MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

[binsonk]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

I have tried to install these two drives in several computers. One computer in particular, based on Asus A7N8X mobo, worked well, except there was no sound. It's very unfortunate that there was no sound because I will be using this computer for music video playback. There was no sound because of the unusual way that audio is processed by the nForce2 APU and outputted to Realtek ALC650 DAC. I intend to open another thread on this Asus board with audio issue. Point: Of several computers I tried, this MSI motherboard is the only mobo to fail to see and setup the two hard drives. Therefore, it is unlikely that something is wrong with the two hard drives.

[binsonk]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

It's a fact that AwardBIOS v6.00PG does not recognize the CPU, so maybe a BIOS upgrade is called for.

[stj]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

audio problems on modern boards are because your linux is old.

a lot of newer boards use stuff like azalia ( probably spelt wrong) soundsystem.
these chips can detect if you have speakers or headfones or line out on any connector and autoconfigure to it.
the kernel must handle this or the mixer will not work properly - specially if your using Pulse-Audio.

[binsonk]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

The real puzzler about that onboard audio issue is that a PCI sound card doesn't work either.
http://www.hardwareanalysis.com/content/topic/4104/

[stj]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

probably because the system wants to use the onboard sound first.

if you go into the config and change the default audio driver to match the soundcard it will probably work.

you can get similar problems with a gfx card on a board with onboard video once you try to use opengl or other 3d modes.

[binsonk]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

If you'll peruse that thread from Hardware Analysis, linked above, you'll notice that it's not a Linux issue per se. Lots of people having problems with this audio design. There's a lotta good ideas in that thread.

[binsonk]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

I'm having trouble with flashing the BIOS with the software provided. If you will be good enough to extract Award Bios version 1.A, you can read instructions and advise. I installed WinXP on a spare hdd connected to the system. I extracted the version 1.A download to a folder on the C drive, namely C:\test. Then I rebooted to Win98 DOS prompt, but could not find C: because C is ramdrive for the DOS files. Couldn't really find any drives from DOS prompt (because DOS can't see NTFS?). So I rebooted to Administrator command prompt, and ran AWFL859G.EXE and got a display of the desired Award Flasher, but it was inaccessible, with a note that Win NT, 2000, XP OS are not supported. So then I generated a (WinMe) floppy boot disk from WinXP, but could not find any drives from A: prompt, similar to Win98 boot disk, error: Invalid drive specification. I also tried to install Win98 on that spare hard drive, but after the first restart, I got an error that the program didn't have enough RAM to continue, even though I have 1.5 GB of RAM. Although instructions say I can do this flash from WinXP, I suspect that it will work only with Win98. Any opinions? Open to suggestions on how to proceed.
http://us.msi.com/support/mb/K8MMV.html#down-bios

Insufficient memory to initialize Windows 98
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/184447

[Dan81]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

I'm having trouble with flashing the BIOS with the software provided. If you will be good enough to extract Award Bios version 1.A, you can read instructions and advise. I installed WinXP on a spare hdd connected to the system. I extracted the version 1.A download to a folder on the C drive, namely C:\test. Then I rebooted to Win98 DOS prompt, but could not find C: because C is ramdrive for the DOS files. Couldn't really find any drives from DOS prompt (because DOS can't see NTFS?). So I rebooted to Administrator command prompt, and ran AWFL859G.EXE and got a display of the desired Award Flasher, but it was inaccessible, with a note that Win NT, 2000, XP OS are not supported. So then I generated a (WinMe) floppy boot disk from WinXP, but could not find any drives from A: prompt, similar to Win98 boot disk, error: Invalid drive specification. I also tried to install Win98 on that spare hard drive, but after the first restart, I got an error that the program didn't have enough RAM to continue, even though I have 1.5 GB of RAM. Although instructions say I can do this flash from WinXP, I suspect that it will work only with Win98. Any opinions? Open to suggestions on how to proceed.
http://us.msi.com/support/mb/K8MMV.html#down-bios

Insufficient memory to initialize Windows 98
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/184447

Try using a USB pendrive:
http://forums.evga.com/How-To-Flash-...de-m15265.aspx
Just download the ZIP,make the bootable pendrive using the DOS files provided but DO NOT add autoexec.bat.Just add the flasher and the BIOS file.

Oh,and when flashing from USB try unplugging any PATA/SATA harddrive.The BIOS (Award BIOS)won't find anything else to boot from than the DVD-ROM and the pendrive,but it will boot the pendrive straight into the DOS prompt.

Method tested on my P4P800-VM with Foxconn 865A01-G-6ELS BIOS and works. Award BIOS booted my 16GB Hama pendrive straight away.

