Originally Posted by jboydchem

I found this last night while trying to solve the same problem (installing XP Pro). Generic drivers did not work. This thread provided some good clues. The solution was on the CD that came with the Asus motherboard but there was no useful documentation on the CD, or in the User's Guide, or on the Asus web site.

First, the system needs a floppy drive, at least during the OS installation.
Next you need to create the SATA driver floppy. If you have a DOS boot floppy with CD drivers, everything can probably be accomplished with the new system, but a second system with a floppy and CD drive will be quicker. (Elsewhere, a few posters choked on the prospect of resurecting an "antiquated" floppy and talked about slipstreaming the necessary files onto a rebuilt XP CD. Using a floppy is a lot simpler.)

What files need to be on the floppy? The first is txtsetup.oem. Find that file and the others will be close by. On the Asus CD they are burried in \Drivers\RAID\FloppyImage\965-965L. Those were the ones that worked, but there were ones that didn't work for me in \964_180 and in \964plus180(181). I copied two files (txtsetup.oem and sisraid) and one folder (RAID) to the floppy. The RAID folder contains 2 folders (winxp and win2000), and each folder has 4 files (property.dll, sisraid2.inf, sisraid2.inf, and sisraid.cat). The same 4 file names in both folders. So, there are a total of 344KB in 3 folders and 10 files.

Have the floppy ready and boot the XP installation CD. After a few seconds there will be a prompt at the bottom of the screen to "Press F6 if you need to install a third party SCSI or RAID driver." Press it quickly or you will miss the chance. After pressing F6, you won't know for at least a minute that the system recognized it. Then "Setup could not determine the type of one or more mass storage devices... To specify additional SCSI devices ... press S."
Immediately after pressing S, "Please insert the disk labeled Manufacturer-supplied hardware support disk [what gave them the idea that it was labeled?] into Drive A. Press Enter when ready". After that it takes at least another minute before you know if it worked and the drive is recognized. If not, look for another set. I built 5 floppies before one worked. Good luck.

Asus K8S-MX micro ATX MoBo
Athlon 64 3400
1GB Mushkin 3200
PNY Quadro4 900 DVI/DVI
Seagate ST380013AS 80GB SATA