ASUS P4B533-V and SCOPE PCI

[Bud Weiser]

Hi !

Last week I´ve set up another machine for SCOPE PCI because both my previous ASUS P4T-E motherboards BIOS chips died some time ago.

I have a ASUS P4B533-V in very good condition, so I used it.
The PC is up and running, I installed SCOPE 4.5 w/ my 4.0 keys and SCOPE runs too.

IN addition to the only 1 SCOPE PCI 15DSP card (2nd gen w/ 2 ADAT I/Os) in PCI slot #4, there are several other PCI cards in the machine like a USB/Firewire combo card w/ NEC chipset for USB and TI chipset for Firewire as well as a Adaptec SCSI card (plug ´n play) because I plan importing all my old AKAI library for STS4000 to that machine.
There´s also a dedicated network 10/100 PCI card (plug ´n play) because I want to connect both my computers (1 w/ SCOPE PCI and the other w/ SCOPE /XITE) to Copperlan MIDI network.

That said,- ALL the cards have their own IRQ already, onboard audio and all USB drivers except the one for the USB/Firewire combo card are disabled.

Only the USB driver for the USB/FiWi combo card shares w/ the ISA 22 ACPI compliant system
(in german:ISA 22 ACPI konformes System).

When I start "the Sycon dpclat Latency Checker",- it spikes like hell.

Now I wonder what it could be.
Do I need the ISA 22 ACPI ?
Or might there be another (up to now not identified) driver causing the spikes ?

All the hardware I use in that machine ran fine in others before,- incl. my Matrox G550 AGP x4 which I used in audio machines only and since 2003.
I installed latest available driver from 2006 though and the mobo´s BIOS is 1008 which is the latest not being beta.

Again, I don´t see any hardware conflicts or shared stuff in the ressources except the ISA 22 ACPI.

I use Win XP SP3 w/ latest updates.

Any ideas/ advice welcome !

thx in advance

Bud

[dante]

Maybe you could strip out all the non Scope cards (network, firewire etc) and add them in one by one, running the latency checker before adding each one back in.

See if any of the other cards causing this.

Even more extreme, take the Scope cards out as well, adding them in one by one w/ latency checker before each one.

If you get a spike with all cards out, then problem is closer to home (on mobo, or RAM etc).

[Bud Weiser]

Maybe you could strip out all the non Scope cards (network, firewire etc) and add them in one by one, running the latency checker before adding each one back in.

See if any of the other cards causing this.

Even more extreme, take the Scope cards out as well, adding them in one by one w/ latency checker before each one.

If you get a spike with all cards out, then problem is closer to home (on mobo, or RAM etc).

Hello ...

Answering on this old post because I´ve set up the machine again, updated everything possible, have SCOPE 4.5 up and running in standalone mode, installed BC Modular which I want to test now w/ SCOPE Pro PCI and later as well w/ XITE-1 (different machine though).

It definitely drives me nuts I´m unable to get rid of the DPC latency spikes because I want to have it perfect and this old Intel Pentium 4 machine is by far fast enough to work w/ SCOPE PCI and SCOPE 4.5.

So,- I´ll include some info in the attachment,- mobo layout and which cards are in which PCI slot, pics of devicemanager showing no conflicts and exclusive IRQ for each card.
Mobo IRQ sharing table is also included and a wordpad file describing usage of the slots and what´s de-activated where (BIOS, device manager, services).

For me, it would be essential to find out what´s happening because I want to use THIS machine together w/ the XITE-1 DAW computer in a combo,- MIDI and audio bi-directional connected by physical MIDI and ADAT and THIS machine especially running devices which aren´t working 100% perfect on XITE-1.
I want it to use as my sampler (STS) and dedicated (BC-) Modular synth though,- but maybe for the VDATs too as also Vocodizer.

If someone might have a look at my infos and might be able to help w/ some additional advise,- that would be excellent.

best

Bud

[garyb]

there's nothing obvious.

try a different video card and power supply. it's just a shot in the dark, but....

you can replace the whole computer for less than $100, probably less than $50. i'd say there's defective hardware somewhere.

