How to force IRQ usage in WIN98

[Silicon Prophet]

Tonight I installed a SCSI controller for my scanner. Previously, I had all my IRQs set up like I wanted them with my Millenium G200 on IRQ 11 with no sharing. Well, the SCSI card I installed decided to use IRQ 11 as well. I would like to force it to use another IRQ if possible, to decrease the chance of a conflict with my G200. I tried opening the system properties and going to the "resources" page for the SCSI controller to change the IRQ, but it says that this resource setting cannot be changed. There must be a way to do it, but I can't figure out how. The SCSI card is occupying the first PCI slot because I have no other empty slots. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers!

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The Silicon Prophet
(aka Manex)

ABIT BH-6, Celeron 300A @ 450 MHz, 128MB RAM, Millenium G200 16MB, IBM Deskstar 10GXP, SB LIVE!, Adaptec AHA-2940UW, Plextor 32X CDROM, Plextor 4X/12X CD-R, 3COM Etherlink XL PCI, US Robotics Sporster 33.6 Fax/Modem, IOMEGA ZIP 100 SCSI, Motorola Cybersurfr Wave cable modem



[This message has been edited by Silicon Prophet (edited 08-12-1999).]

[Helmchen2000]

My G200 shares its IRQ with my Hauppauge WinTV (2devices:Video/Audio) and the USB Port didn't have any Problems till now. So I think there's no need to free up an IRQ. But if you want to do it you have to change the settings in your Bios.
To free up any IRQs you can disable any unused devices like COM-Ports Printer Port or USB-Port.
If this doesn't help, you can assign an IRQ explicitly to each device(PCI-Slot).

Helmchen

[Silicon Prophet]

Helmchen, thanks for the info. I'd like to free up the IRQ anyway, just so I don't have to worry about it. I have some of the IRQs assigned in my BIOS, but there's a catch. The first setting on the programmable interrupt controller controls both the AGP slot and the first PCI slot (as far as I can tell). I say this because when I change the first IRQ assignment to 11, both the SCSI card and my G200 go to the specified IRQ. I've seen someone post the specifics of which slots will share an IRQ when given an opportunity to do so, and I remember that the AGP slot will share with first PCI slot. I'm still trying to figure this out so if you have anymore ideas, send them my way!

Thanks!

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The Silicon Prophet
(aka Manex)

ABIT BH-6, Celeron 300A @ 450 MHz, 128MB RAM, Millenium G200 16MB, IBM Deskstar 10GXP, SB LIVE!, Adaptec AHA-2940UW, Plextor 32X CDROM, Plextor 4X/12X CD-R, 3COM Etherlink XL PCI, US Robotics Sporster 33.6 Fax/Modem, IOMEGA ZIP 100 SCSI, Motorola Cybersurfr Wave cable modem

[Silicon Prophet]

By the way, one other thing I forgot to mention was that I actually do have 1 open PCI slot. IT's the slot at the bottom that is shared with the ISA slot. I have never been able to get any PCI device to work properly when placed in that last slot, so if there's anyone here with an ABIT BH-6 that has gotten something to work in the bottom PCI slot, please tell me how you managed to do it. That would solve all my problems in a snap!

Thanks!

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The Silicon Prophet
(aka Manex)

ABIT BH-6, Celeron 300A @ 450 MHz, 128MB RAM, Millenium G200 16MB, IBM Deskstar 10GXP, SB LIVE!, Adaptec AHA-2940UW, Plextor 32X CDROM, Plextor 4X/12X CD-R, 3COM Etherlink XL PCI, US Robotics Sporster 33.6 Fax/Modem, IOMEGA ZIP 100 SCSI, Motorola Cybersurfr Wave cable modem

[Helmchen2000]

Are you sure that your 1st PCI-Slot shares its IRQ with the AGP-Slot. I've freed up one IRQ by disabling the printerport and now my G200 sits alone on IRQ 5 while my WinTV (1st slot) uses IRQ 9 shared with USB and SCI.
I've read about the BH-6 that it doesn't support PCI-Cards that use a IRQ ón all slots, so if you have one that doesn't need a IRQ try it in slot 5.

Helmchen

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Asus P2B-F(1011b1),Celeron 433,192MB,Millenium G200(8MB SG),Terratec EWS64S,Hauppauge WinTV Radio,IBM DHEA 8.4&6.4,Toshiba 32x CD,Traxdata 4x/8x CD-R,Teles ISDN pnp,CH ForceFX + Throttle


[This message has been edited by Helmchen2000 (edited 08-14-1999).]

[Silicon Prophet]

Helchen, no I'm not sure that the AGP slot shares an IRQ with the first PCI slot, but it sure looks that way from my empirical testing. I hadn't read about the fact that the BH-6 didn't support PCI cards that required an IRQ in all of the PCI slots. That might explain why I can't get anything to work in that last slot. I actually posted a separate thread about that issue. Unfortunately, I don't have any PCI cards that don't use an IRQ, so I guess I'm just out of luck on that one. I'm considering getting a parallel-to-USB converter so I can turn off the parallel port, and put my printer on the USB bus. That would free up another IRQ. Maybe that would fix the problem. I have already disabled both my internal COM ports because my modem has a controller built in. I'll continue to experiment around and see what happens. Thanks for your help. If I ever get this sorted, I'll let you know!

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The Silicon Prophet
(aka Manex)

ABIT BH-6, Celeron 300A @ 450 MHz, 128MB RAM, Millenium G200 16MB, IBM Deskstar 10GXP, SB LIVE!, Adaptec AHA-2940UW, Plextor 32X CDROM, Plextor 4X/12X CD-R, 3COM Etherlink XL PCI, US Robotics Sporster 33.6 Fax/Modem, IOMEGA ZIP 100 SCSI, Motorola Cybersurfr Wave cable modem



[This message has been edited by Silicon Prophet (edited 08-14-1999).]

[Slartibartfast]

On all ABIT boards in recent history the first PCI slot shares an IRQ with the AGP slot, no matter what. The last two PCI slots share, and they also share that IRQ with the USB.

End of story.

- Ash

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Portions of this message may have been Copyright 1999, Jorden van der Elst. All rights (and lefts) reserved.
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[Marshmallowman]

The AGP IRQ is not always the same as the first PCI Slot, It can change to a different one.
I was trying to stop my pci 3com etherlink III sharing an interupt with my TNT, by moving the cards around, and lo and behold just when I put a card that I wanted to share an interupt with the the AGP card it started sharing the IRQ with the 5th pci slot...aaaaarrrggghh!
I have not been able to asign irq's manually in the bios or win98se.
I have finally managed to have a independent irq's, it was easy just remove the other pci card
Guess I will just have to buy a G400 so I don't need to use an DVD card.

But seriously does anyone have a good solution for this bloody annoying problem!!!

[Guyver]

Some PCI cards (namely 3Com and Intel network cards) pick the IRQ from the address line, not the slot. If you check the websites, they discuss which IRQ address "A,B,C,D" they will use. The dual channel Intel uses 2 IRQ's...

Guyv

[KvHagedorn]

I solved this problem by switching cards around. Of the available IRQs, 9,10,and 11 take 1st priority, so as long as you can get SCSI and video on different ones, you should be fine. Ethernet always seems to want to take 9 and sound seems to want 4 or 5. Maybe this will work on your board. I have SCSI on 10 and vid on 11 on one comp and the other way around on the other. Both work well this way. Good luck.

Kind Regards,

KvH