Asus P5E-VM HDMI - G35 video stutter

[justincranford]

This is one of four major issues I am having with the Intel G35 chipset in my Asus P5E-VM HDMI motherboard. I am using it in my HTPC. Here is my setup. I am using all of the latest drivers and updates from the various manufacturers:

*** Hardware ***
Intel E8400 CPU
Asus P5E-VM HDMI motherboard w/ BIOS 0405 (2008/01/02)
OCZ 2x2GB DDR2-6400 SLI 5-4-4 memory
Aver PCIe Combo (R780) Media Center Upgrade (SDTV, ATSC/QAM, S-video inputs)
SMC 802.11a/b/g 108Mbps PCI wireless
Epson Home Cinema 720p (1280x720 @ 60Hz)
Creative Inspire 7800 (7.1 speakers)

*** Software ***
Windows XP SP2 + all updates (4/14/2008)
Intel Graphics Driver v6.14.10.4935 (3/20/2008)
Intel Chipset Driver v8.3.1.1009 (9/24/2007)
Realtek Audio Driver v1.90 (2008/3/31)
Aver R780 Driver v2.5.0.19 (10/03/2007)
Aver MediaCenter v1.6.1.2 (10/03/2007)


Video stutters while playing live analog TV in Aver MediaCenter. I isolated the problem myself by looking at IRQ resources in WinXP device manager under Control Panel. The root cause is an IRQ conflict between the onboard GMA3500 graphics device and the onboard Atheros PCIe Gigabit ethernet device. Both devices use IRQ 16.

The workaround is easy to verify. If ethernet is enabled in BIOS then video stutters. If ethernet is disabled, then video is smooth. Audio is unaffected in both configurations which rules out CPU utilization problems. CPU util remained low (<10%) which is great.

Asus customer support did not bother responding to my request for help. Intel customer support's response is they tested another motherboard and found no IRQ conflict. On their test board they found GMA3500 used IRQ 16 and ethernet used IRQ 20. Obviously this means nothing since they tested a different motherboard. The manufacturer and model were not mentioned so for all I know they could have used been using an abacus. :lol:

So, I can eliminate video stutter by disabling ethernet in the BIOS, but that leaves me without onboard ethernet. How can I fix this? Asus uses a third-party ethernet controller so maybe the problem is specific to the P5E-VM HDMI, or perhaps it affects other G35 chipset-based boards.

Any help or information you can give me would be greatly appreciated.

Can the IRQs be reconfigured in the BIOS? Are the IRQs hard-wired into the motherboard? Can they be changed in Windows?

 

[robinsos]

I know its a long time to re-open this but I have to take my hat off to you Justin.

I am sorry I don't know the answer to your question but you have solved an issue I've been having for about 2 years now...

I thought my Hauppauge NOVA-T500 PCI Dual tuner was to blame, then tried a different tuner card altogether (PEAK Dual) - no joy.

Then tried all sorts of different settings to adjust the video driver settings.

Disabling my ethernet port solved the problem!!

Thanks and great work. (and hope you have moved on from your issue or have solved by another means)

 

[justincranford]

Thanks for the kudos.

Unfortunately the resoution to my problem was swapping my Aver tuner card with a dual tuner Hauppauge. This was a horrible solution because the Aver PCIe Combo card has much higher quality analog video than my dual WinTV, and yet it was gathering dust. Then I recently switched my OS from WinXP SP3 to Win 7 x64. I gave the Aver tuner card another try and it works beautifully in Windows Media Center side-by-side with the on-board NIC.

I cannot say for sure what was the root cause. Could be the different OS, different G35 driver, different Aver driver (Vista x64 driver), or perhaps a BIOS upgrade. For what it is worth, I suspected the BIOS all along because I had other video issues, and now I know 1000000% that it was due to a faulty BIOS. Here is why I think it is the BIOS.


There are many, many, many reports on the web about the Asus P5E-VM showing blank video after resume from sleep/hibernate. This affected me for >2 years, and it made sleep/hibernate completely unusable. Even the switch from WinXP to Win7 did not resolve the problem. Then Asus issued a BIOS update for the P5E-VM four months ago on 2010/04/29.

BIOS 0709 for the Asus P5E-VM HDMI finally fixes the netorious blank video on resume from sleep/hibernate that has plagued so many users of this motherboard. The sad thing is Asus does not even admit fault here. The description of the BIOS just says "Improve System Stability". What does that even mean? I'll tell you what it means. We have been running a wonderful piece of hardware with junk BIOS for >2 years.

http://support.asus.com/download/download.aspx?SLanguage=en-us&product=1&model=P5E-VM HDMI&type=map&f_type=3


Anyway, I got off topic there, but try the new 0709 BIOS before you disable the on-board NIC. If BIOS 0709 resolves one "system stability" video issue (blank on resume), it just might resolve other video issues (stutter due to IRQ sharing). Good luck.


PS - I WILL give Asus credit for their very slick BIOS flash utility that is built right into the BIOS. I downloaded the 0709 ROM onto a USB thumb drive, and the Easy Flash utility in the BIOS read it straight off USB. No messing around with DOS boot disks or ISO burning. That makes flashing the BIOS very easy.

 

[robinsos]

I will give it a go - but to be honest I think my wife will be wondering what the hell I am doing when it works just fine... if it aint broke don't fix it.... then again the blank screen on resume is something that would be nice to be rid of... hmmm.... dilemma....

Thanks for info though will defintiely do it at some point maybe not just now.... thanks also for the rant - made me laugh!

Cheers

Simon

 

[Guest]

For what its worth, I have just resolved jitter on the same mobo by setting "plug and play o/s" to disabled.