BIOS Bug: CD/DVD doesn't boot in certain setups
Printed From: ASRock.com
Category: Technical Support
Forum Name: Intel Motherboards
Forum Description: Question about ASRock Intel Motherboards
URL: https://forum.asrock.com/forum_posts.asp?TID=2315
Printed Date: 20 Jul 2025 at 3:31am
Software Version: Web Wiz Forums 12.04 - http://www.webwizforums.com
Topic: BIOS Bug: CD/DVD doesn't boot in certain setups
Posted By: nuc
Subject: BIOS Bug: CD/DVD doesn't boot in certain setups
Date Posted: 27 Mar 2016 at 9:01am
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Dear Forum members! I have been a happy user of the http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/P55%20Deluxe3/" rel="nofollow - ASRock P55 Deluxe3 for years now. Unfortunately I happened to come across a nasty bug: I have noticed that my bootable CD/DVDs won't work in certain cable configurations, when using two HDDs. For instance if I setup my drives like this: SATA2_1 => HDD1 SATA2_2 => HDD2 SATA2_3 => DVD-Drive or SATA2_1 => HDD2 SATA2_2 => HDD1 SATA2_3 => DVD-Drive or SATA2_4 => HDD1 SATA2_5 => HDD2 SATA2_6 => DVD-Drive booting the DVD will only give me a grey blinking cursor. Setups like those work and let the drive boot: SATA2_1 => HDD1 SATA2_2 => DVD-Drive or SATA2_1 => HDD2 SATA2_2 => DVD-Drive or SATA2_1 => DVD-Drive SATA2_2 => HDD1 SATA2_3 => HDD2 or SATA2_1 => HDD1 SATA2_2 => DVD-Drive SATA2_3 => HDD2 So it only works when I am using either only one HDD, if I am placing the DVD-Drive into the middle, or if I place it first. It will not work when placed at the end with two HDDs. Did not try with more HDDs... I think this looks like a definitive BIOS bug and I hope we can resolve it - it *should* be pretty easy to reproduce if you still have the mobo :) My next mobo shall be from ASRock again :P Thanks in advance!  Best regards, nuc |
Replies:
Posted By: parsec
Date Posted: 27 Mar 2016 at 1:33pm
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I would think if your situation was being caused by a BIOS problem, it would have been noticed by now by other owners, and ASRock would be aware of it. That is, given the age of this board. But I suppose it could be a BIOS problem. Questions for you, and understand that I am going by the manual for your board regarding the options and settings in the BIOS. The manual may not reflect the BIOS options you currently have, due to BIOS updates that were not documented in the manual. Are your HDDs and DVD drive all SATA devices, not IDE drives with an IDE to SATA adapter? Are you using any true IDE drives, that use the 40 pin IDE ribbon cable? What BIOS version are you using now? When you first noticed this problem, did you try clearing the CMOS/BIOS? When you move the drives between different SATA ports, did you clear the CMOS/BIOS after moving the drives? Are you confident that the SATA data and power cables are all working correctly? In the Storage Configuration screen in the BIOS, what is the SATAII Operation Mode option set to? If SATAII Operation Mode set to IDE, what are the SATAII 1,2,3,4 Configuration and SATAII 5,6 Configuration options set to? Does the BIOS have an IDE Device Configuration option available for any of your drives? The Exit screen has several options such as, Load Performance Setup Default (IDE/SATA), and Load Performance Setup AHCI Mode. Have you used those options at any time? When you boot from the DVD drive, do you hear it spin up to read the disk, but then only get the blinking cursor on the monitor? ------------- http://valid.x86.fr/48rujh" rel="nofollow"> 
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Posted By: nuc
Date Posted: 29 Mar 2016 at 8:09pm
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Hi parsec! First of all thanks for your interest and your fast and versatile response! :)
It's SATA only, connected to the native Intel SATA2 ports.
nope
The latest BIOS v1.70
I tried doing so now - it didn't make any difference.
Yes, everything is working correctly apart from that.
