ECS SiS964 User manual

SiS964/SiS180 SATA w/ RAID
User’s Manual
Quick User’s Guide
Version 0.3

Serial ATA RAID Quick User’s Guide
Edition
December 2003
Copyright
© 2003 Silicon Integrated Systems Corp.
Trademarks
SiS is a registered trademark of Silicon Integrated Systems Corp.
All brand or product names mentioned are trademarks or registered
trademarks of their respective holders.
Revision History
Revision History Date
0.1 Initial release May ‘03
0.2
1. Fix some frame’s changes of BIOS Utility
and RAID Utility.
2. RAID 0+1 can’t support as a bootable disk
and DOS working.
3. For best performance, the sequence of
RAID 0+1 is forced to set as Disk 1 -> Disk
2 -> Disk 3 -> Disk 4.
October ‘03
0.3
1. Fix some frame’s changes of BIOS Utility.
2. Add some capabilities in BIOS Utility.
a. Broken Raid warning messages show.
b. Rebuild Function for RAID 1.
3. Broken Raid warning messages show in
RAID Utility.
December ‘03

Serial ATA RAID Quick User’s Guide
CONTENTS
Introduction ................................................................................................1
Features.......................................................................................................2
Support operating Systems........................................................................2
KNOW HOW..........................................................................................4
PERFORMANCE HINTS AND RECOMMEND SETTING.............4
Step 1. Hardware Setup .............................................................................6
HARD DRIVES SETUP ........................................................................6
FOR RAID 0 (STRIPING ARRAY) ...............................................................6
FOR RAID 1 (MIRROR ARRAY)..................................................................7
FOR RAID 0+1 (STRIPE-MIRROR ARRAY)...............................................7
FOR JBOD (SPANNING ARRAY)................................................................8
Step 2. Installing Software Drivers...........................................................9
WINDOWS XP/2000/ME/98SE.............................................................9
NEW WINDOWS XP/2000 INSTALLATION................................................9
EXISTING WINDOWS XP/2000/ME/98SE INSTALLATION....................10
CONFIRMING WINDOWS XP/2000 DRIVER INSTALLATION..............10
CONFIRMING WINDOWS ME/98SE DRIVER INSTALLATION.............10
Step 3. BIOS Utility Operation................................................................11
STARTING BIOS UTILITY...............................................................11
CREATE RAID ....................................................................................14
CREATING A RAID 0 (STRIPE) ARRAY FOR PERFORMANCE............14
CREATING A RAID 1 (MIRROR) ARRAY.................................................19
CREATING A JBOD ARRAY ......................................................................23
CREATING A RAID 0+1 (STRIPE-MIRROR) ARRAY..............................26

Serial ATA RAID Quick User’s Guide
DELETE RAID.....................................................................................28
STARTING TO DELETE A RAID ARRAY................................................. 28
Step 4. SiS964/SiS180 RAID Utility ........................................................31
STARTING TO USE SIS964/SIS180 RAID UTILITY.....................31
ABOUT CREATE RAID....................................................................34
VIEWING THE “CREATE RAID” ...............................................................34
CREATE A RAID SET..................................................................................37
ABOUT DELETE RAID.....................................................................46
VIEWING THE RAIDTYPE MEANING...................................................... 47
DELETE A RAID SET ..................................................................................49
ABOUT RAID RECOVERY..............................................................52
RAID RECOVERY OPERATION.................................................................52

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Introduction
The SiS180 SATA controller is a hybrid solution that combines two
independent SATA ports and one Ultra ATA port for support of up to two
Serial ATA (Serial ATA RAID) and two Ultra ATA (Ultra ATA RAID) drives.
However the South Bridge SiS964 SATA controller only support two Serial
ATA on two independent ports. Specifications are as follows:
Serial ATA Interface
Serial ATA (SATA) is the latest generation of the ATA interface. SATA hard
drives deliver blistering transfer speeds of up to 150MB/sec. Serial ATA uses
long, thin cables, making it easier to connect your drive and improving the
airflow inside your PC.
♦Supports 150 MB/s transfers with CRC error checking
♦Large LBA support for drives over 137 GB
♦Data handling optimizations including tagged command queuing, elevator seek
and packet chain command
Ultra ATA Interface
♦Standard ATA/IDE interface
♦Supports Ultra ATA/133, Ultra ATA/100, and Ultra ATA/66 drives
♦Supports CRC error checking for Ultra ATA drives
♦Separate timing control for two devices attached to one ATA channel
Serial/Ultra ATA RAID Interfaces
The Serial/Ultra ATA RAID is designed to provide a cost-effective, high
performance RAID solution that adds performance and/or reliability to PC
desktops and/or servers using Serial ATA/150, Ultra ATA/133, Ultra ATA/100,
Ultra ATA/66 hard disks.
Serial/Ultra ATA RAID function supports striping (RAID 0), mirroring (RAID
1), striping + mirroring (RAID 0+1) and span (JBOD). Please note that the
function supports hard disk drives only and the South Bridge SiS964
SATA controller don’t support Striping + mirroring (Raid 0+1).
With striping, identical drives can read and write data in parallel to increase
performance. Mirroring increases read performance through load balancing
and elevator sorting while creating a complete backup of your files. Span
would increase the logic hard disk space.
Serial/Ultra ATA RAID striped arrays can double the sustained data transfer
rate of Serial ATA/150 and Ultra ATA/133 drives. Serial/Ultra ATA RAID fully

