Well put, Bladerunner, and if I could, I would like to say that there can be a further childishness in relation to VIA drivers which is often found in installing the "latest and greatest" when in fact there was no need to change them to begin with for a specific motherboard.

Ooh, I forgot to mention, two of my systems are VIA based. It is a perfect world...

H.

Is this Dirty Harry or Caius Caligula speaking?

Plato, the error you receive you very well may have received in 2k IF Microsoft had included the ability in 2K to log those ACPI errors to the event viewer. It seems they have added this to XP to get Hardware Manufacturers to take note of their crap support for ACPI. Email off to your motherboard manufacturer the error and see what they say. ACPI is not Microsoft's fault (well it could be but it isn't in this case).

Wow, long thread here. One thing that I didn't see throughout the posts (sorry if I missed it) is that there are many devices that require multiple IRQs, not just one. I have seen several sound cards that want 3 or more IRQs in order to function properly, and there were times where you could have extra PCI slots but no more IRQs to install anything. But, I too live in this perfect world where I can hookup gadgets and not have issues.

So to sum up what's been said in this thread - I can have ACPI & the ability to use hibernation & have my soundcard cease to function @ random, often within a couple of mins [sometimes it's less than 30 seconds] of starting to watch a video file or play a game - OR I can do without ACPI & hibernation & hopefully be able to get my soundcard [Videologic Sonic Vortex 2] on IRQ10, on it's own, as opposed to being on 12 with a bunch of other stuff as it is now. Is this right?

Is it that hard to understand that your soundcard, or any other device, isn't "on 12 with a bunch of other stuff ". It just looks that way.

Your system doesn't work with ACPI - well fine, can be, don't use ACPI then. But for any readers who are about to install W2K or XP - try an install with ACPI before you believe that it causes problems.

H.

1. Aureal cards and 2K/XP are not the best combination...even without throwing ACPI into the mix.

2. Your board is old. Yes it is old.

3. You can have hibernation without ACPI. I've done it.

4. Always try ACPI first. Lately I haven't had any ACPI problems but if you work on enough systems you will.

5. Go to the sotre. Stick an Audigy in. If it fixes your problems then keep it. If it doesn't then return it. It's really that simple. Well if you can return it.

Although some problems with IRQ sharing exist, most are related to high-bandwidth devices. Windows XP Professional manages IRQs using a first in, first out (FIFO) stack. The more devices that share a single IRQ, the longer it takes to traverse this stack, which can have a system wide performance impact. Performance problems might be reduced if high-bandwidth devices such as high-speed network adapters and high-end Small Computer Standard Interface (SCSI) controllers, for example, use different IRQs. More flexible interrupt handling models are available on newer x86-based ACPI systems that support the Advanced Programmable Interrupt Controller standard. Systems that incorporate the Advanced Programmable Interrupt Controller have access to more interrupts, which avoids the need to share interrupts.

Most x86-based systems do not support manual configuration of IRQ settings. However, a few do offer this capability as a troubleshooting feature. If you are experiencing problems with system lockups or stability, you have two alternatives:

If your system firmware supports manual configuration of IRQ settings, as a troubleshooting method, try manually assigning IRQs to specific PCI slots by using the configuration options in the BIOS. If you need to manually assign IRQ addresses for an ACPI-compliant computer and the BIOS option to disable ACPI is available, disable ACPI before installing Windows XP Professional. However, remember that it is best not to change the BIOS default or automatic settings unless you have a specific reason to do so.
If your system does not support manual configuration of IRQ settings, try moving high-performance peripherals to another slot.





and this is from this DOC that is found on MS site....

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/treevie...dh_dmt_kasl.asp


EEEEAAAHHHHH Say agian??? what was that....

Oh yeah I almost forgot.... if your motherboard isnt ACPI compliant or on the BAD list that MS has then XP isnt suppose to install ACPI..

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/treevie...dc_mcc_htev.asp


and if this isnt an issue then why does MS give you this?

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q216251

Well thats it for me... if you believe that there arent any issues here then thats fine but when MS says they have issues I would tend to believe them.......

Uuuuummmmmmmmm yeah that about right.......

No it is not that hard to understand - I understand it perfectly well, the point I was trying to make is that my soundcard doesn't seem to understand this. Whilst other devices in my system don't seem to mind all pretending they're on the same IRQ [or allowinbg Windows to do so] it seems that my soundcard needs to genuinely be on the IRQ that it wants [10], either that or it doesn't like sharing an IRQ - which it may or may not be doing as I can't see what IRQ's their really using cos of the whole ACPI/virtual IRQ thing.

A.

Greetings to the Society for Unnecessarily Patronising People

Oh bugger. I kinda knew that, but didn't think it was [B]that old. You can? cool....how?<sigh> I would if I had the money, only just bought new mobo & CPU & that kinda cleaned me out financially.

8) It say's "store" in your quote but I said sotre. 8) Weeeeiiirrrdd..

Srory

Sorry I wasnt trying to be funny... I was trying to say that in your case disableing the ACPI may help you.... it depend if you can set IRQ 10 just for your soundcard... that may involve moving PCI cards...ETC... But as IRQ 10 isnt use for any of the system board stuff like system timer, hard drive controllers, USB ports then there is a very good chance that this can be done...

