New Sound Card Sound still choppy

[Lottiemansion]

Sorry Richard,

I didn't mean to pressurise you.

I was suggesting an option, which will take time to look into & could have a cost implication but could be a solution later.

 

[Fiery]

PCI Express X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Pro
Creative Worldwide Support
playback up to 24-bit/192kHz in stereo and 24-bit/96kHz
XRAM 64MB & loads of other bits for 3D surround etc.

These cards are slightly different, capability & performance are the issues.

Richard,

Thank you for all your input into this thread, I appreciate it, as I was starting to run out of ideas.

So Fiery,

I think from the investigations carried out & the results you have been reporting (Still "Choppy").

I would now suggest that you investigate: -

"Swapping" the sound card for a replacement with a card that has the onboard memory as per the above.

So your asking me to purchase a $200AUD card on a hope, that it may solve the problem

I asked about the x-ram card over in the whirpool forums

http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=1601468

 

[Lottiemansion]

Hi,

Firstly, I thought it was a good time to consider the option of returning your "New sound card" for another one with better capability. I was suggesting something that you had already commented on.

Secondly, I have been looking round for options, as usual, & I have a suggestion to make: -

Please consider installing this games enhancement software for the graphics engine as it can improve the "General" performance of the system: -

Creative Worldwide Support or nHancer - Advanced Control Panel for nVidia Cards (Same place just different links).

I refer you to this support page for the reasons: - Creative Worldwide Support

[B]Feedback on User Escalations[/B]
Further to the reported cases of crackling issues reported
by owners of Sound
Blaster X-Fi cards, we have extensively tested both
Creative and non-Creative audio cards on motherboards
where the issues were reported in an effort to isolate
the root cause.
The findings indicate that circumstances causing these
audio glitches only arise on nVidia's nForce 4 range of
motherboards. The Sound Blaster X-Fi card was designed
to meet PCI bus standards and tolerances and this is the
only range of motherboards that operate in this manner.
A full technical description is detailed below, but in brief,
the PCI bus data requests are not being serviced leading
to "gaps" in the audio, resulting in sudden dropouts to no
audio and back again which gives rise to what is perceived
as crackling. As we have identified the resolution of this
issue to be beyond our control, we would advise
customers experiencing this issue to escalate their
concerns to nVidia in an effor to seek a possible solution.
 
[B]Technical Details[/B]
 
We have observed through direct observation of the
PCI bus on the nVidia nForce 4 motherboards that when
the crackle symptoms are occuring, the Sound Blaster
X-Fi card PCI bus master memory requests for audio
data are being held off (not serviced) for very long
intervals.
 
We have observed peak holdoffs of up to 2 milliseconds
in some cases. This is unusual chipset behavior that is
beyond the ability of a hardware audio accelerator to
compensate for in its internal buffering.
The Sound Blaster X-Fi tolerance for these PCI holdoffs
is approximately 120 microseconds peak holdoff, with a 1
microsecond average holdoff.
 
These design tolerances are based on observation of real
PCI bus behavior on leading motherboards over a period of
many motheboard hardware generations.
The nForce 4 motherboard is the first motherboard on which
these extremely long PCI service holdoffs have been observed
by Creative, where another PCI device in the system was not
causing the holdoff.

Please look here for further information on the sound card & Xram performance: -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_Blaster_X-Fi

 

[Fiery]

Hi,

Firstly, I thought it was a good time to consider the option of returning your "New sound card" for another one with better capability. I was suggesting something that you had already commented on.

Secondly, I have been looking round for options, as usual, & I have a suggestion to make: -

Please consider installing this games enhancement software for the graphics engine as it can improve the "General" performance of the system: -

Creative Worldwide Support or nHancer - Advanced Control Panel for nVidia Cards (Same place just different links).

My motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-MA770T-UD3P, it is not SLI, my old motherboard was. Ergo :-

The findings indicate that circumstances causing these
audio glitches only arise on nVidia's nForce 4 range of
motherboards. My mobo is not nForce 4.
Tried nHancer, it started then automatically shut itself down.

