Hi everyone. This is a quick and probably stupid question, so I apologize if I'm posting it in the wrong forum, or shouldn't be posting it at all.
 
A while back, I made a system using the EVGA x58 3-SLI Mobo. When I first set up my system, I didn't see much need for the jMicron controller. I didn't have anything that would use the jMicron controlled ports, and in the past jMicron controller drivers have caused havoc on my system for a number of reasons. For that reason, I opted not to install the drivers,  and disabled the controller in the BIOS - better to keep things simple.
 
Now I'm trying to look for ways to speedily back up my 1 TB HDD. The external drive I have is up to the task, but USB is so slow, I'm hoping to use the E-SATA interface instead. The only problem there is, I have th jMicron controller switched off, and no drivers installed!
 
After all this time, if I were to jump into the BIOS and activate the jMicron controller, would that cause any problems with my machine? Things are running smoothly now, and I'd hate to cause a jolt to the system. Would I have to install new drivers that I scour the internet for? I'm using Windows 7 Professional x64, would Windows be able to find the drivers automatically? And would the jMicron controller cause problems later? I know for a fact that, in some cases, jMicron controlled drives show up as 'SCSI' interface drives. This can cause certain copy-protection schemes to deny access to your programs, for some reason. At least, I've had that problem in the past.
 
Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Your intended use of the jMicron ports are exactly the way I use mine:  one eSATA drive and one eSATA docking station.  They are off until I want to pull a backup of a backup, or attach a random drive for some reason.
 
Just turn them on in BIOS, download a driver: jMicron Windows Driver, and Bob's your uncle.  Enabling one or both jMicron chips will slow down your boot a little (and display a  scary "no driver found" message) but that should be the only effect.
 
If you want to browse the driver folder and the readme, that's here. 

Z.

I have just left the jMicron chips enabled from day 1.
 
Don't know what to tell you about ClamAV.  I haven't actually installed the driver I linked to.  It's the latest I could find.  The one I'm using is R1.17.48.14_eSATA.zip
 
Does the Clam complain about any of the other drives on that download page?
 
Z.

Just enable them both and install the Jmicron driver.
JMB36X_WinDrv_R1.17.62_WHQL.zip is the current newest and can be obtained at ftp://driver.jmicron.com...ATA_Controller/Windows/
 
Id use the normal, not the esata one. The normal one lets the controller chose if it is an esata device or not, the esata driver forces it to treat all devices as removable, not the most ideal if you want to install any internal drives on it.

 
Thanks for the help everyone. To clarify why I'm using ClamAV - I'm operating off a Linux box as a 'screen' before I let anything on my PC. Clam's the only thing available for now at a reasonable (free price).
 
I took a closer look at the JMB36X_WinDrv_R1.17.62_WHQL.zip package, and it comes up clean. Even a Virustotal scan was green across the board. Thanks much for that tip!
 
If I could ask two last questions, if it's not too much trouble. 1) Do I want to install the drivers, then enable the jMicron controllers in the BIOS? Or enable in the BIOS first? and 2) Is there a way to install only the drivers, and not any excess programs? Do I want to unpack the ZIP file and just run the 'setup' executable, or is there a way I can be more selective? I'm not keen on installing more processes to my startup/background tasks.