System Hangs when SATA-AHCI Support is Enabled
Problem:
- The system hangs and "reboot may be required" is shown in the lower left corner of the BING desktop.
- The system hangs while attempting to enter Partition Work or when switching drives in Partition Work.
- The system hangs for a while then shows no partitions on the drive.
Condition:
- The SATA-AHCI option in BootIt Next Generation is enabled.
- The system uses SATA hard drives.
Cause:
- This occurs when the BIOS attempts to access the SATA hard drive and either times-out or is unable to return.
Solution:
- Disable SATA-AHCI support in Settings; or
- Reboot the system using Ctrl+Alt+Delete when you see the "reboot may be required" message.
Details:
BootIt Next Generation includes low level support for accessing SATA CD/DVD drives via the SATA-AHCI option. Due to system specifications actually in use, BING must initialize and communicate directly with the SATA controller.
Unfortunately, the hand-off mechanism as implemented by many systems is one direction only. This means that once one of those BIOSes gives up control of the SATA controller, it won't attempt to take it back. As a result, when a BIOS request is issued for a SATA drive, the BIOS hangs up.
When Partition Work is opened, BING attempts to match BIOS drives to SATA drives. If it can't--such as when a BIOS doesn't provide the correct information needed--then the BIOS is used to access the hard drive. When Partition Work is closed, BING releases direct control of the SATA controller and all future SATA hard drive requests are handled by the BIOS. These future hard drive requests can occur if you choose an option that requires BING to read from a drive or load information from the BING partition itself.