Performance DROPS with 2nd HD

  • Thread starter Thread starter NashBackslash
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One of the first things I did was disable all unecessary onboard features in the BIOS.

That includes onbaord AC97, onboard modem, onboard gameport and MIDI, serial ports, com ports, and in an extreme circumstance, even USB ports.

None were helpful. :/
 
It's beginning to sound like a bad driver. If you have any Roxio software such as "easy CD creator" uninstall it. Also uninstall any other software that is not vital. Then run this program http://www.majorgeeks.com/Lexun_RegScrubXP_d2048.html Then reboot the computer and wait a minute or so to make sure all of the background services have loaded. Then run the "TuneUp utilities" program.
 
It really sounds like it may be an IRQ problem or memory so look at where your PCI cards are located on your mainboard and check your manual and see what shares IRQs. Move them around so you do not have anything sharing. You can also check out (or maybe post) the exploded hardware manager list sorted by IRQs

Couple of other things:

Is there network connected on this machine?
Have you tried turning off ACPI and forcing IRQ assignments?
Are windows sounds turned off?
Any antivirus running?
Have you tried moving the RAM around?
 
If you are having constant restarts, its possible that you actually have a bad power supply. If your volatges are fluxuating too much within the power supply rails, your system can undergo all sorts of nastiness, not to mention that the longevity of all your drives and hardware may be compromised considerably. Good stable power supplies are one of the most overlooked features when people build computers and are responsible for a lot more hardware failures than most people realize. It is also possible that you have cooling issues. Excessive heat buildup can do strange things as well.
 
xstatic said:
If you are having constant restarts, its possible that you actually have a bad power supply. If your volatges are fluxuating too much within the power supply rails, your system can undergo all sorts of nastiness, not to mention that the longevity of all your drives and hardware may be compromised considerably. Good stable power supplies are one of the most overlooked features when people build computers and are responsible for a lot more hardware failures than most people realize. It is also possible that you have cooling issues. Excessive heat buildup can do strange things as well.
Click to expand...

That is a very good point. People often skimp on the power supply not realizing that it is the most important component in the computer. "Speed Fan" is a really good program to monitor your voltages and temps.http://www.majorgeeks.com/download337.html
 
ocnor:

What is "Roxio CD Creator"? I don't remember having any kind of software with that name.

And what do you mean by a "bad driver"? I'm using MOTU's official driver patch which I downloaded from their website. Do they release bad drivers? But I do recall that the restarts happen even back then when I was using the stock drivers from the CD that came with the MOTU unit.

The computer in my studio is not connected to the internet in any way. I don't have internet access at my studio. Also, I've been doing lots of clean re-installs recently, so I don't think my system may have "accidently" download things.

I'll also try that Speed Fan software you suggested, thanks.

Before I go on, I think I should make one thing clear:

I do NOT have internet access at my studio, and the studio computer is used for NOTHING but recording. So, no, my computer is not the average "word processor, internet, MSN, Unreal Tournament 2004, pr0n computer". There's practically nothing in it except for my DAW software.

And this month alone, I have done full formats and WinXP re-installs more than 20 times I think. It may sound stupid, but that's just one of the several silly things I've tried to get that perfect DAW.

So that also means that my registry is fairly clean. I haven't been installing any unecessary programs or anything.

altitude909:

"It really sounds like it may be an IRQ problem or memory so look at where your PCI cards are located on your mainboard and check your manual and see what shares IRQs. Move them around so you do not have anything sharing. You can also check out (or maybe post) the exploded hardware manager list sorted by IRQs"
Click to expand...

Hmm, I'll post the hardware manager list you suggested soon.

Is there network connected on this machine? - Nope.
Have you tried turning off ACPI and forcing IRQ assignments? - What's this? How do I do this?
Are windows sounds turned off? - Yep.
Any antivirus running? - Nope.
Have you tried moving the RAM around? - I'll try this.

xstatic:

Okay, I'll try buying a new power supply to see if it helps. What's a good amount of power supply to use these days? Mine is currently 400 watts. Or was it 450? Can't remember. Should I get a higher power supply?

Also, not to pressure anyone, but, fraserhutch, perhaps you can tell by the error logs I posted, where are the problems coming from?
 
Sometimes windows will allocate IRQ 16 to a bunch of shit since ACPI allocates shared IRQs where it sees fit. This might be what your seeing and thats what the device manager page will show (view by resource connections). I had the IRQL_LESS_THAN problem on a via board, although it was my video and network card that had a beef so whenever I was gaming it up, any network activity would eventually crash the video driver. The solution was to see which PCI slot was shared and then I just moved my NIC so try moving the SB to another slot. There is a difference though between shared IRQs in windows and shared slots on your motherboard, so I would start by moving the card since windows will usually assign everything so it works toghether.
 
