Nice first post! Welcome to the forum.

I've just been considering how I can do this exact thing on my Z77 board for installing XP. I currently am in the process of installing the OS (again, after it somehow got corrupted)....

Thanx!
Well, it's another (simpler) procedure if you want to do it during XP installation, the tricky part is to somehow enable ahci mode if you didn't install XP in ahci mode in the first place. You can use the driver i posted above during the os installation (the F6 method) and Windows XP will be installed in Ahci mode.

P.s. Make a backup of your system regularly, trust me, saves you from a lot of trouble!

Dimos wrote on 2025-01-15, 14:32:

Thanx!
Well, it's another (simpler) procedure if you want to do it during XP installation, the tricky part is to somehow enable ahci mode if you didn't install XP in ahci mode in the first place. You can use the driver i posted above during the os installation (the F6 method) and Windows XP will be installed in Ahci mode.

P.s. Make a backup of your system regularly, trust me, saves you from a lot of trouble!

I tried that, but it insisted on loading the driver with F6 method from a floppy disk, but this motherboard has no floppy disk controller on it. Nor IDE for that matter.

It's not necessary to have a floppy disk drive, you can slipstream the necessary drivers into a Windows XP installation cd/dvd via nLite or you can try to install the os from a usb drive together with the Ahci drivers: https://www.prime-expert.com/articles/b02/ins … omISOWithoutDVD

If this seems too much of a hustle, install Windows XP normally (in Ide mode) and then you can try the post installation process i described in my post.

Dimos wrote on 2025-01-15, 16:59:

If this seems too much of a hustle, install Windows XP normally (in Ide mode) and then you can try the post installation process i described in my post.

I followed your instructions and it worked great. The only thing I changed was I used the sata drivers that I downloaded from Asus website, rather than the ones you provided.

Prior to doing this XP would just crash on boot if I enabled AHCI on BIOS.

That's great! I too had the same result with every other method i had tried, and trust me, i spent a lot of time trying to make it work till i followed this exact procedure.

Glad you had successfully done it!

Thanks for putting this together! I also have a Z77, worked well for me after I substituted the iastor drivers from the asus site. Crystal diskmark reads went up substantially.

Thanks for saving me from reinstalling!

Actually you don't need to enter command line or even touch the registry manually.

All you have to do is to get the Intel Rapid Storage driver for your current chipset.

Just for an example:

I recently got a used HP 8770W workstation laptop which comes with the i7 3920XM processor. It comes with the QM77 chipset. The corresponding IRS driver will be the Intel 7 series chipset SATA AHCI driver (not the /216 that also comes with the driver).

1. Install XP with IDE mode in BIOS. After installation, expand the downloaded Intel Rapid Storage driver. (Mine is downloadable from HP website. But it can also be downloaded from Intel website or corresponding motherboard maker's website.)

Note: the exe file can be extracted with 7-zip. The files will be extracted into DRIVE:....\Intel Rapid Storage Technology Driver\Drivers\x32

2. After running XP for the first time, go to Device Manager.

3. Expand IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers

4. Click on the 4-port SATA driver. If not available choose the 2 port SATA driver. (It may differ from system to system.)

5. Upgrade that driver and point the windows :

a. Install from a list or specific location (Advanced)
b. Don't search. I will choose the driver to install.
c. Have disk
d. {Point to the above location where the IRST driver is extracted.} Choose iaAHCI.inf file
e. Depending on your system, you need to choose the correct driver. In my case, it is the Intel(R) 7 Series Chipset Family SATA AHCI Controller. Beware, that there is also the similar looking
Intel(R) 7 Series/C216 Chipset Family SATA AHCI Controller which won't work.

After changing the driver, reboot into BIOS, change back to AHCI mode, and Windows XP supposed to boot normally.

If not, change back to IDE mode, and choose another port to upgrade the driver to AHCI.

By this method, you will maintain the actual compatibility with your chipset and motherboard.

I've done this before on my desktop when I was using the i5-2500K processor. I also have done it in my Thinkpads E530 and X230, and now the 8770W.

P.S. I'm writing all this in Windows XP 32-bit in the said 8770W laptop, with Supremium (Chrome fork for older OSs, with Panda Dome Security).

Well the truth is that it kind of works in that way. For many chipsets this will be (kind of) sufficient and will get mostly the job done. But...
This method, which is the one mostly reported online, (if you read the original post https://www.os2museum.com/wp/booting-windows-xp-or-not/ from which i mentioned that i got the proper method) does create a little mess. What it really does is forcing the Ahci driver onto an existing ide controller of your system. If, like in your's and many others' cases, you have the access to the correct driver for your chipset it may work and the system, after changing the boot parameter in bios from ide to ahci, will boot normally. But in many cases this will not suffice (like in mine) and as i said before it really messes things around cause you forced the ahci driver onto the ide controller. If you for example tried to boot again in ide mode you would find yourself unable to do so because of this.
The difference of the method i described is that it prepares the system to boot using the iastor.sys from the (compatible with your chipset) ahci package and by booting again (after you changed the boot parameter in the bios from ide to ahci mode) the ahci controller gets loaded and then you can update it in the device manager with the proper ahci driver. This way everything is installed the right way (ide controller stays untouched as it was, ahci controller gets updated with the proper driver), it is guaranteed to work in any system with any chipset (as long as there is a compatible driver for it! - try the https://winraid.level1techs.com/ that i already linked to in my original post and you will most probably find one) and you are also guaranteed that you will never experience any trouble, any shortcoming of any kind and you can freely boot in either ide or ahci mode whenever you like.

Not sure about the problems, but I've been doing this for quite some time (since the days of 2nd gen core CPUs), and I feel using the chipset's original drivers will give better compatibility without causing problems. Besides, it's a straight forward method. The main thing, is to choose which part of the IDE controller that you have to upgrade.

Seems like it's time for someone to build a more up to date slipstreamed iso

Of course if you have a cd or you can find on your motherboard' s site your chipset's original drivers that' s the best option with either method. The only difference between the two is that the one forces the ahci driver to the ide controller (which oftentimes will work fine) while the other enables you to boot with the ahci controller and install the driver to it. In my case, using the exact same driver, the first method didn't work while i had success with the second.

Bro, I've been fighting with XP trying to get ACHI working for about 7 hours now and this was the thing that finally fixed it. Thank you bro, saving and archiving this for the future for sure. Made building my xp/7/linux build so much easier.

Thanks for sharing.
There are videos recommending nLite to add the drivers, but it fails, is a lost of time!
Your information was precise and lovely useful.
Everything worked like a charm!
Regards