Asus A7V + SB Live! Value = Problems?

[Guest]

I heard that this is not a good pair. Is there any truth behind this? If so, what kind of problems? Would I be better off with a Turtle Beach Santa Cruz?

 

[mpjesse]

I have a friend with an Asus A7V and a SB Live, he has no problems at all. Works great.

-MP Jesse

 

[Guest]

I've had no problems with it in my A7V, so I would say it's ok, plus I think the issue is easily correctable with a BIOS update if you actually I have it. I have like i think the 1.0.0.4 BIOS update, my board came that way, I don't know what the latest update is since I don't tend to flash bios unless i have a specific reason to.

 

[Guest]

I have an A7V with the SB Live value.
There is a problem with the IRO for the SB 16 Emulation, adn PCI.
I disable it.
I also notice that once I installed the 4 in 1 Driver
(or 3 in 1), windows 98 se takes a lot longer to boot up.
Any 1 got any idea?
I put the sound card in the 3rd PCI slot.

 

[RavenPrime]

I have an A7V and a SB Live Xgamer sound card. No problems with the sound card. Just be sure to put the Sound Card into PCI slot 3.
I have been having problems with the Geforce2 card--see my other posts if interested.
I had a lot of hangups in the bootup process with the original 4in1 drivers. Once I upgraded to the v4.24, I had no more problems with the bootup. But I also did a clean re-install with the new drivers including the new one for the ATA/100 controller. Check out the Asus web site.

James

 

[Guest]

The big issue with these new m/b`s is the lack of spare irq`s as was mentioned and discussed in the `kawazney` thread. So if you plan to use a printer, scanner, modem, network card, sound, AGP, and a handheld attachment (i.e. Palm on the COM port), then you are out of luck unless they are all USB devices. For all that you will need an old socket7 or BX where you can disable the ACPI controller and gain 2 irq`s on the new motherboards (1 ACPI irq + 1 Ultra-ATA100 irq).

I am using a Live Value on the A7V and it works OK. Mind you I spent a month getting the board relatively stable. I can use all the same cards and cpu in my Abit KT7-Raid without any problems. I still don`t know why the A7V is rated so high - it`s been a disappointment in my experience.

 

[Guest]

I'm currently building an A7V box, and the SB Live seems to be the easiest sound card to run on the A7V from what I've heard on Usenet and mobo forums. Also happens to be what I have. Can't say the current A7V is the friendliest MB to build with tho, but they've all got their issues, eh ? And it's a very powerful board.

I've had the SB Live in PCI slots 3, 4, and 5 and it functioned fine in each.
They say slot 3 is preferred. ….of course it is ! It's the only slot that isn't shared at all (unless you happen to be planning on using the AMR slot, and I've yet to see a modem that uses it).

Problem with that is I've got other cards that need resources too !

PCI 1 is shared with AGP,
PCI 2 is shared w/ ATA/100 controller and AGP,
PCI 4 and 5 share with each other as well as USB

The Sound Blaster has (non vital) 16-bit function, and therefore will be 'looking' for an ISA-type
slot. Since the A7V doesn't have any, you will either need to 'reserve an IRQ for Legacy Device' for it in your BIOS, or disable the 16-bit function of the SB Live.

The preferred SB Live combination seems to be slot 3 with IRQ 5 reserved.

Personally, I had a really 'fun' time trying to find a working slot combination for host-controlled modem and SCSI scanner. And I didn't want to move the SB to the coveted slot 3, when it worked fine in 4 and 5.

I think you'll be happy with the SB Live on the A7V.

BTW, as for the BIOS, I'm using 1004. Have heard often that the bleeding edge 1005's cause a much slower boot, and that 1004 solves some instability issues but raises the CPU temp slightly at idle from the 1003.

And I had to uninstall the Via Bus Master because of issues with my CD Burner.

Just heard that ASUS has discontinued the intergrated Promise controller on A7V and replaced it with a VIA ATA-100 controller. Think I'll take the advice above and check out the ASUS site.

I'll post my system specs separately so that those uninterested don't have to endure the length.

