New soundcard installation - IRQ

[Agzee]

I will be installing a new soundcard in my computer and am thinking of
allocating a specific IRQ to it rather than using a shared IRQ.

The serial port and parallel port are unused on my computer and I was
thinking of disabling both of them in the bios freeing up a couple of
IRQs.

Anyone see problems in doing this?

Agzee

 

[GHalleck]

I will be installing a new soundcard in my computer and am thinking of
allocating a specific IRQ to it rather than using a shared IRQ.

The serial port and parallel port are unused on my computer and I was
thinking of disabling both of them in the bios freeing up a couple of
IRQs.

Anyone see problems in doing this?

Agzee

Why do it? Is there a specific application or hardware that
demands specific resources (i.e., IRQ's, DMA's, etc.) for it
to work. If not, then let the computer and Windows XP resolve
it. In this present day and age, there are no real issues with
shared resources. But if one wants to force specific values,
then make sure that there are the means to do so and enforce it
on the particular piece of equipment, i.e., hard EPROM settings
or jumpering.

 

[DanS]

I will be installing a new soundcard in my computer and am thinking of
allocating a specific IRQ to it rather than using a shared IRQ.

The serial port and parallel port are unused on my computer and I was
thinking of disabling both of them in the bios freeing up a couple of
IRQs.

Anyone see problems in doing this?

Agzee

Nope. Not if you don't use them.

 

[DanS]

Why do it? Is there a specific application or hardware that
demands specific resources (i.e., IRQ's, DMA's, etc.) for it
to work. If not, then let the computer and Windows XP resolve
it. In this present day and age, there are no real issues with
shared resources. But if one wants to force specific values,
then make sure that there are the means to do so and enforce it
on the particular piece of equipment, i.e., hard EPROM settings
or jumpering.

Looking at my device manager, it seems Windows has assigned IRQ 9 to the 4
USB ports as well as my sound card.

This is in addition to having IRQ's 2, 5, & 7 being free and unused.
Perhaps I was using a USB ethernet, HD, and trying to record music (with
instruments) with my sound card. I could see a problem.

 

[Agzee]

Nope. Not if you don't use them.

Thanks for your responses everyone.

My only reason for thinking of allocating a specific IRQ to the
soundcard rather than let Windows determine an IRQ was because of
something I read on a website, mentioning that it was preferable for a
soundcard to have its own individual IRQ.

What the advantage of this is I have no idea!

My motherboard has three available PCI slots and my bios allows me to
set a specific IRQ for any of the three slots.

Agzee

 

[Jonny]

I will be installing a new soundcard in my computer and am thinking of
allocating a specific IRQ to it rather than using a shared IRQ.

The serial port and parallel port are unused on my computer and I was
thinking of disabling both of them in the bios freeing up a couple of
IRQs.

Anyone see problems in doing this?

Agzee

Depends on the sound card. They used to default to irq 5, sometimes 7, or
10 before any windows driver software installation. Now 9 as a phantom
sharing irq seems prevalent in windows itself.

The reason for the exclusive hardware irq, not shared, is to minimize
possibility of sound burps/silences that may occur.

I always free up irqs via the bios setup, if such onboard hardware is not
used. It won't break anything, XP doesn't care.

 

[Agzee]

Depends on the sound card. They used to default to irq 5, sometimes 7, or
10 before any windows driver software installation. Now 9 as a phantom
sharing irq seems prevalent in windows itself.

The reason for the exclusive hardware irq, not shared, is to minimize
possibility of sound burps/silences that may occur.

I always free up irqs via the bios setup, if such onboard hardware is not
used. It won't break anything, XP doesn't care.

I have just checked using "Everest Ultimate Edition 2006" to find out
what IRQ the soundcard is using.

It is sharing IRQ16, although the above program does not show what
other device is using IRQ16, suspect that the onboard soundchip
Realtek AC_97 might have used IRQ16 prior to me disabling it in the
bios.

The soundcard appears to be working fine at the moment, although if I
have any glitchs with out will allot an exclusive IRQ to it.

Cheers - Agzee