[Sparkey55]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

I'm having trouble with flashing the BIOS with the software provided. If you will be good enough to extract Award Bios version 1.A, you can read instructions and advise. I installed WinXP on a spare hdd connected to the system. I extracted the version 1.A download to a folder on the C drive, namely C:\test. Then I rebooted to Win98 DOS prompt, but could not find C: because C is ramdrive for the DOS files. Couldn't really find any drives from DOS prompt (because DOS can't see NTFS?). So I rebooted to Administrator command prompt, and ran AWFL859G.EXE and got a display of the desired Award Flasher, but it was inaccessible, with a note that Win NT, 2000, XP OS are not supported. So then I generated a (WinMe) floppy boot disk from WinXP, but could not find any drives from A: prompt, similar to Win98 boot disk, error: Invalid drive specification. I also tried to install Win98 on that spare hard drive, but after the first restart, I got an error that the program didn't have enough RAM to continue, even though I have 1.5 GB of RAM. Although instructions say I can do this flash from WinXP, I suspect that it will work only with Win98. Any opinions? Open to suggestions on how to proceed.
http://us.msi.com/support/mb/K8MMV.html#down-bios

Insufficient memory to initialize Windows 98
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/184447

If you have a pyhsical floppy drive connected to the motherboard use this method. Download drdflash.exe from a reputable website and follow the instructions for creating a clean boot to dos floppy disk.

Then copy to the boot disk AWFL859G.EXE and W7142VMS.1A0

Now restart the computer with the boot disk you just created and run the flash program from the A: drive. If flash is good reboot.

[binsonk]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

Okay, I flashed the BIOS. Processor was identified as Sempron 2600. IDE detection was swift, accurate, complete. But I got a GRUB error 18. Legacy GRUB. It's suggested that the fix for this is in BIOS.

[Sparkey55]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

If you do not have a floppy drive you can also do this with an optical drive. You will need to make a boot cd using a image file to burn to a cd-r. And will need to burn a cd-r as a data disc with the flasher program and bios file on it. Do not transfer the files to the HDD.

[binsonk]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

I changed the date to today, rebooted, got the GRUB boot menu. The timeout counted down, and then the computer rebooted, instead of proceeding to desktop. Stuck in a loop of rebooting after GRUB boot menu. Can't boot a live CD, just hangs before files loaded to RAM.

[SteveNielsen]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...-error-437543/

[binsonk]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

In BIOS, I did a manual check on all drives, including optical. Went through the BIOS, looking for something. Didn't find much wrong. Rebooted. Voila, desktop for the first time. Seagate drive is shown as an unmounted desktop icon. Looks good, normal. Restarted, cold booted, just works.

[binsonk]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

Small issue with sound card. After reboot, sound takes about 15 seconds to kick in the first time. After it kicks in, sound works until next reboot. With a cold boot, I have to call ALSA sound wizard to re-install the driver, ES1988 Alegro-1 (rev10).

EDIT: A Yamaha card worked flawlessly, so it's fixed.

[binsonk]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

@stj
I just ran a live CD of Slacko 5.5 (kernel 3.2.33) on the Asus mobo A7N8X. I heard onboard sound for the first time. It's good to know there's nothing wrong with the board. I guess I will set this unit aside for now.

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: MSI MS7412 mobo will not boot two hdd's

I'm having trouble with flashing the BIOS with the software provided. If you will be good enough to extract Award Bios version 1.A, you can read instructions and advise. I installed WinXP on a spare hdd connected to the system. I extracted the version 1.A download to a folder on the C drive, namely C:\test. Then I rebooted to Win98 DOS prompt, but could not find C: because C is ramdrive for the DOS files. Couldn't really find any drives from DOS prompt (because DOS can't see NTFS?). So I rebooted to Administrator command prompt, and ran AWFL859G.EXE and got a display of the desired Award Flasher, but it was inaccessible, with a note that Win NT, 2000, XP OS are not supported. So then I generated a (WinMe) floppy boot disk from WinXP, but could not find any drives from A: prompt, similar to Win98 boot disk, error: Invalid drive specification. I also tried to install Win98 on that spare hard drive, but after the first restart, I got an error that the program didn't have enough RAM to continue, even though I have 1.5 GB of RAM. Although instructions say I can do this flash from WinXP, I suspect that it will work only with Win98. Any opinions? Open to suggestions on how to proceed.
http://us.msi.com/support/mb/K8MMV.html#down-bios

Insufficient memory to initialize Windows 98
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/184447

It's a bug with Windows 98, but Microsoft won't fix it and claim it's a feature and not a bug, lol.

It appears that at least on a system I tested, there was a 768 MB limit and if exceeded, causes the Windows loader to give a false insufficient memory error message.

(This includes setting the virtual memory to bigger than 768 MB, on reboot the Windows loader will refuse to load Windows with a false insufficient memory error message.)