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Windows Vista problem – SATA HDD running under PATA mode via BIOS emulation

Many of computer users who are early adapters of Windows Vista likes to have both their previous version and newer version of OS under dual boot mode.

One common problem with newer hardware and older Microsoft OS such as Windows XP is the incompatibility of SATA controllers.

Most of the newer desktop and notebooks are now days coming with SATA HDD instead of older and slower PATA versions, however the major problem with Windows XP is one must install the SATA controller drivers while booting via their floppy drive but here catch is, how many of us now days have a floppy drive ?

To avoid this problem of no hard disk at the time of installation of Windows XP / 2000 / Server 2003 which needs floppy disk to load the SATA controller driver, all modern computer BIOS offers option to emulate the Hard disk operation mode.

All though this would solve the problem of legacy pre Windows Vista OS installation problem, however often windows vista crashes while running under a PC which has SATA HDD operation mode emulated to IDE.

Microsoft has a patch for all version of Windows Vista to solve this problem.

When a SATA hard disk on a Windows Vista-based computer is operating in Parallel Advanced Technology Attachment (PATA) mode, the computer may crash.

Please note, if you have a single boot system running with SATA HDD, its always recommended not to emulate the SATA HDD operation mode to IDE. This is only for those who are willing to run under dual boot with pre Windows Vista OSes.