Soundcard Bus Utilization?

[Saladin]

Morning all.....

While I agree that cards on the SBlive (ptooey!) line of things have large difficulties in sharing the pci bus bandwidth, I'm wondering if there is a more accurate way of measuring what devices (such as soundcards) are actually using....

Does anyone know of a piece of software etc that can somehow monitor bus bandwidth, or what a device is using?

The system I'm using is win98, so even if this info is in the win2k or NT perf. monitors, it won't do me much good....

Thanks

Saladin

[Greebe]

I have searched the net for eons for such and it does not exist.

[Dr Mordrid]

This is best done with hardware.

Agilent Technologies (an HP spinoff) makes a PCI bus analyzer, but it lists for $9,210 USD

http://www.tm.agilent.com/classes/MasterServlet?view=productdatasheet&pro-ItemID=1000002707&language=eng&locale=US

A cheaper option can be had from the PCI-SIG. Their FoxFire II card runs about $599 USD;

http://www.pcisig.com/developers/test_card

Dr. Mordrid

[Saladin]

Gack.

oooooookay then.....

So much for that......heh..

Hey Doc....did you (or anybody else) have access to these at some point? The whole reason for starting this question was to compare soundcards pci bus utilization....

While we (here in the vid-capture-end of things) bag out the sblive (ptooey!) line of cards, due to the many many issues with capture using these in the capture system, it would have been nice to try and determine what GOOD cards would be.

Yep, I've seen sites with WONDERFUL benchmarks, numbers, etc etc....however this information (bus utilisation/sharing ability) is something that is, well...unobtainable except through trial and error....

Bummer....

Oh well....what I have works for me, so that's about as far as it goes......

Thanks anyway all.....If by complete miracle I DO find something that can do this...(hmmmmmm)...I'll be sure to let you know....I"m not holding my breath on that tho.......

Saladin

[Greebe]

Oh yeah Doc, go ahead and post THOSE!!!


(suppose I should have stated there were no economical/hobbiest solutions)

[Dr Mordrid]

One software PCI utility is the old PCISPY tool from Matrox. It at least lists the devices, their device number and their memory maps. It doesn't quantify much, but it's a fast way to some info.

I had a couple of hours with the FoxFire II by way of an acquaintence bringing one over for a bit. The SBLive and AudioPCI cards really showed their stripes, thats for sure.

Dr. Mordrid