Win2k belligerently using IRQ11?

po0k

It seems that win2k loves to use just the one IRQ for all my cards....
I have my modem, Nic, gfx card, sound card (and untill I swapped out my realtek for a 3Com) a SCSI card that the manual for which says taht it needs it's own IRQ - but still worked....
Is there anywya (besides resolving to use the BIOS to do it dirtily) to tell Wi2k to try using other IRqs? I ahve about 3 free....

sceptre

It's put your PCI bus on 11. So all the cards are set to 11.

Mine's the same. I don't think (correctable as always) you'll gain anything from trying to change it

ykt0di9url7bc3

yep ****ty win 2k doesnt want you to change irq numbers, you could look for bios update that allows you to change specific irq numbers , but thats hard to find.........

po0k

Yeah, I tried that, set the PCI slot woith the scsi card in it to 10 (which was totally free). This was with everything else plugged in andrunning on IRQ11.
Thing is working now. Except it's on IRQ11 aswell.
Seems to want to be the last thing you install, maybe something to do with busmastering or something.

Tis annoying all the same, becasue I ahve IRQ4, 5, 7, 9 (sort of -shared with the PCI steering) and 10 free. I'd have 3 free too if I didn't use a serial port once in a blue moon.

ykt0di9url7bc3

have you tried creating a fake IRQ conflict with dummy com ports to try and allow you access to change the IRQ's on your devices...

its a long shot...

po0k

I don't care now, the thing is magicly working again.
That prayer to the machine God must've helped....

Now, to get everything working smoothly under Loonix and Win98......

regi

Oooooh I really found out all about this recently.

The reason all your devices are on the same IRQ is cos your machine is ACPI-compatible, and Windows 2000 detected that.

What it means is that there's a bit of software running (part of windows) that sits in between your hardware and the rest of the OS. This bit of software sits on IRQ 11 (in your case) and handles all IRQ requests to your hardware.

The reason for this is that the OEMs and MS reckoned that most users are too dumb to configure their own hardware, so it does it for you. It can cause instability with certain games and it _will_ slow your system down. Its like the difference between a hardware modem and a winmodem.

You can turn this off

Warning - doing this might cause your machine to blow up. Don't do it unless you know what you are doing. I won't be responsible

This is how I turned it off:

- Open up your Device Manager (right click 'my computer', select properties and then the 'hardware' tab)
- Expand the 'computer' branch, and you should see an item called 'ACPI something' - go to the properties of this.
- Go to 'update driver'
- Tell it to show you all possible drivers.
- There should be a driver in there called 'Standard PC' - use that.

It'll now tell you to reboot, so reboot. When your system comes back up, it'll reinstall all your hardware (I mean _all_ your hardware) and it won't use ACPI. This means you can now assign IRQs to your devices.

Other things:

- Don't do it unless you know what you are doing
- Make sure you know all your device settings and have all the drivers for them.

po0k

Yeah, I used to leave that turned off cos Win98SE wouldn't work with it right, but WIn29k does.
I thoght it was more firmware/lower level, but if it's just software I think i'll get rid of it.
At the moment I'm just going to leave the SCSI card unplugged (it cocked up last night when I went to reinstall the driver for my NIC).
Btw, should I install the diagnostic/util proggie for the 3com 905C?
All I want it do do is go 100Mbit FullDuplex. 802.11p and other stuff doesn't matter much.

Also, it seems to be sending the odd packet here and there to the switch, but the connection, speed and activity leds are not lit up.
When it was gong first, the leds stayed on, but the windows network icon in the task bar kept popping up saying the cable was unplugged and then dissappearing again.
Tis annoying, and might be a symptom of a dodgey connect (going over 10' of freshly crimped CAT5e).
Any thoughts?

TacT

I've found that if you're not careful with the 3c905c's it's easy for the rj45 connector to come loose on the nic itself, try give it a gentle push up with the cable plugged in

You haven't stopped any necessary services etc?

I assume you tried re-installing your nic drivers?

If you still encounter problems you best go with the diagnostic utility and see if you can dig anything up in there.

Gerry

Acpi is implemented in the bios of a machine, its not like the difference between a winmodem and a hardware modem at all. Windows merely talks to the acpi bios. It can slow things down, but sometimes switching it off can slow things down as well. All your boards still have separate physical irq's, but with acpi this is just hidden from you.

po0k

I got the nic working, sweeeeet as a bell.
haven't got software to make use of the WoLAN function yet, but i wil eventually:)

My lucent won't install in 2k now.
Says the name is allready used by another devie and or service.
I thought Win2k knows when you've just unpluged PCi cards, it just disbales them and re enabels them when they're detected again..?

have a Rockwell HCP modem, which I can get specific Win2k drivers for, only win95