I’ve got a server here with a “Promise FastTrack ATA100 IDE RAID controller” … Yay 2 extra IDE ports with semisoftware RAID. Not all too useful in a 1U box with 2 drives, unless you’re into that semisoftware bios-windows RAID crap. So… don’t connect anything to it, and all is well, right? Not exactly. When you do that, all you get on boot is a message saying it didn’t detect any disks, hasn’t configured any RAID sets, and asks you to press CTRL-F to enter it’s BIOS or Esc to continue booting. Phew, okay, that’s fine, let’s just wait like 10 seconds and see if it continues booting. Nope, not after an hour either. Why the *bleep* do you have to press Esc to continue booting … especially in a server! Even if you have a disk connected but haven’t configured a RAID set it will stand there waiting for your Esc. (note: configuring a single-drive RAID0 array does the trick there). Add to that there was no option in the BIOS to turn off the controller… So I dug out the PDF manual from Gigabyte.com.tw and found the jumper to turn it off.

But how irritating is this?! I have a Tyan board that also has that controller on board (but with a BIOS option to turn it off) and it does the same thing if you don’t shut it up… Retarded if you ask me… 😐

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