Big thanks for suggesting this! My standard setting is AHCI Mode, so I tried out IDE Mode and *surprise* suddenly booting up from the DVD-Drive works fine! Whenever I set it back to AHCI any optical media refuses to boot (I tried disabling some AHCI specific options too, but it didnt help). So it seems that this bug is caused by the Intel AHCI module inside the BIOS ROM. Any suggestions from your side? Thank you so much :) |
parsec wrote:Posted By: nuc
Date Posted: 01 Apr 2016 at 7:57pm
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Any ideas? |
Posted By: parsec
Date Posted: 02 Apr 2016 at 10:00am
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I'm confused now, in the post above you now say that you cannot boot
from any optical media/drive (??) after changing the SATA mode, but in
your first post you could boot from the optical drive if it was first or
second in the SATA port order. So you now cannot boot from any optical drive, which you could do so before changing the SATA mode? One thing I did not mention, which is also stated in your board's manual, is it is not recommended to change between any of the SATA modes once the OS has been installed. Such as, changing from AHCI to IDE mode. That is due to the way Windows deals with storage drivers. IDE, AHCI, and RAID modes all use different drivers, although the Intel SATA AHCI and RAID drivers use the same installation package. Changing the SATA mode from AHCI to IDE or vice versa just in the BIOS does not affect the OS installation. When you boot the OS after changing the SATA mode, that is when you can have problems. That seems to be the case now? I forgot to ask this previously, but what is the problem with connecting the DVD drive in a specific order or SATA port that works for you, rather than another order that does not work? I can't find anything in the manual that accounts for the apparent ordering, but I don't have your board and BIOS to experiment with myself. I wonder if the ordering of the drives that you apparently require is related to this statement in the manual: If you select [IDE] mode, the options ?�SATAII 1,2,3,4 Configuration??and SATAII 5,6 Configuration??will appear. This seems to indicate a grouping of the SATA II ports into two groups, which can be configured in some way independently. The IDE Configuration section of the manual is confusing me. Do those options appear when the SATA mode is set to IDE? Do those options apply to the SATA ports, or just the single IDE connector, that may be connected to two drives? Note in the IDE configuration options, the Type of drive ([CD/DVD], [ARMD], [Auto], etc) is an option that needs to be selected. I'm wondering if the selection of the drive Type in IDE mode somehow affects the SATA mode. I asked about some options in the Exit screen, the Load Performance Setup Default (IDE/SATA), and Load Performance Setup AHCI Mode. But no comment about those from you. Any idea what they even do? While this is not always recommended, did you try the Marvell SATA ports for the optical drives? Not having your board and its BIOS to work with is a significant limitation for me in attempting to diagnose your situation. I'm not sure what your current situation is, but is seems you've gone from the optical drive working in some configurations to not working at all. Please clarify this for us... ------------- http://valid.x86.fr/48rujh" rel="nofollow">
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Posted By: nuc
Date Posted: 02 Apr 2016 at 10:44am
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No. When I set my SATA configuration to AHCI mode (my default config), then I can apparently only boot from the DVD drive when it's connencted in a special order. When I set it to IDE, any order works. I normally use Load Performance Setup AHCI Mode - it simply loads AHCI mode plus some additional unrelated options elsewhere (CPU behaviour, HPET-table etc). No I'd rather not connect anything to the Marvell port since it is unfortunately utter crap.
Well.. the problem is unpredictible behaviour. In the beginning I didn't even know what was going on; I thought it's an issue with my DVD image. I burned a few disks again but nothing worked. I had no idea what was the cause, until I played around with the SATA cable order. Now imagine I reorder the drives so that booting from CDROM will work.. what else will happen? Will the HDD show buggy behaviour instead? I have no idea, so I want to have sorted out, what this bug is and where it comes from.
I am fully aware of this. |
Posted By: clubfoot
Date Posted: 03 Apr 2016 at 9:05am
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What you may be encountering is a DVD drive that does not adhere strictly to SATA spec ,...from what you describe in IDE mode. Have you tried a different DVD drive? |
Posted By: nuc
Date Posted: 03 Apr 2016 at 9:15am
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Yes I've tried a Bluray Drive from a different company also -- same results. |
Posted By: clubfoot
Date Posted: 03 Apr 2016 at 9:31am
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Then your stuck with one of your working options,...or attach it to the Marvell controller. |
Posted By: parsec
Date Posted: 03 Apr 2016 at 10:00am
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I'm at a loss about what to tell you. I've never had a situation like this with optical drives. What SATA driver are you using for the Intel SATA controller? That will be shown in Device Manager, either under IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers, or Storage Controllers. I'm wondering if the Intel AHCI driver would improve the situation. The P55 chipset is from the first series of single chipset/CPU "PCH" platforms released by Intel, what we would now call the 5 series chipsets. I was looking through the Intel datasheet for the 5 series chipset, and found some interesting information, although how that directly translates to your situation or finding a fix for it is not clear. The information is really is more of an explanation about how it operates, which may be related to your results. For example, three pages out of the datasheet:    Link to the full datasheet: http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/chipsets/5-chipset-3400-chipset-datasheet.html" rel="nofollow - http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/chipsets/5-chipset-3400-chipset-datasheet.html After reading some of this, you may understand why the ordering might make a difference. This is a good example of what happens when multiple storage protocols (SATA and IDE) are combined together into one logical interface as the user sees it. Things are not as separate and independent of each other as we would assume they would be. It seems to me after going over just what I posted above, there must be more to configuring and using the SATA and IDE interfaces on your board and BIOS than I am aware of. I also don't see any reason for the idea there will be other unpredictable results when using standard HDDs in any order. What are the two models of optical drives you are using? We are currently in a similar situation with SATA and NVMe, which is also confusing. ------------- http://valid.x86.fr/48rujh" rel="nofollow">
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Posted By: nuc
Date Posted: 03 Aug 2016 at 10:46am
Why would other drivers improve the situation? The drivers are not being loaded at all, since Windows doesn't even get started...
My drives are Pioneer BDR-S09XLT and LiteOn iHAS324.
Hm yeah, interesting thought |
Posted By: parsec
Date Posted: 03 Aug 2016 at 12:29pm
So you are booting from the disks in these optical drives. So the only thing that can be used is the storage Option ROMs in the BIOS. But since it is either AHCI or IDE mode, there isn't a storage Option ROM that can be used. Also, we are talking a true legacy BIOS firmware, just a 16Kbit BIOS chip, on a board and chipset that supports IDE drives. Will a BluRay (BD) drive work without a driver or Option ROM, on a SATA port that is shared with and IDE interface? I would not depend on it. ------------- http://valid.x86.fr/48rujh" rel="nofollow">
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