IMSM 8.8/8.9/9.5 & Win7 in-box RAID driver - Random drive failures with 8.9

[idata]

This thread is effectively a continuation of "/thread/5036?start=0&tstart=0 Random drive fails with new Matrix Storage Manager 8.9" that has been locked - a pity because it was a valuable source if information.

I am about to conduct a major hardware and OS update of a PC having a RAID10 setup. Previously the system has been running 8.8 under Vista without problems. The update will include Win7, but I am uncertain which version of IMSM/IRST to use:-

• Version 8.8.0.1009 is not certified for Win7,
• 8.9.0.1023 is certified for Win7 but has the well documented problem with dropping drives,
• the pre-release RST 9.5.0.1037 has still not been officially released, and judging from web reports has many other problems,
• or the in-box Win7 driver..........

Intel's Elizabeth, in /thread/5036?start=423&tstart=0 post 423 of the original thread, stated that the Win7 in-box driver is similar to 8.9.0.1023, but not identical. Has anyone using the Win7 in-box RAID driver had any problems with this version? However, I think that unless the "manager" part of IMSM has been separately installed the user may not be aware that it was randomly dropping drives from the array if they recover quickly.

I would appreciate feedback from anyone using the embedded Win7 RAID driver.

[idata]

I'm glad I found these posts on the problems with drives being dropped by the ICH10R controller because of the IMSM 8.9 driver.

When searching for the new RST 9.5.0.1037, I came across RST 9.5.4.1001. Is this newer one legitamate?

[idata]

8.9 seems to be a huge problem for many people. Wouldn't even boot for me.

9.5.1004 allowed my system to boot and appeared to be OK at first, but has given me a week of unbelievable grief. System would regulalrly freeze (30mins to 2 hours after starting up) without BSOD and with only an occasional iastor error in the logs.

Today, I 'rolled back' to the 'in the box' Win 7 driver, and so far all appears to be fine. Zero errors in event log and (so far) five hours of flawless operation. The console from 9.5.1004 seems to work OK with the 'in the box' driver (but I suspect that an earlier console would be better).

I'd strongly urge you to stick with the drivers that install with Win 7 if you want the system to work!

[idata]

Well I ended up installing 9.5.4.1001 last night and left the computer on overnight. So far, no problems but I will update this if that changes. I ran the verify and it reported 0 errors (verifications or media). It may take a while to see if this works because the dropping of a drive from the RAID did not happen daily, It was random and took a week or two before it would happen. I could try copying large avi files across my home network to stress test it.

This morning I enabled the write-back cache (I have a UPS so I'm not worried about a power failure).

[idata]

I've been running 9.5.0.1037 since December 7th without a problem (knock on wood). It's highly likely the 8.9 random drive failures problem has been resolved. I've been fortune so far not to have experienced any of the problems that seem associated with this beta.

And I look forward to the final release.

[idata]

Hi,

I used 9.5.0.1037 for about 12 hours, during this time two times computer locked up and 2 drives dropped out from RAID10, this was enough testing and installed driver version 8.8, did RAID rebuild and now i have 2 weeks uptime without any problems.

If you have problems please try 8.8. I'm definitely not upgrading any more...

System: Intel X58, W7-64

Regards,

Imre

[idata]

Thanks for your input everyone.

The reason I was originally asking the question was because I was about to execute a major hardware and software update (including 64-bit Win7) to an existing system which was a 7 hour flight away. I have now completed that upgrade.

Because I had experienced problems with 8.9 on other systems (running Vista) but found 8.8 perfectly stable I started by installing 8.8 on the Win7 system. I immediately found 8.8 did not run well on Win7, with freezes during bootup. I was not surprised that 8.8 did not work properly because Intel make it very clear that 8.8 does not support Win7.

The next choice was to use the inbox driver, which worked well. The inbox 64-bit version installs as 8.6.2.1012. Because the inbox driver was working so well I did not see any point in trying the troublesome 8.9 or the yet-to-be released 9.5

I then installed, using the -N switch, the the RAID manager from 8.8 (8.8.01009) which also seems to work well with 64-bit Win7 and the inbox driver.

Based on my experience my advice would be to use the inbox driver withWin7 (at least on 64 bit systems) and wait until the official release of 9.5 before attempting to upgrade.

[idata]

I'm still running 9.5.4.1001 since my December 23rd post. Not one problem yet and I often leave the system on overnight.

I have SMART turned on in Bios and I also turned on the write-back cache.

The only strange thing I found with the Rapid Storage RAID manager software is that it displays a little bubble message over the system tray at login that is intended to make you feel good but it uses the words "Hard Drive" and "Failure" in the same sentance. It actually says something like "one or more of your hard drives are protected from failure" (because of the RAID type used). Anyone who had problems with drives falling out out of a RAID will be sensitive to these pop up messages. It is displayed the same way as the real failure messages. I think Intel should drop that message from the software.

[idata]

I have used 9.5.0.1037 drivers since early December and have not encountered any problems or errors. I have two hard drives in RAID1 and another two in RAID0. My main "harddrive" is an Intel SSD X-25M G2 160MB. OS is Windows 7 Pro 64-bit. Motherboard is ASUS P7P55D EVO (with IMSM option ROM version 8.9.1023).

[idata]

My setup is as follows and I have not had any issues with the new RST 9.5.4.1001 driver. Notice that I have the Time-Limited Error Recovery (TLER) to 7 seconds for read and write. I am wondering if these drivers assume that you have enterprise level drives for your RAID configurations and is banking on the TLER being set to ON.

