Velocity Solo X2 Blinking Curser Boot Problems

[boodaddyz]

Hey Guys,

I have a Mac Pro 3.1 (Early 2008). I am having issues getting my new Intel 730 series 480gb SSD to boot with the Velocity Solo X2 Card.

Here is what I did.

1. Kept my OSX drive installed, and took out all other drives
2. Installed the Velocity card in (Slot 1) x16 slot (No SSD Attached)
3. Installed My new SSD drive on the Sata II slot.
4. Installed Windows 8.1 Pro, and updates (Multiple Restarts) (Made sure the Velocity drivers were installed)
5. Took my SSD out of the Sata II slot, and attached it to the Velocity card
6. Started up Yosemite and selected Windows 8 as the boot drive
7. Restarted and all I get is a black flashing curser. I waited around 5 min
8. Tried booting to windows from the boot screen, and I get the same result

I always install windows without Bootcamp. I don't think that's the issue. Everything was great before I attached the SSD to the velocity card. I am at a loss. Not sure what to do from here. Any help or advice would be much appreciated.

Appreciate your time,

 

[boodaddyz]

Tried a couple more things, and it didn't have any affect.

1. PRAM Reset
2. Moving the Solo X2 card to slot 4
3. Then Moved the OSX drive to bay 4

Still black screen with blinking curser after each step. No lights on keyboard at all...

I am going to call customer support tomorrow. Hopefully there is a firmware update or something I can try.

Will post back with updates.

 

[Gav Mack]

I had similar madness with my 3,1 with separate SSD's for booting Win 7 and OS X. It is finicky booting with the X2 bios in legacy mode compared to the 4-5,1. Got it going via the second SATA port on the X2, sticking one 840 Evo on top of the other with thermal sticky pads with the ODD power extension giving the other Evo juice. Apricorn tech support said it wouldn't work

 

[Draeconis]

I'm having similar issues with my Velocity Solo X2. I install Windows 7 to it from one of the ports in the ODD bay, everything works fine. Move it to the X2, and when selected at boot, it hangs on the Apple logo. I thought it might work in conjunction with installing Windows and hacking AHCI support, but that's made no difference.

Isn't there just some way we can decompile the EFI firmware, change IDE settings to AHCI, recompile and flash? Having said that, I've no idea how you'd do that.. haha.

 

[boodaddyz]

Still waiting on support to get back to me. I did have a thought that got me a little further. I have two superdrives and the Mac Pro 3.1 uses IDE cables instead of sata.

Both drives were set to "Auto" on the switch, and I think this was conflicting. Back in the old days you had to change the jumper on one to master, and slave on the others etc...

To save time I took out both super drives, and now I get a message "No Boot Drive Found. Press any key to continue"

It's not much, but it's a little progress. It seems like the card is working now, but not detecting the SSD.

At first I thought the drive was not getting power even though I power my R9 280x with an external power supply. I tried using the second Sata port on the card, and using my external power supply to power the drive. Same result, so that's not the issue.

I don't know if enabling AHCI by editing the Mac's MBR will work or not... It won't take that long to do... There is an article I might try to follow below...Need to make sure it's not outdated.

http://www.adminsehow.com/2012/10/how-to-enable-ahci-support-for-windows-on-an-imac-macbook-or-etc/

Will keep updating as I go...

 

[Gav Mack]

The AHCI article is correct - mine was already patched and I need it anyway for windows access to all the sleds.

Last official RST supported by the 3,1 is 10.1.0.1008

http://www.win-raid.com/t2f23-Intel-R-RST-RSTe-Drivers-newest-v-v-WHQL.html

Newer hacked modded ones here:

http://www.win-raid.com/t11f23-Modded-Intel-AHCI-and-RAID-Drivers.html

Don't think it is the key thing getting it going though, with the 3,1 it just has problems booting legacy mode off it. Support were useless when I asked about my 3,1, was supposed to be escalated but heard nothing at all back. I got it going off the 2nd SATA port with the optical power extension off my own bat.

 

[boodaddyz]

The AHCI article is correct - mine was already patched and I need it anyway for windows access to all the sleds.

Last official RST supported by the 3,1 is 10.1.0.1008

http://www.win-raid.com/t2f23-Intel-R-RST-RSTe-Drivers-newest-v-v-WHQL.html

Newer hacked modded ones here:

http://www.win-raid.com/t11f23-Modded-Intel-AHCI-and-RAID-Drivers.html

Don't think it is the key thing getting it going though, with the 3,1 it just has problems booting legacy mode off it. Support were useless when I asked about my 3,1, was supposed to be escalated but heard nothing at all back. I got it going off the 2nd SATA port with the optical power extension off my own bat.

Thanks for the links Gav! Did you have to do anything special like install drivers etc... to get windows to boot from the 2nd SATA port? When I hook up the Mac drive to the Solo x2 it boots fine, I just can't get windows to boot for some reason.

Appreciate your time

 

[Gav Mack]

Thanks for the links Gav! Did you have to do anything special like install drivers etc... to get windows to boot from the 2nd SATA port? When I hook up the Mac drive to the Solo x2 it boots fine, I just can't get windows to boot for some reason.

Appreciate your time

I just ignored Apricorn and swapped bits around and bingo it booted, after costabunny who posted about piggybacking her x2 on this forum gave me the big clue to get it going. May possibly have to put the OS X ssd in the second port. A flashing cursor without any Marvell rom bios message of the x2 appearing first suggests legacy mode is hanging on the boot rom part of the boot.

Reminiscent of the old SCSI era with booting off multiple adaptec cards in windows boxes..