2D Choppiness!? (G400Max on a P3-558)

[Hazridi]

Whenever I try to move a window around on the screen for more than just minor adjustments, it chops up. Problem didn't occur on my old TNT 1 (Viper V550). Anyone have any what's up? I've tried AGP Apertures of 32 and 256, no difference. The card is running at 124x.66 = 83mhz, with AGP 2x enabled.

This is the biggest disappointment with the card. Everything else works great, including 3D rendering.

[Hazridi]

Umm... also, I'm running on an ABit BX6 revision 2. 2x128mb dimms. Have an SB Live sharing an IRQ with the G400 Max.

Have a 3c905B and a Adaptec 2940UW, also.

[alessandro]

You blame the card and you have a Live sharing the same IRQ with the G400???????
Try to change the Sblive's IRQ is your first consern.(try to leave the 1 PCI slot empty).
Also check for the latest Liveware for your SBlive(Liveware 3.0)



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Pentium II 450Mhz@504,Asus P2B rev1.04 (biosrev.1011),17" Sony Multiscan 200PST,128MB PC100 ram,Matrox Millenium G400 MAX 32MB 5ns SGRAM,Quantum Firebal EL 10.2Gb,Epson Stylus Color 740,Sound blaster Live!,Cambridge Soundworks 5.1,Creative PC-DVD 5X,CDR-RW Ricoh MP7040S@MP7060S(Tweaked from 4x--->6x with no problem),Adaptec SCSI 2920C,Diamond SupraExpress 56e PRO,Iomega Zip Drive.

[Hazridi]

Umm... IRQ sharing is a spec of AGP and PCI, dude. I have no free PCI slots, anyway and this is the only configuration where everything works.

It doesn't matter if sound is playing or not; the 2D is still choppy.

[Rags]

Hazridi...ummmm...when you have a problem with your computer, one of the first thing that is taught to you is to check IRQ sharing/conflicts....I don't care if the PCI spec. says sharing works and plug and play in Windows is supposed to work, because there are times when they just won't work. Some cards don't like to play nice when sharing with a busmastering video adapter, and the SB Live! is one of them.

You have two choices:

1) You can post a complete IRQ list, and maybe list your PCI card arrangement from top to bottom, and we can figure out what you do to resolve the problem.

2) You can live with your problem or find help elsewhere.

I doesn't matter to me what you do, I don't have to use your computer, I have mine, and mine is setup properly But don't come in here and ask for help, then dismiss the help when you get it. We have been through this with many users, you aren't the first.

Rags

[Hazridi]

IRQ 15, G400Max
IRQ 15, SB Live!
IRQ 14, 3c905B
IRQ 12, PS/2 mouse
IRQ 11, Brooktree Bt848 Capture Card
IRQ 10, Adaptec 2940UW
IRQ 7, LTP1
IRQ 5, SB Live Emulation
IRQ 4, COM1

IRQ 3 and 9 are the only ones free I believe.

The IDE controller is disabled.
My AGP/PCI order is

G400Max
SB Live!
3c905B
Brooktree Bt848
Adaptec 2940WU
Adaptec 10/100 Ethernet card.

AGP and PCI 1 *always* share an IRQ, btw, which is why it shouldn't be a big deal.

I ripped out the SB Live and the problem's still there.

[Kruzin]

Yes, AGP will always share an IRQ with a PCI slot. Which is WHY you shoult leave that PCI slot empty, have a card in it that doesn't use an IRQ, or at the very least, a card that doesn't use bus mastering.

The Live! is the worst card of your system to have next to the G400. They are both busmastering cards, and both want all the resources they can get. I would swap it with the network card, and try to get them down to 9 (which is a higher priority than 15).

Also look at simpler solutions. Are you "stretching" a wallpaper on your desktop? If so, try "center" or "tile". This one setting can create desktop slowdowns...

[Hazridi]

I think all the cards in my machine are bus mastering, even the capture card. I don't use that though so I'll take it out and put the Live there and see what happens.

Are there any other things that might cause this? It's almost as if it's trying to swap for ram, which is silly on a machine with 256 mb.


[This message has been edited by Hazridi (edited 05 March 2000).]

[Hazridi]

It's not choppy at all if I have ANY other window maximized -- only if it's just the desktop visible.

I have tried disabling the wall paper, that did nothing.

I'm a little confused here.

[Brent]

Try using Ctrl-Alt-Del to disable all background apps except explorer and sys tray and see if that fixes it. If so, you have a background app hogging resources.
Also, go into your mobo bios and get the G400 onto IRQ 9. The SCSI it is sharing with is notorious for hogging PCI bandwidth.

[Hazridi]

I tried the background process stuff, to see if it was the matrox utilities causing the problem, but it's not.

I can get it to a lower IRQ (it's on 10 this moment) but it doesn't help one bit.

[Stringy]

what version of the Matrox drivers are you using?? 5.52??

Is this the same install of Windows that had the TNT1 in it?? did you just swap out??
Maybe there is some left over TNT stuff in your DX or what ever..

just a few suggestions.
Craig

[This message has been edited by Stringy (edited 06 March 2000).]

[CrazyBee]

Some of you (ahem) geek people need to realize that most situations might have a cookie-cutter solution, but, others dont. Some people have a problem on these forums with barking a bit early.

Any ways, I may have missed it, but, Hazridi, what type of mobo do you have? Latest BIOS on it? drivers? I once had a FIC mobo that needed some drivers to work correctly with some hardware.

Also, another suggestion would be to, and I hate to say it, re-install windows. Back stuff up, delete the 'C:\Windows' directory and install. I had a problem with lag at boot-up and not having my USB ZIP show up in Windows Explorer. I did that and it worked. I had previously tried just installing windows over itself but it diddnt do anything.

Also, FYI for some, I had my G400, SB Live!, and USB controller all on IRQ 10. I did change it since I had an IRQ open and put the G400 on that. For aesthetic reasons. I had *NO* problems while it was like that.


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Abit BX6 Rev.1
Celeron 366A PPGA @ 566, 2.1v
192 meg RAM, CAS2
13.0 gig Maxtor 4320 HD
6.0 gig Maxtor (in removeable drive bay)
HP8110i 4x2x24
Pioneer DVD-104
SB Live! 1024
USB ZIP 100
G400 32MB DH 5ns RAM at 187/211
Two KDS 17" Trinitron monitors
YAMAHA HTR-5140 Reciever

[Hazridi]

This is going to scare all of you, I know. Problem's gone. Want to know what I did? I enabled active desktop, watched problem go away. Disabled it. Problem is now gone.

Don't you friggin hate windows?

[Brent]

I usually find active desktop sucks resources and creates instability, especially if you have a high colour desktop wallpaper and try to drag windows around with "view contents" enabled. Did you find enabling it cured your problem or am I misunderstanding you?
RE Windows, I wonder how many users would abandon Microsoft overnight, on principle alone (after years of having to eat crap and take it), if an alternative only 90% as good/ compatible was available? I hear you Linux folks baying away but for most of us, there would be too much hardware and software incompatibility at this stage to lose/ afford.
What about a new thread voicing MS opinions? There are those that think MS has done a great job "considering things outside their control" and others like me that think MS has exploited the market by being in a position to sell last years model at a premium just because they have killed the competition.