Upgrading A8M2N-LA (Nodus M3) to SATA-II 3.0

jayteawhy · Nov 19, 2010, 07:18 PM

Hi, newbie here.

I read with interest a post from three years ago about increasing the transfer rate of the SATA controller on the HP/ Compaq A8M2N-LA (Nodus M3) motherboard from 1.5 Gb/s to 3.0 Gb/s:
The A8M2N-LA (NodusM3) in various HP media center systems

My son inherited an HP Pavilion a1637c running XP Media Center from his grandfather a couple of years ago, and I've been messing around with it ever since.

When the hard drive failed last month, I decided it was time to switch over to Windows 7, so when I installed the new drive I did a clean install of Ultimate x64. Upgraded BIOS to v3.10, downloaded the latest Nvidia drivers, etc.--just about everything seems to be working great. Checked the speed on the Nvidia SATA controller--it's 1.5 Gb/s.

I'm wondering if there's a way to increase the SATA transfer rate to 3.0 Gb/s with my present configuration. I inspected the southbridge & confirmed that it's an nForce 430--but I didn't get any further as the information on the linked post is for XP/ Vista and I'm reluctant to get in over my head & break what's fixed up just fine.

On the other hand, it would be really handy to adapt one or more of the internal SATA ports to eSATA for external drives (there's only one drive bay in the case), and I figured while I was at it . . .

Thumbs up or down? Are there Nvidia drivers out there to support?

jayteawhy · Nov 21, 2010, 01:43 AM

Well, looks like it's a driver and/ or BIOS issue--nothing to do with Windows 7--as I've run into the same problems as the others on the cited thread.

Went ahead & followed the instructions provided by Randomness, but I'm given no option to manually enter the SATA rate.

Oh, well.

Nov 19, 2010, 07:18 PM	#1
jayteawhy HardwareHeaven Newbie Join Date: Nov 2010 Location: Chicago Posts: 2 Rep Power: 0 System Specs	Upgrading A8M2N-LA (Nodus M3) to SATA-II 3.0 Hi, newbie here. I read with interest a post from three years ago about increasing the transfer rate of the SATA controller on the HP/ Compaq A8M2N-LA (Nodus M3) motherboard from 1.5 Gb/s to 3.0 Gb/s: The A8M2N-LA (NodusM3) in various HP media center systems My son inherited an HP Pavilion a1637c running XP Media Center from his grandfather a couple of years ago, and I've been messing around with it ever since. When the hard drive failed last month, I decided it was time to switch over to Windows 7, so when I installed the new drive I did a clean install of Ultimate x64. Upgraded BIOS to v3.10, downloaded the latest Nvidia drivers, etc.--just about everything seems to be working great. Checked the speed on the Nvidia SATA controller--it's 1.5 Gb/s. I'm wondering if there's a way to increase the SATA transfer rate to 3.0 Gb/s with my present configuration. I inspected the southbridge & confirmed that it's an nForce 430--but I didn't get any further as the information on the linked post is for XP/ Vista and I'm reluctant to get in over my head & break what's fixed up just fine. On the other hand, it would be really handy to adapt one or more of the internal SATA ports to eSATA for external drives (there's only one drive bay in the case), and I figured while I was at it . . . Thumbs up or down? Are there Nvidia drivers out there to support? Last edited by jayteawhy; Nov 19, 2010 at 09:17 PM.

Nov 21, 2010, 01:43 AM	Thread Starter #2
jayteawhy HardwareHeaven Newbie Join Date: Nov 2010 Location: Chicago Posts: 2 Rep Power: 0 System Specs	Re: Upgrading A8M2N-LA (Nodus M3) to SATA-II 3.0 Well, looks like it's a driver and/ or BIOS issue--nothing to do with Windows 7--as I've run into the same problems as the others on the cited thread. Went ahead & followed the instructions provided by Randomness, but I'm given no option to manually enter the SATA rate. Oh, well.