SP2504C on Intel D875PBZLK. Had to set speed jumper to 150 !

[Lilla]

SP2504C on Intel D875PBZLK. Had to set speed jumper to 150 !

Short story:

I sometimes experience SP2504C "drive not detected" problem when I first power on the computer. When I press Ctrl-Alt-Del (or hardware reset button) to try again the drive is always detected.

On the 14th, after trying everything else I could think of (see list below), I decided to try setting the jumper on the SP2504C drive that specifies 1.5Gb/s (instead of the default auto-negotiate) which is what this motherboard supports. Since setting the jumper I have powered up (from power down state) 12 times (28 times as of 15th at 3p) without a failure. Before installing the jumper I would have had some failures by now.

According to Samsung FAQ (see link and quote below) this jumper should only be required for certain VIA chipsets. A Samsung White Paper (see link and quote below) says compatibility tests were preformed using motherboards with Intel 875 chipset. However, the auto negotiation employed by the drive seems unreliable on my Intel motherboard with Intel 875P chipset.

MY QUESTIONS:

Is needing to set the jumper on this Intel motherboard an indication of a problem with my hard drive? or is it OK so long as it continues to work reliably with the jumper on the drive?

Has anyone else experienced a need to set the drive jumper on a SATA II drive to 1.5Gb/s (vs auto negotiate to determine 150 / 300) when using a motherboard that has an Intel chipset?



Long story:

Setting the jumper on the hard drive was my last resort.
My computer components, and a list of other things I tried is listed below.

On friday I installed new SP2504C SATA II drive on Intel D875PBZLK v301 motherboard with two SATA I ports. The motherboard shipped with two SATA cables and I am used one of them to connect this drive.

Samsung SP2504C SATA II drive (purchased from ZipZoomFly)
It was sold as OEM but appears to be a retail package without the fancy box. The drive arrived in a clear plastic hard drive case. The clear plastic hard drive case was in a dense foam box, which was in a larger cardboard box that was full of shipping peanuts. These items shipped with the drive: installation instruction page, screws, jumper, and a 4-pin molex to SATA power adapter.

My SP2504C has a NIDEC motor. Firmware is VT100-33. Mfg Dec 2005. I am using the power adapter that shipped with the drive. And the SATA data cable that shipped with the motherboard. I used Samsung HUTIL v2.00 to enable S.M.A.R.T. and to set AAM to Quiet. I ran the Self-Diagnostic. Elapsed time: 1.31 hours. No problems found. The drive is quiet, and has very little vibration. It is mounted in a drive cage located at bottom front of case with L1A fan blowing at 5V on it. It is the only hard drive in the system.

OS: Windows XP Home SP2 slipstreamed
Chipset INF v7.2.2.1006 pub 20051114 (latest available)

Samsung DVD/CDRW drive, and a floppy drive.
SP2504C is the only hard drive.
Uninterruptable Power Supply
512 Crucial ECC memory
No overclocking. No underclocking.

Intel D875PBZLK v301 motherboard (bought Jan 2004)
BIOS P34 (latest available)
Chipset Intel i875P

Power Supply: Seasonic SS-400AGX Super Silencer 400W ATX12V v1.3 APFC Power Supply rev. A2 [has 4-pin molex power connectors, no native SATA power connectors]


Below is a description of the problem I am experiencing with SP2504C

When the computer is powered on, the new hard drive (SP2504C, which is the only one in the system) is not always detected on the first try. It is always detected on the 2nd try. The failure rate is approximately 1 in every 6-12 power ons.

When I power up, it will either be good, or after about 15 seconds I will get this message: Reboot and Select proper boot device or insert boot media in selected Boot device.

I installed the new drive on Feb 10-11. Late on the 12th I experienced a "drive not detected" problem. On the 13th and 14th (today) I continue to experience this problem ocassionally.

Before resorting to setting the jumper on the SP2504C drive, I tried all of the things below, none made a difference.
- Used a diff. 4-pin molex connector from the power supply
- Used a diff. 4-pin molex to SATA power adapter.
- Used a diff. SATA cable, i.e. the other one that came with the computer.
- Used a diff. SATA port on the motherboard. There are two.
- In BIOS, tried changing "Hard Drive Pre-Delay" from disabled (default) to 3 seconds.
- cleaned the contacts on the motherboard SATA ports

Please see MY QUESTIONS above in Short story section.

----

Related information...

SAMSUNG's Digital World - Hard Disk Drive - FAQ - SATA Speed Selection Jumper
http://www.samsung.com/Products/HardDis ... /index.htm

...quote...
Some VIA Serial ATA controllers do not support SATA 3.0Gbps drives.
These controllers include the following chipsets:
VT8237 / VT8237R / VT6420 / VT6421L
...end quote...

SAMSUNG’s Digital World - Hard Disk Drive - White Paper - Serial ATA Interface
http://www.samsung.com/Products/HardDis ... /index.htm

...quote...
SAMSUNG, before producing the Motherboard backing the Serial ATA, tested its compatibility with ABIT and Promise Add On Card. SAMSUNG also tested compatibility and performance with most computers with Motherboard (Intel 875 chipset) backing the Serial ATA. The results of the tests suggested that there were no compatibility problems. With the introduction of Serial ATA chipset from Intel, the industry will rapidly adopt the new interface and Samsung is ready to provide the customers with high performance Serial ATA interface products.
...end quote...

[Lilla]

I am now feeling confident that it is not a problem that this drive (when attached to this motherboard at least) requires the jumper. This drive is very quiet, runs cool, no noticable vibration. I love it!

I also posted this issue on the ABXzone.com Intel D875PBZLK forum...
http://www.abxzone.com/forums/showthrea ... ost1295812
Samsung SP2504C SataII. Auto-negotiate problem. Had to set speed jumper to 150!

And I got a response from GFORCE100. I decided to share it here in case it might help someone else.
http://www.abxzone.com/forums/showthrea ... ost1295835

Originally Posted by Lilla
MY QUESTIONS:

Is needing to set the jumper on this Intel motherboard an indication of a problem with my hard drive? or is it OK so long as it continues to work reliably with the jumper on the drive?

Has anyone else experienced a need to set the drive jumper on a SATA II drive to 1.5Gb/s (vs auto negotiate to determine 150 / 300) when using a motherboard that has an Intel chipset?

1) No it's not a problem but rather an issue with how SATA II drives used on SATA I supporting chipsets sometimes don'g get recognised due to timing issues most likely in how the HDD's are detected upon bootstrap. Setting your drive (or rather forcing it to) SATA I won't hurt it or performance because a) the 875P chipset can't support SATA II anyway and thus will always run at max SATA I and b) SATA II is really only beneficial in fast RAID configurations where 150MB/sec can be surpassed. In most cases however no drive today can sustain anywhere near that speed and burst speeds are....just that, burst that doesn't translate into true performance.

2) People do it on other drives too, it's a known issue but nothing to cause concern. It's not something that affects merely Samsung Spinpoint series drives but rather SATA II drives on the whole. Only if your HDD was to be getting louder and louder or showing errors in read/write operations would you need to investigate before it's too later (i.e. loss of data etc.). Given your description however just sit back and relax.