PCI / SoundCard Issue??

[BossaNova]

Okay Guys I need some help!! and here's the issue I'm having..

Parts List: Board:MachSpeed

http://www.machspeed.com/specs/xcaliber/PT88BSPRO.html

CPUentium 4
Chipset: VIA northbridge PT880
Bioshoenix AwardBios
Problematic Part: Creative SoundBlaster Audigy PCI SoundCard..

The Situation: My OnBoard Audio is AC97 "standard" in bios it has two options: OFF / Auto. I have it set to OFF.. Now Motherboard/VideoCard/CPU/HDD/RAM all work great! I've gotten Windows fully loaded and all the Updates done.. I cruise the net it does it all.. no problems.. when I plug in the PCI Sound card.. still no problems.. then once I load the drivers for it.. instant problems one time it even crashed while I was loading the drivers .. anyways once I install the soundcard I start getting random system halts.. even the system clock stops.. I plan on contacting Machspeed tech support tomorrow.. cause personally I believe the problem is either how I have the the onboard audio set in BIOS or the problem is some kind of PCI or IRQ conflict well anyways .. just throwing the problem out there for anyone that might have some good solid advice..

 

[felixc]

It may be an IRQ conflict.

When the PC boots, have a look at the screen when it lists the PCI devices in the system. It will show what IRQs are used by each peripheral. Some drivers do not appreciate at all to have an IRQ shared with another card/driver.

If this is the case, check in the BIOS if you can turn off peripherals like serial or parallel ports to get an extra IRQ line available. You can also try moving the sound card to another location. It will reshuffle the IRQ aessignments.

 

[UUVGuy]

It may be that the IRQ that the OS is assigning the soundcard is reserved in the BIOS. That would cause the symptoms you describe. You will have to get into the BIOS and see if the IRQs are OS assignable or is one or two are reserved.
The PCI bus should be fine with OS shared IRQs especially if you have bus mastering turned on.

 

[wahnula]

Can you start in Safe Mode with Networking with the card installed?

 

[BossaNova]

we'll currently I'm re-zeroing my HDD,, I was using System restore to trouble shoot my sound card ... we'll my system halted right in the middle of a system restore.. and it totally screw'd my file system.. I could'nt even get windows to successfully boot in safemode.. nor could I even get up the recovery console.. so anyways currently I'm using the Maxtor Software to do a second, full zero re-write.. it's very time consuming.. then I have to run diag on my HDD to make sure it's running properly.. once I've done that I should be able to get windows back-up and running as long as I don't get another "Unmountable Boot Volume" error again.. then I guess I have to try getting into the recovery consule so I can run "fixboot" on the c: I'm not sure I just know I might be a day away or two from getting back to were I was with the conflicting soundcard.. I know there is a section in Bios for disabling or enabling reserved IRQ's so I'll make sure to enable all the reserved ones.. I have autodetect PCI clock turned on is that similar to bus mastering? We'll anyways until I get this HD up and running again.. I'm gonna have to wait.. lol

 

[UUVGuy]

What you will want to do is let the OS assign the IRQs. That way, there should be no conflicts even if two cards share the same IRQ. That is one of the beauties of the PCI bus and a Plug and Play OS. Most BIOS these days assume bus mastering so you don't have to worry about it.
The autodetect PCI clock just senses the speed at which the PCI bus runs.