Good luck !
Edge

 

[Guest]

System Specs

MB - ASUS A7V rev. 1.02
Asus BIOS 1004c
Promise ATA Controller; BIOS 2.01 build 28; Driver 1.6 build 25
AGP VxD Driver, IRQ Routing Miniport Driver, and Chipset Functions Registry
from ver 4.24 of VIA "4in1" Driver (minus the Bus Master driver)
900Mhz T-bird @ 900Mhz
512 M 133SDRAM
OS - Win98se
PS - 300W
ATA/100 Primary Master - IBM 30G ATA/100
ATA/100 Primary Slave - Maxtor 15G ATA/100
ATA/66 Primary Master - Plextor 8x4x32 CD-RW w/ DMA enabled
ATA/66 Secondary Master - 52x CD
USB ports unused and disabled
AGP - Matrox G400
PCI 1 - empty
PCI 2 - empty
PCI 3 - Adaptec 2930U SCSI (for scanner only - Epson ES-1200C )
( IRQ 5 reserved for PCI slot 3 )
PCI 4 - Diamond Supramax 56K winmodem
PCI 5 - SB Live Value

IRQ
0 System timer
1 Standard 101/102-Key or Microsoft Natural Keyboard
2 Programmable interrupt controller
3 SUP2750 PCI Modem Enumerator
3 Creative SB Live! Value
3 ACPI IRQ Holder for PCI IRQ Steering
4 Communications Port (COM1)
5 ACPI IRQ Holder for PCI IRQ Steering
6 Standard Floppy Disk Controller
7 ECP Printer Port (LPT1)
8 System CMOS/real time clock
9 SCI IRQ used by ACPI bus
10 Win95-98 Promise Ultra100 (tm) IDE Controller (PDC20265)
10 ACPI IRQ Holder for PCI IRQ Steering
11 Matrox Millennium G400 DualHead - English
11 ACPI IRQ Holder for PCI IRQ Steering
12 PS/2 Compatible Mouse Port
13 Numeric data processor
14 Primary IDE controller (dual fifo)
14 VIA Bus Master PCI IDE Controller
15 Secondary IDE controller (dual fifo)
15 VIA Bus Master PCI IDE Controller

DMA
0 (free)
1 Creative SB16 Emulation
2 Standard Floppy Disk Controller
3 ECP Printer Port (LPT1)
4 Direct memory access controller
5 Creative SB16 Emulation
6 (free)
7 (free)

 

[Guest]

Just did some looking around, and looks like the deal with new ATA/100 controller is that the The new VIA chipset has full support for ATA-100 included so it doesn't need the Promise controller, and ASUS plans on using that in a future board revision.

Bummer.

Re-reading your post, ravenprime, I guess you were saying that you installed the new *version* of the *Promise* ATA/100 controller.

Guess it was just high hopes thinking it might be related to what I'd heard about ASUS having discontinued the Promise controller on A7V.

Be real sweet to download software rather than buy a new board......

 

[Guest]

My A7V work fine with SB Live even though all the pci slot are fill up with different card. rock solid, never a blue screen.

system spec:
ASUS A7V Rev1.02 Bios 1.004D
OS. Win Me (do not install any Via 4-in-1)
CPU: Duron 650 (Overclocked 1000mhz fsb100x10)
CPU FAN: thermaltake chrome orb (cpu temp should < 50c)
Memory: PC100 128M
AGP: ASUS V6800 Deluxe (1st monitor)
PCI 1: S3 virge pci (2nd monitor)
PCI 2: adaptec 2940 (for umax scanner & toshiba scsi 40x)
PCI 3: Promise FastTrak66 Raid 0 (2xWDC 10.2 7200 ata66 ide)
PCI 4: Intel 21041 10/100 ethernet
PCI 5: Soundblaster live value (winME driver from creative)

* on-board promise ATA100 disable (irq for adaptec 2940)
** Via primary master-wdc 10.2 5400 ide
secondary master-Sony ide cdrw
*** Com 1 & Com 2 disable (free up irq)

So far I have no complain to A7V + sound blaster live

 

[Guest]

I too have problems with the ATA 100 and 2940
You can enable the 2940 when you are in Windows but will not boot with both active

 

[Bubba]

A7V and SBLive = no problems for me.
Put the SBLive in the third slot and disable SB16 Emulation.