1. Intel Core i7-860 CPU
2. Intel DP55KG Motherboard (BIOS Version KGIBX10J.86A.3878 10/28/2009)
3. G.SKILL Ripjaws F3-12800CL9D-4GBRL (4GB Memory DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) 1.5v)
4. PNY GeForce 9800 GTX+ 512MB PCIe Video Card
5. Plextor PX-880SA DVDR
6. 2 - Western Digital Caviar Black WD7501AALS 750GB SATA II 7200 RPM 32MB Buffer Hard Drives set up in RAID 1 configuration, with 2 Volumes defined
   1. Updated Time-Limited Error Recovery (TLER) to 7 seconds read and write using the WDTLER utility
7. Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit RTM
8. Intel® Chipset Device Drivers 9.1.1.1025 dated 12/29/2009
9. Intel® Matrix Storage Manager ROM 8.9.0.1023
10. Intel® Storage Technology version 9.5.4.1001

Hope this helps,

Keith

[idata]

Was keeping up with the prev thread for a while just came back to it to see if there was a fix and it's locked.

Still no official release from Intel after 8.9 for Windows 7. Shame, it's been way too long. I also, through official Intel Chat Support on 12/2/2009, documented my setup and related failures which were/are same as most on the prev thread. Never heard from anyone from Intel except the form-letter type email with the link to the following that to this day still says downgrade but 8.8 not for Win7 or try 9.5 which is of course was never officially released:

http://www.intel.com/support/chipsets/imsm/sb/CS-030818.htm http://www.intel.com/support/chipsets/imsm/sb/CS-030818.htm

Interesting that no one from Intel has commented on this new thread. Elizabeth was working hard, but no word from her toward then end when the prev was locked. We really need a perm resolution to this 8.9 issue. In the mean time, a post from Intel with a current status and that Intel is still working the issue toward resolution.

[idata]

Take a look at this page. http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&DwnldID=15251&lang=eng http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&DwnldID=15251&lang=eng

[idata]

Thanks for the link Keith, great heads-up. This is very interesting, the file is dated 14 Oct 2009!

Like many others, I have been regularly checking to see if 9.5 has been officially released. Pre-release versions have been available for several months, but still no full version. I had put this down to Intel having problems in making it work correctly, or perhaps problems in getting the Trim command to work for SSD's. But the existence of this Intel M/B board version is puzzling, when as far as I am aware the controller hub on these Intel boards is identical to the controllers on other vendors boards. Presumably Intel have fixed the problem for their own boards, but the fix does not work on all boards because of differences in chipset implementation. If this is the case 9.5 may solve the problem with some boards, but there may still be problems with a few others - but how do Intel know this when they say that they have not been able to reproduce the problem? Puzzling. Clarification from Elizabeth would be very helpful.

I have found that 8.8 works fine on all the Vista systems I have built, and the embedded driver works well on all Win7 systems, which when coupled with the grief I experienced with 8.9 on several boards, leads me to be in no hurry to experiment. However, I have previously used Intel board only versions of the chipset INF files with other vendor's boards with no problems at all.....

Has anyone tried these Intel-only 9.5 drivers on non-Intel boards?

[idata]

I have been using the 9.5 driver for almost two months with the EVGA X58 SLI Motherboard. I had problems with the 8.9 drivers but this driver seems to work flawlessly.

[idata]

I'm still running 9.5.4.1001 since December 23rd. Not one problem yet. I had many problems with drives dropping out of RAIDs with the 8.9 varients but I never tried the one that came on the Win7 DVD much past the initial installation.

[idata]

I'm having similar issues with 8.9.

9.5 seems pretty unreleased as there is no way of browsing to it or searching for it, only accessing the url directly. But where is 9.5.4.1001? is there a link?

I am also worried about the existence of Intel Dekstop Boards compatibility list. Why not list the supported chipsets. Something is wrong here and I am worried about implementing it in our production systems.

Any more experiences or updates?

[idata]

This is funny. Here is a list of ICHs that are not supported by Intel Rapid Storage Technology:

- http://www.intel.com/support/chipsets/imsm/sb/CS-022693.htm http://www.intel.com/support/chipsets/imsm/sb/CS-022693.htm

So we are just missing the list of supported ones.

[idata]

Here is what I got out of the iaStor.inf file which should equate to what is supported.

• Intel(R) ESB2 SATA RAID Controller
• Intel(R) ICH7R/DH SATA RAID Controller
• Intel(R) ICH7MDH SATA RAID Controller
• Intel(R) ICH8R/ICH9R/ICH10R/DO/5 Series/3400 Series SATA RAID Controller
• Intel(R) ICH8M-E/ICH9M-E/5 Series SATA RAID Controller

Hope this helps.

[idata]

The best way to find out whether the Intel-M/B version of RST supports the ICH in your own board is to go to http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&DwnldID=15251&lang=eng here and look at the list of supported Intel boards, and select the one that uses the same chipset as the one you are using (the clue is the numeric part of the part number), click on the link and navigate through to to the "Technical Spec" in the "Documentation".

As an example for those using X58 based boards, the Intel board would be Intel DX58SO, for which the link eventually takes you to the http://downloadmirror.intel.com/18128/eng/DX58SO_TechProdSpec.pdf techical spec, where you can check the ICH type in this case "Intel 82801IJR I/O Controller hub (ICH10R)"

Now, have I the courage?........................

[idata]

For me it wasn't a matter of courage - it was a matter of getting a system to work reliably. Aside from the fact that the 9.5 driver isn't dropping drives, it also did a rebuild in a small fraction of the time of the 8.9 driver.

But I would never switch drivers on a working system if I could avoid it.

[idata]

Well, I'm going to stick to 8.8 in Win7 64-bit for now. I've had no errors for months. I am surprised that we arn't seeing any updates to the official releases though.