Re: Computer Pops???

Peter - thanks for your useful and lengthy response.


>
>> Pentium III 450 MHz.
>
> Are you sure it is a p3, not that it matters as much as clock
> frequency does, but 450 Mhz sounds like a p2 spec to me.

Yeah, it is a PIII. There was some crossover of clock times when they
were introduced.


>
>> Rack for five SCSI drives, populated with two 9.5 gig Seagates
>
> Thre questions:
>
> is it a pci controller?

This is what Intel says:

"The embedded SCSI controller on N440BX Server is the Symbios SYM53C876
dual function controller. This device provides both Ultra wide and
legacy narrow SCSI interfaces as two independent PCI functions1. PCI
slot 3 is RAID-upgradeable, providing additional support for an
Intelligent I/O (I2O) RAID controller by AMI."

I guess that's a yes, but I'm ignorant here.

>
> is it a raid controller?

No.

>
> how are the drives configured?

NTFS, single partition per drive.

>
>> one half gig memory
>> Windows XP, service pack two, home edition
>
> Why did you remove the NT4 it most probably came with?

Sorry, it came without OS. But I checked with Intel, and they told me
the board was certified for XP.

>
>> Aardvark Direct Pro LX-6 soundcard
>
> Oh, that one, it is excellent
> (== huh?- never heard about it ... O;-) .... )

Small company, now out of business. But if you check it out, I think
you'll find it was a pretty sophisticated card, with the best shielding
of the PCI card I've ever seen.

>
>> It does that chore well, but the sound is
>> polluted with pops.
>
> I would not call that well, unless of course I was in fear of
> disouraging it. To put it kindly the machine may have alternative
> abilities that are more pronounced in other fields of use.
>

Poor phrasing on my part. It would be good absent the pops.


>> When you boot up the computer, there is one loud
>> speaker shredding pop,
>
> This is because it does, it is a problem for you because you have not
> put an attenuator on the input of the power amp, 12 to 20 dB is a
> probably useful range.

I did, immediately after the first experience.

>
>> then a much milder pop about every three to five seconds.
>> This is without loading up any software at all except
>> the OS. Any ideas what could be causing this?
>
> For a first guess: the scsi controller polling the scsi bus perhaps
> because the OS asked it to check for the existence of a CD-rom if the
> CD-rom drive is scsi and because autoplay is enabled.

The CD-ROM is IDE. Autoplay is off. Anything else the controller could
be looking for?

Ethernet is disabled, if that's relevant.

>
>> I've updated all the drivers and the BIOS.
>
> Updating the bios was the good idea, removing the OS it is asasumed to
> have had was not. Do you have the option of re-installing it?

XP is all I have.

>
>> I've heard clicks and pops can be caused by buffer size
>> problems, so I've tried changing them without effect.
>> It makes sense that this wouldn't solve the problem,
>> since I don't have to load my music software
>> to get the pops.
>
> You are quite right. What you can do is to try removing the
> scsi-controller, if pci, and put a disk on the assumed mobo IDE
> controller, that is about the only way to ascertain whether it is the
> scsi controller that causes the issue.

Since the SCSI controller is embedded in the mobo, I can't do that. I'm
also reluctant to invest in an IDE drive for this box. It's too old.
However, if I decide to go that route, would disabling the SCSI
controller in Device Manager work?
>
>> Thanks for your time and your help.
>
> For use as a musical instrument it will always be a waste of mains
> power, if you want to use it, then set it up for what it is possibly
> good at: file server with redundant storage. But if it has a hardware
> raid 5 controller, and thus is worth using for it, if you can afford
> three large scsi disks, then it is also possibly ebayable, at least
> the controller is likely to be.

Yeah, I may well be wasting my time. But I'm making such small demands
on this machine, I thought it could handle them. I have no need of a
server.

Thanks, again.

Larry Bellinger
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: 3B2 Disks
    ... being able to read the disk in its present format. ... 2 MFM drives on a custom controller. ... SCSI came much later as an add on card. ...
    (comp.sys.3b1)
  • Re: 3B2 Disks
    ... 2 MFM drives on a custom controller. ... what it came out of) but the only SCSI I heard about on the 3B's used ... any software out and would more likely have recycled the floppy disks. ...
    (comp.sys.3b1)
  • Re: Hot Swapping a SATA drive in Windows 2000 and XP.
    ... knowledge) that designates add-on cards as SCSI but rather the system BIOS. ... this day if you choose to boot from a HD (IDE or SATA) which is attached to ... drives attached to the built-in promise controller will most probably ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.hardware)
  • Re: RAID configuration with out RAID controller
    ... disks with out scsi controller, ... That's a pretty good trick to use hard drives without a controller. ... you are saying you do not have a SCSI Array Controller so you cannot create ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.general)
  • RE: Missing Multimedia Audio Controller
    ... Turn the boards sound hardware off in the BIOS.You can/could also move ... Drives Memory Modules c,d ... Primary IDE Channel [Controller] ... SiS PCI IDE Controller RADEON 9000 SERIES ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.hardware)