tje wrote on 2024-05-21, 08:57:

Hi, […]
Show full quote

Hi,

Suspect this might be a lost cause, or far too niche, but I figured it doesn't hurt to put it out there and ask.
I have an intel L4440GX board, a nice dual p3 500 that I'm looking to build an NT4 machine from. https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/s/intel-l440gx
Having made the textbook mistake of looking at it and thinking "ooh, PCI-X - I'll get a nice gig ethernet card" then realising, that whilst it looks very simiilar, a Raidport is not a PCI-X slot, I then RTFM and went looking for the right Raidport card to turn the on-board scsi into RAID. Given my want to use spinning rust, I figured having a mirrored set of vintage spinning rust was likely to be worthwhile in future.
The on board scsi is working fine, it shows the adaptec scsiselect bios, and my disks show, can be LLF'd etc (even though it only shows ~9gb of my 146gb drive - but I can deal with that).
I found this - https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/111833859280 which looks to be the correct item, and so got it. I actually got 2, as one arrived without a dimm, and both cards behave the same, so reasonably sure this isn't a hardware failure issue.
It plugs in, the LED lights, but there's no bios on boot. When I boot to dos, and try and the disk based bios update, it initially detects the card, and tries to flash, but then boms out and says card not present.
Upon closer inspection, this card has a sticker on it saing that it's a ARO-1130A/HP - suggesting this might be an OEM HP part. I now thing that it's likely there's some sort of bios / vendor lock.
Anyone got any suggestions before I throw in the towel? I'm wondering if there's anyone who's seen similar, and has managed to maybe force cross flash between firmware / bios.
My fall-back option is to put the raidport card back in the box and live with regular disks on the standard scsi controller.
As always, any insight appreciated 😀 thank you all.

Probably the wrong card for the board - the L440GX+ has a RAIDport III enabled connector whilst the ARO-1130A is a RAIDport II card...you're ideally looking for an ARO-1130U2 card (see the compatibility list at https://web.archive.org/web/20070828030149/ht … /raid_guide.htm )

Thanks - blindingly obvious, not sure how I missed that.
Fortunately, looks like I have another board that the unit I've got should work in.
Time to see if its even possible to find a Raidport III card for the intended board.
Thanks again.

I use one. Not the A model, mine is a U2
You cant use the ARO-1130A/HP in that slot it has to be the ARO-1130U2 controller card. It will not work with any of the other Adaptec ARO-1130 cards.

When it works it boots up into a SCSI Select utility that looks very much like the AAA-131U2 BIOS does.

Thanks for that - my own stupidity 😀
Now need to source a U2... which looks to be just about impossible! 😀

tje wrote on 2024-05-22, 09:45:

Thanks for that - my own stupidity 😀
Now need to source a U2... which looks to be just about impossible! 😀

I would say so yes.
It wasnt a popular controller to begin with.
I know there were some OEM controllers but I couldnt tell you what is printed on the sticker. I know mine was an Adaptec retail original and the sticker on the chip has ARO-1130U2 printed on it.

Here'a a thread on the Dell version - Adaptec ARO-1130U2 SCSI RAID controller drivers for Windows 98SE

Thats great - thanks for the input.
Saved search on ebay time I think.

This is what youre looking for.

Its hard to find because as you can see the cards name is Adaptec ARO-1130C but the sticker calls it an ARO-1130U2 2Mb 7896