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supports Serial ATA/150 and Ultra ATA/133 specification of up to 150MB/sec
per drive, depending on individual drive specifications.
The technology also offers fault tolerant, data redundancy for entry-level
network file servers or simply for desktop PC users wanting to continually
protect valuable data on their PC. The Serial/Ultra ATA RAID offers RAID 1
mirroring (for two drives) to protect data. Should a drive that is part of a
mirrored array fail, Serial/Ultra ATA RAID technology uses the mirrored drive
(which contains identical data) to assume all data handling. When a new
replacement drive is later installed, Serial/Ultra ATA RAID rebuilds data to
the new drive from the mirrored drive to restore fault tolerance.
Features
zThe SiS180 controller support two Serial ATA (Serial ATA RAID)
and two Ultra ATA (Ultra ATA RAID) drives. The South Bridge SiS964
SATA controller only support two Serial ATA (Serial ATA RAID) drivers.
zSupport RAID function: RAID 0, RAID 1, JBOD and RAID 0+1.
(RAID 0+1 function can be used by SiS180 controller with all
hard drivers on it.)
zSupport bootable disk except for RAID 0+1.
zWindows-based SiS RAID Utility software tool (only support
Windows XP and 2000).
zBIOS RAID Setting Utility
Support operating Systems
zMicrosoft Windows 98 Second Edition

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zMicrosoft Windows Me
zMicrosoft Windows 2000 Professional and Server
zMicrosoft Windows XP

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Step 0. What is RAID
Know How
This section will give you an overview about the RAID system and introduce
the basic background and glossary which you need to know before using
“SiS RAID Controller Application”.
1. RAID: (Redundant Array of Independent Disk Drives) use jointly several
hard drives to increase data transfer rates and data security. It depends
on the number of drives present and RAID function you select to fulfill
the security or performance purposes or both.
2. RAID 0: Also known as “Stripping”. All of the data are distributed evenly
to all of the existing drives. You gain benefits on performance because
the data transfer rate is multiplied by the number of drives. However,
RAID 0 has high risks of data security. All of the stored data will be lost if
even any one drive in the RAID set crashes.
3. RAID 1: Also known as “Mirroring”. Two hard drives are required. The
goal of RAID 0 is to ensure data security. Data is written to two or more
drives synchronously. That is, 100% duplication of data from one drive
to another.
4. RAID 0+1: Also known as “StripeMirror”. At least four hard drivers are
required. RAID 0+1 is a combination of RAID 0 and RAID 1. Data is
striped into two drives then mirrored. It provides high performance and
high data protection. This is a costly solution as RAID 1 because the two
mirrored drives represent an expensive insurance
5. JBOD: (Just a Bunch of Drives). Also known as “Spanning”. Two or
more hard drives are required. Several hard disk types configured as a
single hard disk. The hard drives are simply hooked up in series. This
expands the capacity of your drive and results in a useable total capacity.
However, JBOD will not increase any performance or data security.
Performance hints and recommend setting
For the best performance and reliability, please read the following
suggestions.
1. In Serial ATA port, use Native Serial ATA drives. Parallel ATA to Serial
ATA converter board is NOT suggested.
2. In Parallel ATA port, use ATA 66/100/133 hard drives
3. Use the same model hard drives.
4. If you have only two Serial ATA drives, the auto-configure function will
assign each on a different channel as a master drive. Using only two
Parallel ATA drives to create a RAID array is NOT suggested. It might
decrease performance.

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5. Always use 80-conductor cables.
6. We strongly recommend you should use “DMA” transfer mode.
7. The recommended block size is “64K” when creating RAID 0 and
RAID 0+1.
8. The best performance of RAID 0+1 is set the sequence as Disk
1 -> Disk 3 -> Disk 2 -> Disk 4. So the SiS RAID Utility and
BIOS RAID Setting Utility will force to set the sequence as 1324.