[Bud Weiser]

there's nothing obvious.

try a different video card and power supply. it's just a shot in the dark, but....

you can replace the whole computer for less than $100, probably less than $50. i'd say there's defective hardware somewhere.

Hi Gary, I hoped you chime in,- thank you !

I replaced the ATI graphics card by the Matrox G550 and my office machine w/ the ATI inside shows exactly the same issues, but w/ onboard audio and a different PWR supply.
Here we have a good Enermax 450W ATX which is tested.

But it´s great to read you don´t see anything obvious, so it´s a hardware issue which cannot be fixed in any of both machines, maybe mobo revision even latest BIOS update is done.

I already bookmarked a HP XW 4600 Core2Duo E8400 machine for EUR 164.- incl. 19% VAT.
It has several PCIe x16 / x8 and x1 slots but also 3 PCI.
Any idea which mobos are in these machines and will they work w/ 2 PCI cards (SCOPE Pro & SCOPE Pulsar 2) ?
I´ll get the 2nd card soon.

thx again

Bud

[garyb]

the HP should work great. i have an xw4400 and i'm pleased.

mine does give occasional PCI overload message(once a month), but it always works after the first retry and it never hinders my work. i'm using 3 PCI cards and one of them is a Pulsar1. i believe they have Intel motherboards, but you'd have to check with HP for details.

i think the xw series are well made machines. at this point in time, they're a bargain as well.

[Bud Weiser]

the HP should work great. i have an xw4400 and i'm pleased.

mine does give occasional PCI overload message(once a month), but it always works after the first retry and it never hinders my work. i'm using 3 PCI cards and one of them is a Pulsar1. i believe they have Intel motherboards, but you'd have to check with HP for details.

i think the xw series are well made machines. at this point in time, they're a bargain as well.

Thanks again, Gary,- good to know.
I´ll ask the seller and hope he knows which mobo is inside.

Here are the specs:

HP
Modell Workstation xw4600
Formfactor Mini-Tower
Processor (CPU) Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 3 GHz
Memory (RAM) 2 GB DDR2-RAM
Harddrive 250 GB SATA
Optical DVD-RW
Chipset Intel X38 Express
Graphics NVIDIA NVS 300
Network Gigabit Ethernet
Audio onboard
Expansion slots: 3 PCI slots
1 PCI Express x8 slot (x4 functionality)
1 PCI Express x1 slot (half length)
2 PCI Express x16 Gen2 slots (1 for graphics)
Schnittstellen 9 USB 2.0, Seriell, Parallel, 2 PS/2, RJ-45 (NIC), 1 External SATA, Audio
Abmessungen 16.8 cm x 45.6 cm x 45 cm

used item w/ some wear and tear

COA-sticker for Windows Vista Business (no OS installed)

XP installed comes for EUR 25.-

Do X38 chipset motherboards come w/ regular PCI support,- not PCI-to-PCIe bridge ?
Maybe you know that ...

I think this machine would also be XITE-1 ready.
X38 chipset says PCIe x1 is PCIe 1.1,- is that o.k. w/ XITE-1 PCIe card ?
http://ark.intel.com/de/products/31919/ ... Controller

Bud

[garyb]

yes, it's fine with the XITE.

it's socket 775(core2). it has real PCI slots.

it's an HP motherboard, but i believe it's made by intel. it's not really an issue.

[Bud Weiser]

yes, it's fine with the XITE.

it's socket 775(core2). it has real PCI slots.

it's an HP motherboard, but i believe it's made by intel. it's not really an issue.

Cool !

Thank you very much,- you´re da man !!!



Bud

[garyb]

Thank you very much,- you´re da man !!!

nah, that is jailhouse talk.
we're both men, i think.....

[dawman]

BTW Bruda Mann Bud,
I still have an ancient Scope/Giga-DAW that uses a Matrox G450 AGP4x.
It's 9 years old.
Those guys built some really quality cards, even if it was only 16GBs of DDR3 RAM.