User guide

Although Soundblaster card's usually present little problems running in the same computer as Digidesign hardware,
this IRQ arrangement may cause crashing problems on some systems. To disable:
- Right-click MY COMPUTER, select PROPERTIES.
- Select the DEVICE MANAGER tab, and look for Creative Misc. Devices. If found, double-click anything that says
Legacy Emulation, and checkmark the Disable. Hit OK. If not found, check in your Sound, Video and Game
controllers for anything that says Legacy Emulation or Legacy Audio and disable.
Windows 98 SE and ME Setup Index | All FAQ Index
[8187]
How to Check your system for any resource (IRQ) conflicts on Win98 SE and WinME.
How to check your resource (IRQ) assignments:
-Right-Click MY COMPUTER, select PROPERTIES.
-Select the DEVICE MANAGER tab and double-click COMPUTER. This will show you a complete list of all the IRQ's in
use.
-If you see more than 2 devices on the same number, you may experience a conflict.
-Any device can, without problem, share with IRQ holder for PCI steering, or ACPI IRQ holder for PCI IRQ steering.
Some other devices that will not usually cause problems are System Management Bus or SMBus, and SCI IRQ used
by ACPI Bus.
When it comes to any Digidesign Hardware (Digi 001 or Audimedia III), make sure that they are assigned a unique
IRQ. The only item that may (and should) be sharing with our hardware is a "Holder for PCI Steering"
-Devices to watch out for (especially when they are sharing with other hardware in your system) include:
Other sound cards (e.g. SoundBlaster), SCSI controllers, USB controllers, Network cards, Video cards, and many
others.
If you have a conflict, here's how to resolve it:
The best way to force Windows to allocate a different resource to your hardware is by installing the card in question
to another PCI slot. This may mean trying 2,3, or even 4 different slots. You may need to swap positions with
another card to allow the audio card to use that PCI slot.
All unused PCI cards should be PHYSICALLY REMOVED, not just disabled in Windows, as this does not always truly
free up the resource. Remember to power down your system before changing hardware; you should NEVER install
or remove hardware while the computer is powered ON, except for USB and FireWire devices.
Some BIOS manufacturers may allow you to assign a specific IRQ to a PCI slot (from within the BIOS under PCI
configuration - see below), but you should try to avoid IRQ 9 because it is cascaded to IRQ 2. It will allow you to
assign PCI slot 2, for example, to IRQ 5.
Some more tricks for freeing up IRQs are to disable one or more COM (serial) ports, Printer (aka: LPT or Parallel)
ports, USB ports and/or onboard audio (Sometimes called AC97 or Legacy Audio) from within the BIOS (see below).
You must check with your motherboard/computer manufacturer to find the correct way to do this. Disabling devices
within the BIOS will remove them from the system, and possibly allow a device or two to jump to a free IRQ,
reducing the amount of troubleshooting you must do.
To get into your computer's BIOS, you'll need to reboot (or turn on) the machine. Immediately when you see the
boot-up logo or memory/hard drive check, press the appropriate key (which varies from computer to computer -
check your computer's documentation if you're unsure) until it enters the SETUP. This will be before Windows boots,
and typically it only waits for 1-2 seconds for you to press the key. The most likely keys are DEL, F1, and F2, but
could also be any of the F-keys (you can usually press multiple keys at the same time if you're unsure.) Within the
BIOS, you should select Integrated Peripherals. If you don't see this option, try Advanced, and within this menu,
look for I/O Configuration, Peripheral Configuration, or something of the like- it varies from system to system. This
is where you'll see the options to enable/disable hardware. This is also where you'll change the parallel port mode if
you are using a parallel port midi interface. Then follow onscreen instructions on how to exit and save changes.
Another option within the BIOS, which may be under almost any menu depending on the computer, is PLUG AND
PLAY BIOS or INSTALLED OS. This will have two choices, Windows and non-Windows (the wording may be