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Step 1. Hardware Setup
Hard Drives setup
The SiS180 controller supports up to two Serial ATA hard drives and
two Parallel ATA hard drives. The South Bridge SiS964 SATA controller
only supports two Serial ATA hard drivers.
For RAID 0 (Striping array)
zAny combination to 2, 3 or 4 Hard disks would combine to a stripe
system.
zThe South Bridge SiS964 SATA controller only supports combination 6
and the SiS180 controller supports all combinations.
HDD Population Rules for RAID 0 (Striping)
Ultra ATA (Master) Ultra ATA (Slave) Serial ATA (Master 1) Serial ATA (Master 2)
1 VVX X
2 VX VX
3 VX X V
4 X V V X
5 X V X V
6 X X VV
7 V V V X
8 V V X V
9 VX VV
10 X V V V
11 VVVV
V = Selected; X = Unselected
NOTE: Storage Capacity: the number of hard drives times the capacity of the
smallest drive in the disk array
Working Speed: the speed of the lowest drive in the disk array

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For RAID 1 (Mirror array)
zAny of 2 Hard disks would make a mirror system.
zThe South Bridge SiS964 SATA controller only supports combination 6
and the SiS180 controller supports all combinations.
HDD Population Rules for RAID 1 (Mirroring)
Ultra ATA (Master) Ultra ATA (Slave) Serial ATA (Master 1) Serial ATA (Master 2)
1 V V X X
2 VX VX
3 VX X V
4 X V V X
5 X V X V
6 X X VV
V = Selected; X = Unselected
NOTE: Storage Capacity: the capacity of the smallest drive in the disk array
Working Speed: the speed of the lowest drive in the disk array
For RAID 0+1 (Stripe-Mirror array)
z4 Hard disks would set up a RAID 0 + 1
zOnly the SiS180 controller can support this function.
HDD Population Rules for RAID 0+1 (Striping + Mirroring)
Ultra ATA (Master) Ultra ATA (Slave) Serial ATA (Master 1) Serial ATA (Master 2)
1 VVVV
V = Selected; X = Unselected
NOTE: Storage Capacity: the capacity of the smallest drive in the disk array
Working Speed: the speed of the lowest drive in the disk array

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For JBOD (Spanning array)
zAny combination to 2, 3 or 4 Hard disks would combine to a JBOD
system.
zThe South Bridge SiS964 SATA controller only supports combination 6
and the SiS180 controller supports all combinations.
HDD Population Rules for JBOD (Spanning)
Ultra ATA (Master) Ultra ATA (Slave) Serial ATA (Master 1) Serial ATA (Master 2)
1 VVX X
2 VX VX
3 VX X V
4 X V V X
5 X V X V
6 X X VV
7 V V V X
8 V V X V
9 VX VV
10 X V V V
11 VVVV
V = Selected; X = Unselected
NOTE: Storage Capacity: the number of hard drives times the capacity of the
smallest drive in the disk array
Working Speed: the speed of the lowest drive in the disk array

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Step 2. Installing Software Drivers
zSiS RAID driver support Microsoft Windows XP/2000/Me/98SE
1. SiS180 controller support Serial ATA/Ultra ATA w/ RAID0, RAID1,
RAID0+1 and JBOD by installing SiS RAID driver .
2. South Bridge SiS964 SATA controller support Serial ATA w/ RAID0,
RAID 1 and JBOD by installing SiS RAID driver. For RAID function,
SiS180 support RAID0, RAID1, RAID0+1 and JBOD and SIS 964
support RAID0, RAID1 and JBOD by software RAID driver only.
3. Support the function of installing Windows Operation System to
RAID array except for RAID 0+1.
For special occasions, users can refer to the following sections with
details on the SiS964/SiS180 driver installation when used with various
operating systems.
Windows XP/2000/Me/98SE
New Windows XP/2000 Installation
The following details that installation of the drivers while installing new
Windows XP/2000. This method don’t be supported for new Windows
Me/98SE installation.
1. Start the installation:
Boot from the CD-ROM. Press F6 when the message “Press F6 key
if you need to install third party SCSI or RAID driver” appears.
2. When the Windows XP/2000 Setup window is generated, press S
key to specify an Additional Device(s).
3. Insert the driver diskette into drive A: and press Enter.
4. Choose one of the following items:
“WinXP SiS Raid/IDE Controller “,
“Win2000 SiS Raid/IDE Controller”,
that appears on screen, and then press the Enter key.

