Lockups with G400 MAX (SCSI related ?)

[Katoona]

I have just bought the G400 MAX in Norway (got it shipped from Ireland), and I have problems with the card. The screen suddenly freezes, sometimes after 1-2 minutes other times after 10-15 minutes. It happens no matter what kind of program I'm running, but it always happens right away if I'm playing RE-Volt or Star Wars Pod Racers. I have tried everything that have been discussed here at the forums and I believe the problem is related to my integrated Adaptec 2940U2W controller on the Asus P2Bs motherboard. I have tried the utility PCISPY that comes with the new bios, and it says that Device no.6 is in conflict with the G400 card. No other program, device manager or system utility that I have tried show any conflicts, but I guess this utility tells the truth since the card isn't working and it is written by Matrox. Anyway, device no. 6 is the "mass storage controller", which I guess is the SCSI controller. I haven't enabled the IDE controller. Do anybody have any idea how I can resolve this problem ? In the PCISPY utility there is an option where the program can solve the problem, but it doesn't manage to do so.

Please help me if anyone knows how ?

My system:
Asus P2Bs
PII 450
384MB PC-100 RAM (NEC)
Seagate Cheetah 10.000RPM LVD
(Integrated Adaptec 2940U2W)
Canopus PureII3d 3DFX
3COM 905b XL Network Card
All other cards have been removed and Windows98 (not SE) have been reinstalled twice.
DirectX 6.1 and 7

No card is installed in PCI slot 1. The G400 shares an irq with IRQ to PCI steering.

I have tried updating the bios on the motherboard, disabled everything with caching in the bios, different Matrox drivers, every possible adjustment and tweaking of the card, like forcing 1XAGP, 2X AGP, disabled Bus Mastering and just about everything.

[Katoona]

It seems that the problem occurs when something fast is happening on the screen. It may sound stupid, but when I press "back" in Internet Explorer fast many times (Lets say I wanna go 10 pages backwards)it freezes right away.

PCISPY is the utility that comes with the new 1.5 bios that can be downloaded from Matrox.

[Zypher]

I got an idea...

What physical slot is it in? I bet its the one right next to AGP, aka Slot 1.

Move it. Slot 2 or 3. Throw a irqless device in slot 1 (only one I know of is V2 though) or keep it empty.

If thats not it, well I did try helping. Post even more info.

BTW, it should not show up as 'mass storage controller' except on bios boot screens. In winblows it should be AIC78xx or AHA-2940xx in device manager. Or at least something like that.

Right click my computer, properties, device manager, then double click the computer on top of the tree. This will give you your irq list. Most of the time, you want both the g400 and the 2940 to have thier own irq, no sharing. (except with pci steering, which actually isn't a device)

You should have enough irqs to leave on both ide controllers. Most modern cards won't let you even TRY to use 13 (numeric data) 14 or 15 with them, because they assume you have those ide on. Even if the device lets you, then the motherboard proably won't either Award based sure won't, and AFAIK all asus are award, as are many/most BX.

[Katoona]

I have no card in PCI slot 1.

The Adaptec 2940U2W is integrated on the motherboard.

I am aware that it doesn't matter whether I have the IDE controller enabled or not, I just disabled it to see if "mass storage controller" was the SCSI controller or not. And now I know that it is.

[agallag]

I also have a P2B-S, and I've also seen this exact problem. The Re-Volt demo mostly did it. I've made it much better by turning off the "VGA Bios Shadow" in the bios, as well as "Snoop Ahead". It's only happened once since, in about 20 hours of Re-Volt. Hope this helps you too.



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Andrew Gallagher - andrew@agallagher.com
Asus P2B-S (1010), PII-350@350), 64MB PC100, 12.7GB Quantum Fireball EX ATA-33, 2x2.1GB Quantum Atlas I UWSCSI, Toshiba 6201 SCSI CD, Yamaha CRW4416S SCSI CD-RW, WangDAT SCSI, MillG400 32MB DH w/ 5ns RAM(5.25 Divers/1.5 Bios/Fo=310.5MHz), SBLive! Retail (LiveWare2.1), JVC RX884V Dolby Digital Receiver@500W, Dell D1728D-LS 17" Monitor (first head), ProScan 27" NTSC TV (second head), Win98SE, BeOS 4.5.1, RedHat 6.0, NT4SP5

[Ali]

Most SCSI cards are set to ID 7, so you might try changing that. Usually with Adaptec you press <Alt> A during startup to get to the bios setting.