And yes I was considering getting a PCI Express X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Pro, however I cannot simply exchange this one now ..... I have had it too long, and as Creative have yet to respond to my question of whether or not it will actually make a difference, that combined with no opinion about the PCI Express X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Pro, other than this and I quote "I don't know if anyone has said this, but X-RAM is just a silly feature on some of the Creative X-Fi cards that supposedly load the audio data of some games onto the soundcard RAM (X-RAM) instead of your normal RAM. This only works in a few, older games though, such as Battlefield 2. I do not think any current game makes use of it, and it will provide no benefit to playing music such as MP3 files. I assure you your problem will persist if you buy an X-Fi card.

I am now in two minds, do I spend $200AUD on a HOPE that it may work, after spending $100AUD on this card.

 

[Lottiemansion]

Hi,

I recognise that your board is not NVidia nForce4 but feel that the article stated: -

Further to the reported cases of crackling issues reported
by owners of Sound
Blaster X-Fi cards, we have extensively tested both
Creative and non-Creative audio cards on motherboards
where the issues were reported in an effort to isolate
the root cause.

These test appear to have been doen on the "Reported" motherboards, was yours one of them? Perhaps not but that does not mean that your motherboard is not affected though.

I was "Hoping" yes hoping, that the nhencer software would add a buffer to the sound system & eliminate the problem. After all it did state that it enhances system performance, again could be just game related.

Other comments made in the article relate to game performance & the blockers from the graphics engine hogging the communication bus causing "Choppy" sound, which the Xram seems to over come in games. If this is not applicable to a standard system resource, then we are back to square one.

 

[Lottiemansion]

Hi,

Another option from the support center: -

Creative Worldwide Support
(B, C, D & F.)

DMA, reduce graphics acceleration, SB 16 emulation & finally the BIOS. All for Vista)?

 

[Fiery]

Hi,

Another option from the support center: -

Creative Worldwide Support
(B, C, D & F.)

DMA, reduce graphics acceleration, SB 16 emulation & finally the BIOS. All for Vista)?

DMA is already checked

I do not get this bit though :-

Pictures by Fiery_WA - Photobucket

To check the IRQ allocation:

1. Select Start > Settings > Control Panel > System > Device Manager.
2. Click on the Computer icon (the first icon in the list) in Device Manager to view the resource allocation for all your devices. If the SB 16 Emulation / Legacy Device either shares an IRQ with another device or takes an IRQ higher than the one used by the Sound Blaster, try to install the latest Chipset drivers (specifically the IRQ Routing Mini port Driver when using older VIA Chip sets).
3. In Device Manager select Creative Miscellaneous Devices > SB 16 Emulation(or Sound, video and game controllers) > Legacy Device (depending on the card you have).
4. Select this entry and click Properties.
5. Click the Settings tab and select LPT Interrupt Sharing. This allows SB 16 Emulation / Legacy Device to use the same interrupt as the Printer Port (Parallel Port, IRQ 7), which does not state a problem, as there hardly will be a situation where the Parallel Port and the SB 16 Emulation / Legacy Device are used simultaneously

 

[Fiery]

Merry Christmas Lottie and ric

 

[Lottiemansion]

To check the IRQ allocation:

1. Select Start > Settings > Control Panel > System > Device Manager.
2. Click on the Computer icon (the first icon in the list) in Device Manager to view the resource allocation for all your devices. If the SB 16 Emulation / Legacy Device either shares an IRQ with another device or takes an IRQ higher than the one used by the Sound Blaster, try to install the latest Chipset drivers (specifically the IRQ Routing Mini port Driver when using older VIA Chip sets).
3. In Device Manager select Creative Miscellaneous Devices > SB 16 Emulation(or Sound, video and game controllers) > Legacy Device (depending on the card you have).
4. Select this entry and click Properties.
5. Click the Settings tab and select LPT Interrupt Sharing. This allows SB 16 Emulation / Legacy Device to use the same interrupt as the Printer Port (Parallel Port, IRQ 7), which does not state a problem, as there hardly will be a situation where the Parallel Port and the SB 16 Emulation / Legacy Device are used simultaneously

Thank you & a Merry Chrismas to you too.

Sorry, that's good because you shouldn't. It is for Windows 95, 98 etc. My mistake when looking through to see what was applicable.

 

[richc46]

A very Merry Christmas to you, too. A wish that your New Year is filled with health and happiness (and the computer is working properly, too)