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5. Press Enter to continue with installation or if you need to specify
any additional devices to be installed, do so at this time. Once all
devices are specified, Press Enter to continue with installation.
6. From the Windows XP/2000 Setup screen, press the Enter key.
Setup will now load all device files and then continue the Windows
XP/2000 installation.
7. Please install the driver package again (ex. SiS RAID driver
v1.02) while the operation system has been setup.
Remark:
If you would like to install windows to any RAID set, you should
create RAID from BIOS RAID setting Utility or SiS964/SiS180 RAID
Utility first and then follow the steps above.
Existing Windows XP/2000/Me/98SE Installation
1. Install the driver by execute SiS RAID driver setup utility.
2. The drivers will be automatically installed.
Confirming Windows XP/2000 Driver Installation
1. From Windows XP/2000, open the Control Panel from “My
Computer” followed by the System icon.
2. Choose the “Hardware” tab, then click the “Device Manager” tab.
3. Click the “+” in front of “SCSI and RAID Controllers” hardware type.
The driver “ SiS 180 Raid Controller ” should appear.
Confirming Windows Me/98SE Driver Installation
1. From Windows Me/98SE, open the Control Panel from “My
Computer” followed by the System icon.
2. Choose the “Device Manager” tab.
3. Click the “+” in front of “ IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers” hardware
type. The driver “ SiS 180 IDE Dual Channel ” and “ SiS 180
IDE/RAID Controller ” should appear.

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Step 3. BIOS Utility Operation
Note:
For the best performance and reliability, please read “Performance Hints
and Recommend Setting” section in Step 0.
Starting BIOS Utility
1. Boot your system. If this is the first time you have booted with the
SiS964 or SiS180 and the drives installed, the BIOS will display the
following.
[ RAID Information ] includes some statements. See below :
a. No RAID Install !! ÆNot any completed RAID exists.
b. Raid 1 (Mirror) : [Disk X] [Disk X] ÆHave a RAID set.
c. Broken RAID detected. Do you want to enter Setup Menu (Y/N)? Y
ÆYou can select [Y] to enter setup menu to handle it. Or you can select
[N] to ignore this message.
d. Found a new HD! Do you want to rebuild RAID 1? Y ÆOccurs when
the controller has broken Raid 1 and single HDD existing simultaneously
and the location of single HDD is just conformed it’s rebuild conditions.
Silicon Integrated Systems Corp. RAID BIOS Setting Utility v0.XX
(c) 2003-2005 Silicon Integrated Systems Corp. All Rights Reserved.
Press <Ctrl><S> to run BIOS Setting Utility
Scan Devices. Please wait…………
Primary Master : XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXMB UDMA X
Primary Slave : < Device Not Found >
Secondary Master : < SATA Device Not Found >
Secondary Slave : XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXMB UDMA X
[ RAID Information ]

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e. The Raid is wrong!! Do you want to fix it??(Y/N) ÆOccurs when the
locations of two SATA HDD change owing to ATA HDD existing or not.
2. Press <Ctrl-S> keys to display the SiS964/SiS180 Utility Main Menu.
3. Press <R> to display the RAID setup menu below. This is the fastest
and easiest method to create your first array. The [A] and [D] key will
appear randomly in the different conditions.
[a]. No RAID existing but have available disks existing :

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[b]. No available disk existing but have RAID existing:
[c]. Available disks and RAID existing simultaneously:

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[d]. Available disk is not enough to create RAID:

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Create RAID
NOTE:
zSiS180 controller support RAID 0, RAID 1, JBOD and RAID 0+1.
zSiS964 SATA controller support RAID0, RAID 1 and JBOD.
zThe selection of RAID 0+1 will appear when 4 single HDD existing.
Creating a RAID 0 (Stripe) Array for Performance
NOTE:
1. SiS180 enables users to create striped arrays with 2, 3, or 4 drives.
2. SiS964 only supports 2 SATA drivers to create a stripe array.
To create an array for best performance, follow these steps:
1. Press <A> to start creating a RAID array.
2. Press <2> and <Enter> to select RAID 0.

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3. You will have two selections to create a RAID 0 array. The default
value is <1>. If you select <1>Auto Create, you can create a RAID 0
array faster and easier. The Blocksize will be selected by its default
value “64K”. The result after auto creating will be shown on step 6.
Besides, you also can select <2>Manual Create, see following steps.
4. Press <1>─<5> keys and <Enter> to select Block Size. ( Default : 64K )
5. Use<↑> <↓> to select disk , and press <Enter> to select disk, <Q> to
exit. When you press <Enter> on the disk you wanted, the RAID Type