Apparently (I hope) I was right a few answers ago, with the pci=nomsi kernel boot parameter 
See here:
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/linux-hardware-18/linux-will-not-recognize-any-sata-devices-853907/
Same XFX MI-A78S-8209 Motherboard as yours (discovered in chat), and same problem… marked SOLVED)
This seems to be a problem with the way your BIOS version initialises the VIA VT8251 south bridge SATA controller… XFX did release a BIOS Update that fixed the issue, but appear to have withdrawn it for some reason (at least I can’t find it on their website)… and now (hopefully) on to a fix that doesn’t require the BIOS update.
Boot from your 10.10 LiveCD, and as soon as you see:
http://linuxforums.org.uk/MGalleryItem.php?id=1122
displayed at the bottom of your screen… keep hitting the Space Bar until…
A screen similar to this will appear and ask you to select a language… select English and hit Enter:
(if you get to the purple Ubuntu screen with the 5 or 6 dots, you missed it and will have to try again)
http://linuxforums.org.uk/MGalleryItem.php?id=1132
Press the F6 key, and a menu will open as in the above picture.
Hit the Esc key to exit the F6 menu (you MUST enter F6 then exit the menu, or the White text won’t appear)
You will now see some WHITE text just above the F1 through F6 options, that looks like this:
http://linuxforums.org.uk/MGalleryItem.php?id=1082
Now type:
pci=nomsi
(For clarity… that’s PCI=NOMSI in lower case… MUST be lower case… FYI, msi = Message Signal Interrupts)
so the end of that line reads:
quiet splash – pci=nomsi
Press Enter to “Try Ubuntu without installing”
Now see if Gparted detects your disks… if so, just install Ubuntu.
This next bit may seem a bit of a pain, but you’ll only have to do it once.
After you finish installing Ubuntu from the CD, (when you first boot from the hard drive) you will need to enter the pci=nomsi option again, but the way you edit the boot options is now slightly different…
As soon as your BIOS POST screen disappears, and you see:
http://linuxforums.org.uk/MGalleryItem.php?id=1122
Press SHIFT key, you will be presented with the GRUB menu
Select the ‘default’ Ubuntu kernel (usually the top one), and rather than pressing enter, press E to edit.
You will be presented with a screen like this:
http://linuxforums.org.uk/MGalleryItem.php?id=1152
Press DOWN ARROW until you get to the line that starts with:
linux /boot
and press the END key to position the cursor at the end of the that line… it usually ends with “quiet splash”.
Now you can enter additional kernel boot options… the nomodeset option has been added in the above screenshot… but you need to add pci=nomsi in its place, so make the end of that line read:
[b]quiet splash pci=nomsi[/b]
(doesn't matter if it moves down a line, as long as there is a space between splash and pci=nomsi)
Now hit Ctrl+X to boot.
Now to make the fix permanent.
To make the fix permanent…Once booted into Ubuntu from the hard drive, open a terminal (Applications>Accessories>Teminal)
In the terminal enter:
sudo gedit /etc/default/grub
hit enter, and enter yor password when asked. (FYI, you won’t “see” anything being entered when you type your password but it IS being entered)
When gedit opens, find the line that reads:
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT=“quiet splash”
and change it to:
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT=“quiet splash pci=nomsi”
Save and exit gedit. (make SURE you click Save before exiting)
now back in a terminal, enter:
sudo update-grub
Hit Enter, and your password if/when asked.
You’re done… Ubuntu should now boot without the need to enter the pci=nomsi option every boot.
