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Fixing Marvel G200 IRQ with VIA MVP3
I have been frustrated with the IRQ setting of my Marvel G200, since it would never be set to IRQ 11 as I believe it should be. I found a simple fix to the problem for my PA-2013 motherboard-based system with VIA MVP3 Chipset and Award BIOS. This procedure assumes that you have the most current Award BIOS, Windows 98SE, and VIA 4-in-1 Chipset patches for your system. Similar settings may work with other BIOSes and OSes.
In the BIOS under PCI settings, change configuration from Auto to Manual. Change IRQ 11 from PNP to Legacy/ISA. Make sure that "Assign IRQ to VGA" is DISABLED, NOT enabled! Changing IRQ 11 to Legacy/ISA prevents this IRQ from being used by other devices, and disabling the VGA IRQ assignment lets Windows 98SE auto assign the IRQ (which it will assign to 11 since no devices are using it). In Windows 98SE, make sure that the PCI Bus setting (under the System Devices listing) is set to Default settings, so that Hardward Device Enumeration is used and IRQ Steering is enabled.
I hope that this procedure saves you as much frustration as it has saved me. I discovered this after a lot of aggrevation, trial, and error. My system is solid and very reliable as configured below:
Motherboard: FIC PA-2013 rev 2.0 E-O036 with 2MB Cache
Chipset: VIA MVP3 (not so bad any more)
BIOS: Award JI438 from FIC
Memory: 128 MB PC100
CPU: AMD K6-2 450 @500 - runs cool
Video: Matrox Marvel G200 AGP 16 MB RAM with fan mounted on heat sink (not overclocked)
Sound: Diamond Monster MX300 PCI with Aureal 4.06.2048 drivers (not Diamond drivers) and Soundblaster Pro Emulation disabled to save an IRQ
IDE Controller: Promise Ultra 66 PCI with 2-7200 RPM ATA66 drives - each as Master on their own channel
Modem: USR 56K Voice PCI Hardware Modem
USB: IS DISABLED! I don't care what VIA says, my system is rock solid without it and it saves me an IRQ.
Network: SMC Ultra 16 ISA Ethernet
SCSI: UMAX IS11 ISA
Parallel port is enabled at IRQ7 and both serial ports are disabled.
Note: My system is using both the PCI and ISA slots of the shared PCI4/ISA1 slot (thanks to a modification to the cards that share the slots). PCI Slot 1 (next to AGP) is empty. The PCI device in PCI slot 4 will share an IRQ with USB if USB is enabled.
PowerDesk: 5.25 (if someone gets a newer version to work with their PA-2013 board and 3DMark2000, let me know), Bus Master Enabled.
Video Tools: 1.51
Direct X: 7.0a
VIA 4-in-1: 4.23 (each installed separately). AGP 4.03 is installed in Turbo mode.
Video Capture: ULead MSE Pro 5.2
All BIOS settings are set for maximum performance. Write Cache Pipeline and Read Around Write are both ENABLED. All Video and System BIOS Caching/Shadowing is Disabled. Memory timing is Turbo, Cycle Length 2. AGP Aperture 256M.
3DMark2000 Rating: 1450
In the BIOS under PCI settings, change configuration from Auto to Manual. Change IRQ 11 from PNP to Legacy/ISA. Make sure that "Assign IRQ to VGA" is DISABLED, NOT enabled! Changing IRQ 11 to Legacy/ISA prevents this IRQ from being used by other devices, and disabling the VGA IRQ assignment lets Windows 98SE auto assign the IRQ (which it will assign to 11 since no devices are using it). In Windows 98SE, make sure that the PCI Bus setting (under the System Devices listing) is set to Default settings, so that Hardward Device Enumeration is used and IRQ Steering is enabled.
I hope that this procedure saves you as much frustration as it has saved me. I discovered this after a lot of aggrevation, trial, and error. My system is solid and very reliable as configured below:
Motherboard: FIC PA-2013 rev 2.0 E-O036 with 2MB Cache
Chipset: VIA MVP3 (not so bad any more)
BIOS: Award JI438 from FIC
Memory: 128 MB PC100
CPU: AMD K6-2 450 @500 - runs cool
Video: Matrox Marvel G200 AGP 16 MB RAM with fan mounted on heat sink (not overclocked)
Sound: Diamond Monster MX300 PCI with Aureal 4.06.2048 drivers (not Diamond drivers) and Soundblaster Pro Emulation disabled to save an IRQ
IDE Controller: Promise Ultra 66 PCI with 2-7200 RPM ATA66 drives - each as Master on their own channel
Modem: USR 56K Voice PCI Hardware Modem
USB: IS DISABLED! I don't care what VIA says, my system is rock solid without it and it saves me an IRQ.
Network: SMC Ultra 16 ISA Ethernet
SCSI: UMAX IS11 ISA
Parallel port is enabled at IRQ7 and both serial ports are disabled.
Note: My system is using both the PCI and ISA slots of the shared PCI4/ISA1 slot (thanks to a modification to the cards that share the slots). PCI Slot 1 (next to AGP) is empty. The PCI device in PCI slot 4 will share an IRQ with USB if USB is enabled.
PowerDesk: 5.25 (if someone gets a newer version to work with their PA-2013 board and 3DMark2000, let me know), Bus Master Enabled.
Video Tools: 1.51
Direct X: 7.0a
VIA 4-in-1: 4.23 (each installed separately). AGP 4.03 is installed in Turbo mode.
Video Capture: ULead MSE Pro 5.2
All BIOS settings are set for maximum performance. Write Cache Pipeline and Read Around Write are both ENABLED. All Video and System BIOS Caching/Shadowing is Disabled. Memory timing is Turbo, Cycle Length 2. AGP Aperture 256M.
3DMark2000 Rating: 1450
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