ECS K7S5A and Aardvark Whining

Queue

Queue

Active member
I'm building a new machine...
I'm doing it slowly, cuz I can, and cuz it might become an audio only rig, networked to my general purpose rig.

The basic setup (so far)
Enlight 7237 ATX case
Premier ATNG 300W AMD approved, PIV approved PSU
ECS K7S5A
AMD XP 1700+
256MB PC133 SDRAM (Generic)
WD 30 GB ATA100 7200RPM Drive (In a Mobile Rack removeable drive Bay)
OEM Radeon VE Dual Head 32 MB DDR
ACER 24x CDROM
Floppy Drive
PS2 Keyboard/Mouse
Various Monitors

The board came with a fairly recent BIOS, I don't think it is worth flashing, cuz the updated BIOS's only change was to add recognition of the AMD 2000+ CPU, and I've got the 1700+.

So here's the deal...
I loaded up Win2K, SP2, and Video drivers and any MOBO tweaks suggested at ocworkbench.com (where there seems to be a huge K7S5A support base). I then tried to load the Win2K Beta 5 drivers for my Aardvark Direct Pro 24/96 soundcard. No go... Then I tried Beta 4, it hiccuped on the first try, but then installed.

OK, great! Then I plug in headphones or monitors into the Aardvark, and I get a high pitched whine in the left channel. It does not get louder when I move the Aark's main volume up. I have tried disabling everything onboard (Sound, LAN, USB). I have tried moving the Aark card around in the box in all the PCI slots but the one closest the AGP card. I have tried removing the CDROM, Floppy drive, and Mobile Rack (one at a time). I have disconnected the case fan, and stuck my finger on the CPU fan (momentarily). I swapped out the AGP card for the one in my old box (ATI expert 98? AGP 2X). Still whining, no changes in pitch, etc...

I put the Aark back in my old box WinMe AMD K6III+ 450 etc, and it is quiet as can be. I don't have another ATX PSU, but I could swap this PSU into my old box (MOBO is AT/ATX). I've read about others having problems with Aarks and noise, that solved their problems by replacing the breakout box and or the cable. I also know this MOBO is notorious for acting up when not used with a good PSU, but things seem pretty stable.

Any ideas?

Queue :confused:
 
It would be worth a shot swapping the p/s's around. I use to have a turtle beach multisound pinnacle that had this high pitched whine. Drove me crazy trying to figure it out - swapped power supplies and the whine dissappeared. Being only in one channel is kind of odd though.
 
Have you talked to Aardvark tech support? They're pretty good.

I asked them before I upgraded what AMD mobo recommendations they had, and they suggested going with an AMD 760 chipset, so I ended up with the Epox 8K7a+. They may know something you don't. I'd drop them a line.
 
Well it wasn't the PSU. I swapped in an Enermax, still whining... :mad:

So I decided to get scientific... Eliminate all possibilities before trying to get a new MOBO or new Aark pieces....

(I figured everyone would point at everyone else...)

My old box has Win Me on it, so I needed to rule out the OS. Didn't make sense, just one channel whining...., but guess what. Loaded up WinMe, and the whining is gone!!!! :)

I dunno if production drivers will fix my problem, but this little MOBO cooks compared to my old one. Time to get back to the fun stuff.

Queue
 
My Stupid soundcard whines, its a horrible high pitch sort. I went to the Audio control panel for Win 98SE and Started to play around. I fixed my problem, it was the CD, not the actual hardware but the mixer software with Windows 98, I muted the CD and ta-da, the whine stopped. I un-mute it when I burn a disk just in case of some weird Windows symbiotic relationship. I hope this helps. I muted the CD in both the record and play back controls.



Peace,
Dennis
 
This MOBO has onboard sound, which does not whine. I tried muting different channels in the windows mixer, but when the Aark is in, I don't have it doing the windoze sounds, just route the audio signals to it from recording apps. I also tried with the onboard sound disabled in the BIOS, the whine did not go away.

Just for kicks I may try to reformat the Win2k drive, and install WinMe on it to make sure it wasn't that drive making the noise.

Queue
 
Well.... it wasn't that HD either... WinMe on that drive works fine too...

Tried with XP Pro today.... :mad: damn whine........ :mad: :mad: :mad:


Right now I'm blaming Aark, as this thing works fine in Me, but not anything NT based........ (2K, or XP)

Queue
 
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