Solid State Logic Soundscape Mixer - Manual (Page 98)

Soundscape Mixpander
Page 98 of 109
10. Troubleshooting
Hardware installation problems
Several problems relating to the installation of PCI cards are listed below.
Shared Interrupts (IRQs) on the PCI bus
Typically for PCs that have 5 PCI slots there are 4 PCI slots and 1 AGP slot, but as there are only 4
IRQ lines assigned to PCI, there will sometimes be one IRQ line that is shared between two slots.
This interrupt line is connected on the motherboard to two slots (e.g. PCI slots 4 and 5) and
therefore even if Windows or the BIOS tries to assign a different IRQ to each card fitted in these
slots, it will be unable to, and this may cause problems. The solution may be to move the card to
another free card slot in the PC.
A similar situation exists with on-board devices (i.e., on the PC motherboard) like VGA, SCSI, PS2,
USB and network adapters where the IRQs assigned will have to be the same as for some of the
PCI slots. Typically the AGP slot uses the same IRQ line as the nearest PCI slot.
Sharing Interrupts (IRQs) between SSL Soundscape audio cards and other PCI Devices
The drivers for other PCI devices may not allow sharing. In any case DO NOT share IRQs between
a Soundscape audio card and a PCI card from another manufacturer unless you are absolutely
sure that the other device’s driver allows sharing. Most on-board devices will share IRQs with a
Soundscape audio card without problems.
Incorrect BIOS settings for Plug and Play PCI Cards
The BIOS of the PC usually includes settings for Auto or Manual IRQ selection for each of the PCI
slots. You may experience severe problems if the BIOS does not allow Windows to change or
assign the IRQ during installation, due to conflicts between different PCI cards or on-board
peripherals like serial or parallel ports. For normal use, the Auto setting should be selected for
each PCI slot, so that the IRQ and memory settings are managed correctly. Only change this if you
are fully aware of the requirements for each of the devices in your PC and of the potential
consequences. If an APIC (Advanced Programmable Interrupt Controller) option is available in the
BIOS, enabling it will provide additional interrupt resources.
PCI Bus settings
Incorrect PCI bus settings in the BIOS can create clicks, audio interruptions and even lock-ups. If a
PCI Latency Timer parameter is available in the BIOS, set it to 64 or higher.