mobo difficulties - sata2_0 showing in CMOS as IDE channel 2

[cbliss1000]

Hello!

I'm building a work computer for a friend (specs below), but it won''t boot past the "verifying DMI pool data screen." After some experimenting, I found that by removing the hard drive all was well, until, of course, I needed a hard drive to install the OS (XP32).

After posting here on anandtech, I was told to double check the hard drive settings in CMOS. Having done so, I realize that there is a problem: CMOS tells me that the hd is plugged into IDE Channel 2 Master, which it isn't - it's plugged into the SATA2_0 port, where it should be (and which should read as IDE Channel 0 Master, no?). The fact that it "isn't" in the primary position may account for the dmi pool data hangup, suggesting a mobo failure. I experimented further and found that none of the SATA2 ports on my mobo register as IDE channel 0.

What should I do? I've tried resetting CMOS, made sure everything was snugly attached etc... Oh, and a spare hard drive worked perfectly when plugged in via an old ribbon-style sata belt, but I can't use it (it's my backup drive).

phenom II x3 720
gigabyte ga-ma758gm-us2h
wd caviar green 750gb hd
asus eah4350 radeon hd 4350
samsung 22x dvd drive
lynksys wmp300n-rm pci wireless adapter
antec earthwatts 380psu
coolermaster elite 335 case

Thanks in advance. Sorry for my verbosity.

 

[sirmonkey1985]

IDE channel 0 should be the normal IDE channel.. since there are 2 channels for IDE.. 0 and 1.. it would then make SATA2_0 channel 2.. another trick would be to try using the optimized default bios setting.. sometimes it works because thats the only may my 780G mobo would boot up.. and i could never figure out what setting it changed to make it work..

 

[Old Hippie]

Oh, and a spare hard drive worked perfectly when plugged in via an old ribbon-style sata belt.....

That's an IDE drive.

I'm not real familiar with AMD chipsets but somewhere in your BIOS you should have a setting for the MB to see the drives as IDE, SATA, or AHCI.

Try setting it to SATA?

 

[cbliss1000]

will do - thanks for the advice... I'll post again w/ results.

EDIT: Yeah, no luck, I tried all the suggestions. To reiterate my problem: my new build is stuck @ the "Verifying DMI Pool Data" screen. When I remove the hard drive, it boots just fine and I can run xp installation. I suspect, however, that the mobo and not the hard drive is the issue, because CMOS says that the hard drive is plugged into IDE Channel 2Master and NOT IDE Channel 0 Master (according to this article, if the hard drive settings in CMOS are screwy you can get stuck where I am). None of the SATA2 ports actually read as IDE Channel 0.

Sirmonkey: I'm not 100% sure what you're saying about the IDE channels. Are you saying that anything plugged into the SATA2_0 port will read as IDE Channel 2 in CMOS?

 

[cbliss1000]

YAY! Turns out, all I had to do was change the boot priority from hard drive to cd in the BIOS, as recommended in the page linked to above. For whatever reason, it didn't want to boot w/ an empty hard disk, even though xp was in the dvd drive... I've never had this problem before w/ builds (if the priority boot didn't have bootable files, the bios just checked the secondary boot), but if it works it works.

Thanks ya'll.