ISA soundcards -- Are they worth it?

[ed collins]

Hi, all

I have an ISA AWE32 SoundBlaster card and am wondering if it's the source of
my troubles.

When I play .mp3 files, I sometime I hear crackling sounds, dropouts and
sometimes a system crash. I can't decide if it's the SB driver or hardware
or Motherboard (Asus P2B, PII, 440BX chipset). The sofware used is
RealPlayer or Windows Media Player in both Windows 98 and XP (I have a dual
setup).

Has anyone had problems with their ISA soundcard? If so, please leave a
note. Any and all replies are certainly appreciated.

e.



crosspost to:
microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics
microsoft.public.windowsxp.device_driver.dev
microsoft.public.windowsxp.general
microsoft.public.windowsxp.hardware

 

[Kenny S]

Is the computer unstable in windows 98 also?
I mean are you seeing the same problems on both win98 and xp?

Isa cards are very old...
A new compatible pci sound card is very cheap you can probably find one with
15 $

--
Hope this Helps, let us know!
Kenny S
www.computerboom.net
Freeware and more!

----

 

[Ghostrider]

Hi, all

I have an ISA AWE32 SoundBlaster card and am wondering if it's the source of
my troubles.

When I play .mp3 files, I sometime I hear crackling sounds, dropouts and
sometimes a system crash. I can't decide if it's the SB driver or hardware
or Motherboard (Asus P2B, PII, 440BX chipset). The sofware used is
RealPlayer or Windows Media Player in both Windows 98 and XP (I have a dual
setup).

<<snipped>>

ISA sound cards are designed for a previous era when
operating systems and hardware requirements and demands
were both easier and simpler. Even though the SB AWE32
is "plug and play", it does have some very specific
hardware requirements as well as specific settings that
might not be easy to achieve under PCI-bridging, IRQ-
sharing, etc., even though the 440BX chipset is a very
good one. IMHO, the 440BX chipset, although excellent
in its day, is obsolete along with the ISA-slot; I'd
set up a 440BX chipset motherboard with the hardware
and OS of its particular time frame.

 

[Yves Leclerc]

ISA cards are not your main problem. Sure, they a quite old and do not have
the newer features. The problem is the drivers. Sound Blaster is known for
writing "buggy" drivers and they has stopped writing ISA drivers.

BTW: The next version of Windows (Longhorn??) is supposed to no longer have
any ISA support. It is still is development (not even a beta???).

 

[Guest]

contray to what most have said so far......

isa slots have more than enough bandwidth for audio applications.
there is really no reason to have an audio card on the pci bus unless you are going to be using more than 6 16 bit 48 khz streams.
there is enough available bandwidth for 6 streams (in or out or a combo of both) @ 16 bit 48 khz.

the mp3's are being converted to .wav then streamed to your card.
if you have cracks and pops more than likely it will be from either bad connections on the card itself or from bad cables to your amp/speakers from the card. or from an irq conflict with another device in the system.

i have an older pII 350 on a bx chipset mobo with 128 megs of ram and the exact same sb awe 32 running under win xp. it plays mp3's just fine, granted not while playing half-life at the same time. if you have a lot of other apps running while trying to play mp3's on a pII you are gonna have audible noise and glitches in mp3 decoding due to too much going on for a pII.

would suggest you do use win 98 or win98 se instead of xp on something in that performance range. if you are above a pIII 600 with 256 megs or more of ram xp is faster. below that mark win98 is faster