Hi all

Im currently running an (old) Gigabyte ga-8simlh motherboard and have an Asus SATA Lightscribe DVD writer im trying to run.

I have an IDE to SATA converter and was wondering if sata drivers are available for this motherboard and if it is even possible to run the dvd writer on the motherboard at all.

there is the option of the sata add in card

Do you mean a PCI Slot card?

Im currently trying to use a little card that plugs into an IDE slot and has a SATA plug coming out of it which is then plugged in to the SATA device.

If you have the hardware adapter that connects to the SATA data cable connector on the drive and converts it to an IDE connection and connect that to an IDE header with an IDE data cable, you don't need SATA drivers - the mboard will see the SATA drive as an IDE drive.
SATA optical drives DO NOT run any faster than the fastest IDE optical drives - currently the max speed they can currently run at in both cases is UDMA 66 - 66mb/sec.

Are you sure that adapter is compatible with optical drives? I don't think all of them are. As mentioned above, you should not need any SATA drivers.

As aegis points out, the interface adapter must be compatible with optical drives - optical drives require the adapter recognize the ATAPI standard, which all optical drives use. You can get a hardware adapter for as little as $20 or less - if you already have any SATA and IDE data cable required , if applicable (it might come with one or the other or both), that's all it costs you.
E.g.
These ones DO support optical drives:
- $17 in USA
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicat...
- or $21 in Canada;
http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applicati...
(Note - regarding the reviews - keep in mind it is a lot more likely for someone to make a review if they had a problem that it is for them to write one if they didn't. I have found Sabrent products are as good as any other brand.)
- $22 USA, but rather bulky
http://www.addonics.com/products/io...
- $18 USA
http://www.satacables.com/html/sata...

Since many recent mboards have only one IDE header on them, and many people who are upgrading have more than 2 IDE connected drives, it is very likely you can get such an adapter locally without you having to pay for the shipping and handling you must pay when you order from the web - local smaller computer places that build computers and have lots of parts are most likely to have them at a cheap price - at least, probably cheaper than the web price plus shipping and handling.

There are even cheaper adapters, but if their descriptions do not mention supporting ATAPI or supporting optical drives, they probably ONLY work for hard drives.
......

You could also go another route if you have a spare PCI slot and get a PCI SATA drive controller card (for as little as $30 or less) and connect the SATA optical drive to that (and up to 3 or four other SATA drives), BUT I do not recommend that in this case......
- if the only PCI slot you have available is the last on the end closest to the center of the mboard, the controller card will probably not work properly in that slot - that slot is forced to share the same IRQ as the video and that usually causes problems.
- the same thing applies - the SATA controller card chipset must recognize the ATAPI standard in order to support recognizing optical drives - not all of them do - e.g. many Promise chipsets do not - Silicon Image chipsets do.
- virtually all PCI card SATA drive controller chipsets require you load drivers for them. On this older mboard, your SATA optical drive will probably not be detected until you load those drivers. That's not a big problem if you have Windows already installed on an IDE hard drive, or if you are installing Windows on an IDE hard drive from an IDE connected optical drive - th Windows installation or Setup will detect a mass storage device or similar while booting and ask you to supply the drivers.
BUT because your ga-8simlh has no SATA drive controllers built in, and because of that probably has no SATA support in the mboard bios, you probably will not be able to boot from a bootable CD in a SATA optical drive connected to the SATA controller card, even if you can choose to boot from the card as a SCSI device in the bios.

If you have no ide hard drives connected and are setting up Windows from scratch on a SATA drive connected to the controller card, you must load the drivers for the SATA controller card by pressing F6 near the beggining of Setup, and then insert a floppy with the SATA drivers on it.
You probably must use a IDE connected optical drive in order to run Setup from a CD in it.
.....

Or for that matter, you can often get new IDE connected DVD combo drives for as little as $40 or less from local smaller computer places that build computers and have lots of parts, and you could use your SATA optical drive with some other computer.

the sata card advantage is that it will allow you to have more connections for more drives mostly

"the sata card advantage is that it will allow you to have more connections for more drives mostly"

If his bios had SATA drive support, I would choose a SATA controller card too. Since it probably doesn't, there are lots of possible glitches - he is probably better off using a interface adapter or an IDE optical drive.

Ive got heaps of PCI slots availableand most cards I have seen come with driver disks so that could be an option.

The adapter I have at the moment definatly supports ATAPI (at least the package says it does) so it should be working.

XP is installed on an IDE hard drive and the IDE Slot im trying to use the optical drive with does work as i can connect a CD drive (IDE) to it and it picks it up straight away. Not so for the SATA DVD drive though.

The hardrive is running as Secondary master at the moment.

Adapter is a vague term.
Do you have something similar to the interface adapters I pointed to in the earlier part of response 5, or do you have a PCI SATA controller card with 2 or more SATA headers on it?
If you have the former, you should have no problem because the mboard bios sees the SATA drive as an IDE drive.
If you have the latter, you could have any of the problems I mention in response 5.