SCSI and Video can actually share an IRQ. Just one of those things I suppose. If you read the PCI 2.1 specs it says something about it.

Hope this helps

Ali

[Ali]

Opps, looks like putting pointy brackets around words makes them dissapear. Thats meant to be Alt A to get to the SCSI bios

[Katoona]

I can't see how changing the SCSI controller from ID7 to antoher ID will help me. The SCSI controller doesn't share any IRQ's with the G400 MAX card, so I don't think this would help, but thanks for your input.
I will try it of course, and if it works I will let you know !

[agallag]

The SCSI controller is supposed to share the IRQ with USB, and it's very happy doing so. No need to change the host adapter ID either. Other people are seeing this lockup on varios other mobos, including one using a K6 mobo (no SCSI). It's not a SCSI issue, it's something wrong with either the games (unlikely, as re-volt never crashed on my g200) or with the g400 (drivers, bios, conflict with mobo, etc., very likely). Have you tried the settings I mentioned? Any luck?

[SteveC]

No-one's suggested temperature yet? Check that the card's not getting hot, or that it's not causing the ambient temp of your case to rise as to cause problems.

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Cheers,
Steve

PS: Some or all of the above message may be wrong, or, just as likely, correct. Depends on what mood I'm in. And what you know. ;¬)

[agallag]

I'm pretty sure it's not heat. I have a pentium fan on my vanilla g400, and it's capable of running faster than a max (runs forever at 310MHz PLL). When clocked normally, Re-Volt would still hang regularly. My case has 3 chassis fans, plus the PS fan, the processor fan, and the G400 fan. Case temp never goes over 34C.

Changing the settings in the bios as I mentioned seems to help quite a bit, but there's still something wrong somewhere.

[SCompRacer]

Katoona, I have a P2B-LS and still get that same "device no. 6 conflict" message using pcispy, despite no conflicts with IRQ or memory addresses. Had no problem with prior 16MB G400 OEM or recent MAX. I would not put too much weight on that being your problem.

I would leave the SCSI ID as 7. With the P2B-LS, PCI slot 1 (above ISA) shares IRQ with AGP, slot 2 can be assigned seperate IRQ, slot 3 will share with onboard LAN and slot 4 will share with SCSI and USB. Just guessing here, but with your P2B-S, slot three should be able to assign seperate IRQ since you don't have onboard LAN. Been along time since I had one.

SCompRacer

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P III 500 @ 560 via 112 FSB, ASUS P2B-LS, 1010 BIOS, w/256 MB 8ns ECC RAM, ECC Enabled since 5.13 driver release, current 5.25 drivers, dual 9 GB Cheetahs, 10 GB IDE DiamondMax, Plextor Ultraplex/Plexwriter, Hitachi IDE DVD CD ROM, SCSI ZIP insider, G400 MAX, SB Live, Sigma Hollywood + DVD decoder, US Robotics 56K Sportster, Sony GDM400PS, UMAX 2400S SCSI scanner, Soundworks 5.1, HP 6P Laser & 890C, LAN & USB enabled. SB Live shares IRQ w/MAX, bus mastering enabled, Win98 SE and NT 4.0 SP4.




[This message has been edited by SCompRacer (edited 09-20-1999).]

[Katoona]

Ok, I give up. I have tried to get the card to work for several days, and even if it is possible to solve the problem, without me knowing how, I don't think I will ever be able to trust the card, so I am going for the Nvidia Geforce instead. It seems that I am not the only one having problems. Anyway, no more Matrox for me.

Thanks to all of you that have tried to help me !

[SteveC]

Oh well, we failed. See ya when you come back when the G600 is out

[Whisper]

You are using Windows 98?

If so, goto the Adaptec Web site, and download their drivers for your SCSI controller, do not use the Windows Adaptec drivers, they suck badly. I have had huge problems in the past with Adaptec SCSI Cards using the Windows 98 drivers, which are easily resolved by using the drivers Adaptec wrote specifically for your make and model of your SCSI controller.

Hope this helps

Cheers