I hope so. I've had another idea as well - I could try removing the card, turning on the PC long enough for it to POST, tell it to reset the errrmmm..oh bugger, forgotten the name of it off the top of my head - that thingy under PCI/PNP in the BIOS, then turning off & putting the card back in. I'll have to record this on my VCR to find out what IRQ it's on as it flashes by too quickly to read.

If doing that doesn't work then I'll have to see if doing without ACPI solves the problem. The thing that makes it worse is that it's not predictable - it doesn't seem to be caused by any noticeable event. Someitmes I can watch a couple of hours of recorded video files [I sometimes use my PC as a VCR, as my actual VCR no longer records in stereo] without probs, but then other times it doesn't last more than about 10 seconds before the sound goes, & then I have to reboot to get it back.

Funnily enough when I 1st [re]installed XP after getting new mobo & CPU it was on 10, even in Device Manager, but so was my network card. I tried uninstalling & reinstalling the network card [physically as well as in Device Manager], but when I reinstalled it it kept going back to 10 [@ least that's what it showed up as in Windows - that blasted virtual IRQ thing certainly confuses the issue when you're trying to troubleshoot].

I'd forgotten that my mobo does [or so it seems] have the ability to allocate specific IRQs to specific PCI slots. The reason I forgot about it before is well...

I've seen the ability/function to do this in the BIOS's of other mobos & the way it was done was nice & simple:

PCI no. X use IRQ Y

Anyone care to guess which way of doing this Abit didn't use? Yup, that's right - the simple 1.

The reason I forgot about my KT7A-RAID v1.3 [supposedly] having this ability is that when I tried to wrap my head around the explanation of it in the manual I ended up tying my brain in knots!

Here's what it says:
So far, so good - normal straight-forward stuff, right? So then there's this:WTF??? Can anyone explain that in plain & simple English please?

Sure try this....

http://duxcw.com/faq/irq/irq.htm

Also your PCI slot has a IRQ that you can assign but it also is connected to other devices like your usb port...etc (USB not a PCI card but it will use the same IRQ as the PCI slot) so it almost like being a real PCI card... takes the same resoures...

Errrmmm... That's not exactly what I meant. I know that it's a more awkward way of assigning IRQs to PCI slots, but what I don't understand is how to use that table to figure out how to make a spcific PCI slot use a specific IRQ.

I don't know why Abit [or Award, if it was their idea] would chose to do it this way instead of the "PCI no. X use IRQ Y" way.

try going to thier web site and see if they have a support forum... I am sure someone thier has the infor you need...

I figured it out eventually, not that it did me much good - made no difference @ all. Tried moving cards around according to what slots share IRQs with each other & so on to get it on its own & managed to get it on the right IRQ in the BIOS, but that didn't help. Did the thing in device Manager to switch to a Standard PC [instead of ACPI] so that windows reports IRQ useage the same as the BIOS, but that makes no difference either, well, actually that's not strictly true - it made the problem a bit worse, Now, if the sound goes the system sometimes freezes up which is a less dramatic version of what my SV2 used to do with old mobo [used to lock the system & black-screen].

I've also updated to the latest BIOS [incase anyone else has a KT7A (RAID or non-RAID) version 1.3, there's a new BIOS out - 8T]. No change from that, nor from the latest VIA 4-in1 betas. Oh well, I think my system's probably in a bit of a mess "under the hood" now after all this fiddling, so am gonna reinstall. <sarcasm>Oh what fun!</sarcasm>

Unless doing the fresh reinstall solves the issue then it looks like I'll be in the market for a new soundcard. Will probably go for an Audigy, £55.28 [inc VAT & delivery] for the OEM version doesn't sound too bad I guess.

I think if I was you I'd maybe try and steer clear of a Creative Labs soundcard.
Don't get me wrong, I love my Audigy to bits, it's never caused me a single problem and I'm extremely happy with it.
However I'm using an Intel chipset and there are numerous stories on the web with people having problems with the Live! & Audigy - What they all seem to have in common is VIA chipsets.
Be it VIA or Creative Lab's fault (I refuse to take sides on that one) they really don't appear to be well suited together.

What alternatives would you suggest? I'm rather reluctant to go with Videologic again as this is the 2nd card from them that I've had probs with - haven't had any CL cards yet. Please bear in mind that I can't really afford to spend more than the cost of that Audigy.

I was planning on getting that Audigy [though not for a few weeks yet, sadly] from Overclockers.co.uk, & I was thinking that if I fone them beforehand & specifically ask them if there would be any problems using it with a KT7A-RAID v1.3 & XP & they say that it should be fine & it then turns out to be problematic then I could send it back.

It would be difficult for me to recommend any other make of soundcard than CL as I've always used them, ever since my SB Pro.
But then again I've always used Intel chipsets too so never had a problem.
overclockers.co.uk have a quite good forum so I'd be tempted to post over there asking about the Audigy and your exact motherboard and see if anybody else has had success or failure with that combination.