I don't mean to run out and just buy a new power supply. I don't condone throwing money at a problem unless you are convinced that is the actual problem. It may be time to have a professional asess your problems. You could have a CPU on its last legs, a Northbridge issue, Power supply issue, grounding problem in your motherboard etc.... Think of it like a car. When your car breaks you try the simple things that you know how to do. If those don't work, you take it to a mechanic instead of buying part after part and spending hours trying to put them in.
 
altitude, by "turning off ACPI", do you mean to just change it in Windows, or do a re-install and choose "Standard PC" at the Windows installer?

xstatic, I know exactly what you mean, but the problem is, there is just no way at all for me to KNOW exactly what the problem is!

Even if all it took to solve my problem was to nudge something an inch, how would I know?

I am still at home, I haven't been to the studio yet. If I post a screenshot of an exploded view of my hardware list, sorted by IRQ, and also a screenshot of my IRQ settings in BIOS, would it be of any help then?
 
I had troubles with 2 sata hard drives when I first set them up. I asked GTP3 to send the audio files etc to the slave drive. But it all went bezerk and almost made me smash my fist into my monitor on several occasions.

There was some stupid problem with firewire devices/ SP2 and sata drives. In the end I never did fix it, so I went bugger it, I'll record everything to my monster 160g main drive and manually transfer stuff to the slave as needed. With the size of drives these days and the power of processors, I think it might be a bit old school in some ways to have to go to a slave.
 
Nash,
You can turn off acpi without rebuilding windows, go into safe mode and simply change the driver for computer type (manually install the driver single processor) It will reboot and you will be running without ACPI. HOWEVER, things that will no longer work: Automatic poweroff and the number of IRQs will be reduced but no longer virtualized so you should be able to assign them manually. This is also a one way trip so if you want to go back to acpi, you will need to do a clean install of windows.

Like I said in the pervious post, this should only be a last resort
 
altitude909,

Tried exactly how you suggested to me. The only options I have are: ACPI Computer, Standard PC.

In the Windows installer, I have a few more, like ACPI Multi/Uniprocessor, MPS Multi/Uniprocessor, Standard PC, Standard PC with C-Link i486 (or something like that) etc.

So which one should I choose?

Re: view of my devices

I have uploaded pictures of my device list, an .nfo generated by System Info, and also an HTML file containing a table of devices that are displayed before Windows starts.

I really hope this will reveal any useful information on WHAT EXACTLY is wrong on MY system.

http://nash.wanzafran.com/systemstuff.zip - 402 KB
 
I see that your video card is sharing an IRQ with a USB controller. The SB Audigy is also sharing an IRQ with a USB controller. Anytime a video card or soundcard shares an IRQ it can cause problems. You might want to disable the USB and see if it makes a difference.
 
NashBackslash said:
I am still at home, I haven't been to the studio yet. If I post a screenshot of an exploded view of my hardware list, sorted by IRQ, and also a screenshot of my IRQ settings in BIOS, would it be of any help then?
Click to expand...

Absolutely.

Your event files aren't that helpful, so I'll have to dig through your minidump files. I'll get back to you when I have more info.

That said, the errors you're seeing (in the event log) are usually the result of bad drivers. Are you sure that all your drivers are up to date? Have you installed all WinXP service packs?

I see that wmplayer, sonar, and explorer are all crapping out on you, and when the offending module is identified, it is a WinXP module. Maybe you need to get online and patch up to the latest versions? Windows Update included....
 
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Thanks a lot, I really appreciate all this.

Looking forward to any more information you can give me...
 
to disable ACPI, use standard computer. Strangly, your IRQs only go up to 11 which is not what I would expect. I would still try moving the SB to a different slot
 
to disable ACPI, use standard computer. Strangly, your IRQs only go up to 11 which is not what I would expect. I would still try moving the SB to a different slot.

Sharing USB devices on IRQs should be OK since they are lowspeed devices (I share a bunch since I have like 12 USB devices connected)
 
No good, guys.

I disabled all forms of USB, firstly in Windows, and when it still restarted, disablled all USB completely from the BIOS.

Still restarts!

Here is a new error report from one of todays' crashes:

http://nash.wanzafran.com/new_error.zip 17 KB

Contains a minidump.
 
Yeah,
Didnt think the USB is causing it.

I am really starting to think this may be hardware related (Powersupply).

Try going back to one drive and see if it still does it, if not, its time for a new PSU since adding a drive may have pushed your current one over the edge.

Otherwise, start looking for a new mainboard, they should be cheap and plentiful for a socket 478 these days (You know how I feel about via)
 
I really hate to say this, but it looks like this may be the end of my current PC. :/

My loan is approved, but I'm only going to get it sometime next month.

I still have a couple more projects to go, and I'd like to make sure I am able to get these last two done smoothly before the thing is put away for good.

I'll try disconnecting the hard disk, and see if it still crashes. If it does, I'll replace the power supply. I'm even willing to buy a new set of RAM just to see if I've been using faulty RAM all along. 266 MHz RAM shouldn't be too expensive.

Thanks for your time, guys. I really appreciate all this - trust me, you were all very helpful. Had not been for the responses for this thread, I'd probably be very depressed!

BUT... I'd still like to find out where the problem was coming from. I hope the minidumps and other information I posted weren't put to waste. I'm still very interested in finding out what was the culprit. If I can solve the problem, I can setup this PC as a second MIDI/graphics editing PC or something...
 
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