G400max 32 DH with AbitKA7 MoBo PROBLEMS

[Adriaan-F]

Hi,

since I bought the following system:
Aopen HQ45
ABIT KA7
Matrox G400max 32mb dh
SB live
Compex Fredomline (100mbits)
WD 20,4 gb hd
52x cd-rom

I've had lots of problems. One of them is still not solved. The computer crashes every now and then. I've tried newest VIA drivers(422 and 4.03 AGP), newest G400 drivers (552.014). I've even flashed my MoBo BIOS to the latest (RX) release. Now, if I reboot win98se, the computer cannot find a free irq for the matrox card. If I then change and apply something in the properties of the display and reboot then the card is recognized. Next time restarting, the computer has the same problem. It's by the way nothing to do with pci addresses, but some memory addresses are double set or something.

Right now, everything inside my head is tumbling. I'm not an expert on all these things, though I'm trying hard to understand it. I'm wondering, could it just be that my MoBo is faulty and that it needs to be replaced? Or is it something else, to be set with BIOS or drivers etc.?

Thank you for replying,

Adriaan

[paulcs]

Make sure "assign IRQ to VGA" is enabled in your motherboard's BIOS. Your AGP card should have its own IRQ (sharing *only* with IRQ Holder for PCI Steering") and it should be on IRQ 9, 10, or 11.

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[Adriaan-F]

Card is on IRQ 10, with only the ACPI IRQ holder for PCI steering, so that should be ok.... Thanks for replying.

[Taz]

Something to try, go into the BIOS setup and select PnP/PCI configuration from the menu. On screen that appears down the bottom you should see four lines labeled INT Pin x Assigment, where x is 1 to 4. When you highlite each of these lines you should see a list of cards on the right hand side of the screen which use this resource. Hitting return allows you to change it from auto to a specific IRQ. change these so that the G400 is not shared with another card if this is not possible you may have to physically move cards around. IRQ's 5,9,10 & 11 should be available for assignment to your cards. Make sure also that Assign IRQ for VGA, which is displayed on the same screen, is set to enabled.

Good Luck

[Adriaan-F]

Thank you for reply,

I've been checking the IRQ settings in the device manager and the BIOS pnp/pci configuration, like you said, but all devices are on separate IRQ nr.'s. Assign IRQ for VGA is enabled.

It must be something else, especially because right now, my matrox doesn't have any conflicts with memory addresses at all. But when I'll restart win98se, the matrox card will be in conflict again... strange, really strange.

[anid]

Sorry to hear you are having problems, I just set up one of these boards with a G400 and no problems. Glad mine went better . First thing I can think of is did you do a clean install on Win98 after puttting in the new mobo? Not installing clean tends to create all sorts of strange bugs. Other than that, the only things I can think of is making sure that USB is enabled in BIOS (with an IRQ) and Video init first is set to AGP (though that shouldn't affect it). Oh, is it telling you there is a memory conflict? I once changed the slots of 2 cards (swapped their positions) and had to uninstall the drivers for a third (unrelated) card to get everything working again. A virtual allocation in use by the third card was needed by one of the others - since it was "virtual" it wasn't actually in use, so the BIOS thought it was free but the card wouldn't relinquish it, so Win couldn't load the driver. Confused? I was... At any rate if it is telling you there is a mem conflict, track down the device the mem range belongs too and remove it's drivers, then reinstall them.

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"I wrestled with reality for 27 years and I'm happy to say I finally won out over it."