If you have both IDE and SATA optical drives connected on a computer, from what I've heard the mboard bios will always default to booting from the IDE connected drive(s) first.
If you do have both connected, try disconnecting the IDE one(s).

I have an interface adapter, NOT a PCI controller card.

Only the SATA DVD drive is connected by itself (plus a HDD on another IDE slot)

Is the mboard bios detecting the SATA optical drive as an IDE drive at all?

If it isn't......
- make sure the IDE data cable connector on the mboard end and the connector plugged into the adapter are plugged in in the same direction, if it's possible to plug either or both of them in either way - if one is backwards the drive cannot be recognized.
The stripe on one edge of the data cable should be at both of the the pin one ends of both headers/sockets.
- don't connect an IDE optical drive.
- make sure the Secondary IDE controller is enabled in the bios Setup.
- the drive's capabilities require you use an 80 wire data cable - a 40 wire one may or may not work with it - if it does work, the drive will not be able to run in it's faster modes and it may not be recognized as a DVD or a burner drive.
- the IDE connector connecting it to the mboard end must be the proper one - usually it's blue on an 80 wire cable - or in any case the one farther from the middle connector on a 3 connector data cable.
It probably doesn't matter whether you connect the adapter to the middle or the other end connector on a three connector data cable, but you could try connecting it to the end one (master when using cable select).

There are no jumper pins on a SATA drive on which you can install (or not install) a jumper to designate it as master or slave.
The interface adapter may only be able to designate it as master. In that case, the master channel for the secondary IDE must be enabled.
......

This applies to Windows only.

Are the main chipset drivers installed?

If they aren't, it is common for the IDE controllers to not be detected properly, particularly the Secondary IDE, and if the Secondary IDE is not detected properly, optical drives are often not detected at all, or are detected but are not detected as DVD or burner drives. In that case, an IDE optical drive would have the same problem as a SATA drive connected through a interface adapter as IDE when connected to Secondary IDE.

Whenever you load Windows from a regular Windows CD (or DVD) from scratch, after Setup is finished you must load the drivers for the mboard, particularly the main chipset drivers, in order for Windows to have the proper drivers for and information about your mboard hardware, including it's AGP or PCI-E, ACPI, and hard drive controller support. If you have the CD that came with the mboard, all the necessary drivers are on it. If you load drivers from the web, brand name system builders and mboard makers often DO NOT have the main chipset drivers listed in the downloads for your model - in that case you must go to the maker of the main chipset's web site, get the drivers, and load them.

Are you overclocking this mboard?
If so, try backing off on the overclocking somewhat or setting it to standard settings.

Yeah chipset drivers could be the problem, I noticed when im choosing the boot devices DVD isnt on the list.

Pretty sure its not the adapter, when i first boot up and its detecting IDE drives the light on the adapter starts blinking but once the drives are detected it stops.

Alsot the adpater im using plugs straight into the motherboard IDE slot, there is no cable in between.

I said that applies to Windows only (or whatever operating system you use) because loading the main chipset drivers has nothing to do with whether the bios detects the SATA drive while booting.

"Alsot the adpater im using plugs straight into the motherboard IDE slot, there is no cable in between."

Huh?
Do you mean it installs directly onto the IDE header or connector?
There's no such thing as an IDE slot.
A 40 "pin" IDE header (which actually has 39 pins) a.k.a. a connector, which on recent mboards has a plastic shroud around it, yes, but that's not a slot.
If you have a card in an actual slot it's a PCI slot, often white or off white, and the card is a PCI SATA controller card.

Yeah plugs straight into the IDE header then

You must also have a SATA data cable or some other data connection between the drive and the adapter.

If it uses a regular SATA data cable, it should latch into the drive socket and the adapter socket - it should not come out easily when you merely brush against the cable - if it does, mere vibration can cause a poor data connection or no data connection at all. If it doesn't latch, tape the end connector in place, or better still replace the SATA cable with one that does latch.

OK yeah it definatly doesn't "latch" but plugs in fairly solid.

What makes the end connector on the SATA data cable "latch" is there is a squarish projection on one side that sticks out a bit that fits in a slot on one side of the SATA socket. It's easy to damage that projection or to break it right off. If you have another SATA data cable that will "latch", try it - if you don't tape the end connector in place.

As far as I have seen the type of interface adapter you are using should not need drivers - the chip on the adapter converts the SATA connection to an IDE connection all on it's own - but you should check it's packaging or directions that come with it or look on the manufacturer's web site to make sure. If it did not come with CD it probably does not need drivers.

There's a small possibilty the adapter is no good. If you can try connecting it to another computer, preferably one that also has SATA controller headers on it, do that.

ATX mboards are always powered in some places as long as live AC is being supplied to the PS (and the PS is switched on if it has a switch), regardless of whether the computer is running. You must remove the AC power to the PS whenever you install or remove any connection or component that plugs into the mboard or the PS connectors inside the case, otherwise you may damage something.