Fourth X-fi card.. and finally I get popping/craclking/stalling

Soldato
Joined
30 Jan 2007
Posts
15,483
Location
PA, USA (Orig UK)
Damnit. Had 3 previous FPS cards without incident, all been fantasic. Now just got a 2nd hand xtrememusic (full size card), and using PAX drivers that were faultless before.... games are unplayable. It actually makes the game stutter and stall in time with crackling/popping.

Using a P35 board now rather than my previous X48 however, so it could be that. So gutted.
 
Just ran the DPC Latency Checker, and then tried to play a game. Queue bad stuttering etc. Getting latency of upto 2500us :-( Damnit.

Will try the bottom PCI slot tomorrow or something and then try and narrow the issue down to which device is causing a conflict or some description.
 
I have two of them, they both work fine in old machines, but strangely one of them has problems with new machines. Mine, which I bought pretty much on release day, is still working correctly.

Very strange..
 
Last night I quickly changed the IRQ to 14 (not sure if it changed it in windows.. I didn't have time to check this morning), and ran the DPC Latency checker again. No change, still just as bad with crackling, popping, stuttering.

I will investigate further when I get time. 3 cards no issues, fourth card (different version).. major issues. Maybe it's to do with the physical location of the PCI slots? This board has two PCI slots right at the bottom of the board, and I remember it's recommend to try and put them in the highest PCI slot (which I have done.. but it's not very high lol). I don't really want to up the PCI Latency in the bios if I can help it.

But here is the graph:

DPCLatency.jpg


Really wishing I hadn't swapped out my X48 board now :-(

EDIT: I will uninstall everything sound card related, get rid of the drivers and try the older PAX drivers that used to work fine for me.
 
Last edited:
Well situation much improved. I wouldn't say it is 'perfect' yet, but 99% there.

Changed slot to the lowest one, and disabled nvidia sound in device manager and the nvidia driver control panel (from graphics card), which strangely I had four of in the device manager. Games do not really stutter and seem to work out. Mind you, I am in 'entertainment mode', rather than game mode at present... lol. Will test game mode later.
 
Not sure I ever followed this up. The problem was the Nvidia HD Audio drivers conflicting with the sound card. Disabled (or not bother installing) the Nvidia HD Audio.. problem instantly solved :-D
 
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