hi all , i was wondering if someone could help me out here. Im currently using the Guillemot ISIS souncard on a pentium 3 450..(intel motherboard and chip).. I am runing 256 mb ram and 2x Seagate 8.4gb harddrives.. Im using logic audio to record multiple tracks of audio. Once i get about 8 tracks into the system it will start to run slow and start chugging along. After about 10 tracks i get system overload errors where i will press play and it will play for a sec then digital distortion cuts in then WAMMO! it overloads. I am not running anything else on the pc , just ISIS software , windows and logic. Apart from this overload problem the computer is very fast and efficient. When it does overload , im not using any plugins either so its not like im really pushing the machine...Anyway i hope someone can help me on this as its not really what i expected from digital recording .. Thanks everyone , u all do a great job....
System Overload!!!!!!!!!
- Thread starter Spider
- Start date
Okay, first, are you running win9x?
Second, do you know if it's your processor overloading or the ide bus (harddrive)?
If it's the processor and you're using lots of effects, turn off some effects
!
If it's the harddrive, you should check to see if you have direct bus mastering turned on (in fact, you should do this anyway).
You do it like this: Bring up the windows system properties menu (windows+break), go into the device manager and then look at each hard drive in turn, making sure that 'DMA' is checked for each one (can't remember which Tab). Then restart. If the computer doesn't retain the new settings, it probably means that your motherboard doesn't support dbm. But yours should, seems fairly new.
G'luck, hope this helps.
matt
checK: http://www.mp3.com/carolynn
Second, do you know if it's your processor overloading or the ide bus (harddrive)?
If it's the processor and you're using lots of effects, turn off some effects
!If it's the harddrive, you should check to see if you have direct bus mastering turned on (in fact, you should do this anyway).
You do it like this: Bring up the windows system properties menu (windows+break), go into the device manager and then look at each hard drive in turn, making sure that 'DMA' is checked for each one (can't remember which Tab). Then restart. If the computer doesn't retain the new settings, it probably means that your motherboard doesn't support dbm. But yours should, seems fairly new.
G'luck, hope this helps.
matt
checK: http://www.mp3.com/carolynn
thanks for that cakey2.... Im running win98se
, and i have a feeling its not the motherboard because when it happens i usually have no effects on ,
Now the dma on the hard drives , i had a problem with them before , (i mean dma wasnt checked and got terrible problems, so checked them and all was fine, but still occasionally got PCAV 11 error , system overload) ... Now when i try to check one of the harddrives dma , like u said it wont retain the setting, yet it use to ... now i have just installed a new cd rom, a 52 speed which is on the same ide bus as the harddrive that wont accept dma.. But this isnt the hard drive i record audio onto, i just use this as an extra drive in case i need the room... hey cackey , im a little new with computers , but is there anyway i can find out for sure if it is the ide channel thats overloading?? I currently run a burner and a harddrive(allows dma) on one ide channel and a normal cd rom and another harddrive (wont allow dma) on the other ... Does this configuration seem a little odd? My brother built it yet he doesnt get into the DAW scene... im wondering if this could be my problem.. anyway thanks a lot for your help cakey......
Brett
, and i have a feeling its not the motherboard because when it happens i usually have no effects on ,
Now the dma on the hard drives , i had a problem with them before , (i mean dma wasnt checked and got terrible problems, so checked them and all was fine, but still occasionally got PCAV 11 error , system overload) ... Now when i try to check one of the harddrives dma , like u said it wont retain the setting, yet it use to ... now i have just installed a new cd rom, a 52 speed which is on the same ide bus as the harddrive that wont accept dma.. But this isnt the hard drive i record audio onto, i just use this as an extra drive in case i need the room... hey cackey , im a little new with computers , but is there anyway i can find out for sure if it is the ide channel thats overloading?? I currently run a burner and a harddrive(allows dma) on one ide channel and a normal cd rom and another harddrive (wont allow dma) on the other ... Does this configuration seem a little odd? My brother built it yet he doesnt get into the DAW scene... im wondering if this could be my problem.. anyway thanks a lot for your help cakey......
Brett
MrBoogie
New member
That configuration sounds a little odd to me. I've been building systems for a few years and I have always tried to keep the hard drives on the primary channel, and the cd-roms on the secondary. It really shouldn't matter with newer cd-rom drives, but worth a try, I think. 
If that doesn't work, check if you have the latest bios and drivers for your motherboard.
Good luck!
If that doesn't work, check if you have the latest bios and drivers for your motherboard.
Good luck!
hey thanks mr boogie , im a little vague when it comes to pulling a pc apart so i might get someone to do it for me ... I might get one big harddrive and just install the burner that way each component has a seperate channel.. Ill check out the Intel site for new drivers too ... thanks heaps for that ... ill let u know ...
Hmm, ok.
Well, I do it like you ie a cd and an HD on each channel - this means that if you want to copy from hd to hd, it's quicker (i think).
Now, I don't know how to check that it's the IDE channels overloading, but you can check if it is/isn't the processor. Have you got the system monitor tools installed? If not, then install them. Just ask if you need to know how to do this. Run the system monitor for processor usage while you're also running your audio software. See if you can make it glitch out whilst watching the monitor, if the dropout coincides with a peak on the processor usage, then that's probably the culprit.
Re your HD's/CD's/mobo, if any component is old (ie older than a coupla years) then they not work with direct bus mastering.
Hope I can help!
g'luck,
matt
checK: http://www.mp3.com/carolynn
Well, I do it like you ie a cd and an HD on each channel - this means that if you want to copy from hd to hd, it's quicker (i think).
Now, I don't know how to check that it's the IDE channels overloading, but you can check if it is/isn't the processor. Have you got the system monitor tools installed? If not, then install them. Just ask if you need to know how to do this. Run the system monitor for processor usage while you're also running your audio software. See if you can make it glitch out whilst watching the monitor, if the dropout coincides with a peak on the processor usage, then that's probably the culprit.
Re your HD's/CD's/mobo, if any component is old (ie older than a coupla years) then they not work with direct bus mastering.
Hope I can help!
g'luck,
matt
checK: http://www.mp3.com/carolynn
well i didnt have it installed , so i did .. now tell me if this sounds wrong but in the system monitor , while playing back a take that usually does overload it was averaging around 50 - 55% (proccessor usuage)it jumped to 70% once but straight back to 50%... When it overloaded the monitor was still saying 50%.. And all through this the resource meter is reading 90% resources free.. is this basically saying that it quite well could be the ide channel..?? Can these things blow or anything ?? maybe i should just use the one drive on a channel by itself , can u do this ?? anyway thanks a lot for that cakey.....
spider
spider