybe I won’t) (maybe I’ll just move the pagefile to a RAID-0 stripe)
So far, everything is working as desired.
Thanks, Ed
**********************************************************************
**********************************************************************
This method worked fine for the 32-bit Win 7 on my dual-boot setup, the 64-bit Win 7, however, still blue screens. (I DID make sure to use the x64 iastor.sys), but I have not yet defined a RAID array.
Why? I feel that I’m missing something in the registry…but I have set both iastor and iastorV to 0, even msahci to 0.
Is it possibe something would be different on my x64 installation for the ICH9R chip?
I’m hoping that later I can image both OS’s and restore them to an array.
I am thinking that what I’m trying here is not possible because of the way RAID itself is implemented, or am I off base?
The 64-bit is on another physical hard drive from where the bootmgr is.
I suppose I’ll have to alter the bootmgr code, but is this even feasible?
You could give the registry file found here a go:
http://drnathan.teamhackaday.com/2009/03/09/how-to-enable-intel-ich-raid-after-installing-windows-vista/
This is the exact file I used for Vista x64, though that is not 100% guaranteed to work in Windows 7
Thanks very much for your quick and incisive reply, in spite of my unfocused and exhausted technical ramblings.
That reg file worked like a charm!
Everything functioning great under Windows 7 x64, so far….
I also set ‘iirsp’ Start=0, though I don’t know how relevant that was.
Thanks again !
No problem, glad it worked for you!
Tried this on Windows 7 x64 last night which was in AHCI mode and I wanted to move to RAID (ICH10R)… Intel Matrix Storage Manager was already installed (I downgraded to the version you linked to be safe), ran the patch and switched to RAID, and booted without a problem. You are a lifesaver, thank you very much for this information!
The registry you list shows “DriverDesc”=”Intel(R) ICH8R/ICH9R/ICH10R/DO SATA RAID Controller”
I have a Dell Optiplex 330 with the 975X ICHR7 chipset will this process work?
Windows XP SP3
Many thanks!
Al,
Looking at Intel’s summary of the Matrix Storage Manager software, the latest version does mention support for the ICH7R chipset, so it *should* work without any issues.
As the software installs the same driver across the board, I would think that you should be just fine. If you give it a shot, let me know – I would like to know how you make out!
Thanks for the info, I will try this evening
Al
Well, I followed all the steps and no luck. Note: this is XP Pro not Vista and Dell Optiplex 330 with the 975X ICHR7 chipset . When I attempt to reboot the PC it goes right into the Intel matrix Storage ROM and tells me disk are degraded and the like. Not sure what to do at this point, maybe return the newly purchased HD and chalk up another winn for the PC
Any thoughts are appreciated!
Al
Al,
Are you trying to create a RAID 0 or RAID 1 array?
Windows and the Matrix Storage ROM are two mutually exclusive portions of the RAID configuration, so the changes you made in Windows should not affect the configuration on the actual RAID controller. I would try playing around with the settings on the controller for a bit and seeing what you can make of it, it sounds like the issue you are having regarding the “degraded” array is a controller-level issue.
Thanks for the reply. I am attempting Raid 1. My options in the BIOS are RAID, ACH and ICH. I will look into it further.
Al
Please tak a look at this from Intel, especially the “Warning” comment.
http://www.intel.com/support/chipsets/imsm/sb/CS-029980.htm
Your comments are appreciated.
Al
Yeah, that warning from Intel is precisely what my post helps to fix. You might be having issues since yours is an ICH7 chipset, though again if you are encountering issues before booting at the actual chipset configuration dialogs, that is another issue altogether.
I will say that the RAID controller may report a degraded array while it builds a RAID 1 mirror, but that depends on chipsets. I am not 100% sure it applies here, but that could be the case.
Any luck booting into Windows at all?