A question about the Gigabyte GA-K8NS Ultra-939 mobo

[Animix]

I notice that the BIOs allows what appears to be easy assignment of IRQ's for each of the slots, except that slots 1 & 5 are going to share IRQ no matter what. My questing is, do *any* of the PCI slots share an IRQ with the AGP no matter what, or can any/all slots be assigned an IRQ independent of the AGP.


The reason I ask is that on the ASUS A8V-Deluxe, PCI slots 1 & 5 share with the AGP no matter what. I need to defeat this siotuation and be able to have all 5 slots assignable to IRQ's independent of the AGP.

thanks

 

[Steve Oxford]

I have the A8V non deluxe mobo and its the same.. 1 & 5 share with the AGP regardless and I've found nothing that can be done BIOS wise that changes that, so.. I bought a magma.. :wink: Where there's a will there's a way or something like that.. LOL

 

[Animix]

I have the A8V non deluxe mobo and its the same.. 1 & 5 share with the AGP regardless and I've found nothing that can be done BIOS wise that changes that, so.. I bought a magma.. :wink: Where there's a will there's a way or something like that.. LOL

what I am findeing is that my 3 x RME HDSP cards will run in the Magma all alone but will not tolerate a UAD-1 card being in the Magma. Even one UAD-1 causes crackling if an RME card is in there. I can run all 4 x UAD-1 cards in the Magma if the RME cards are in the mobo PCI slots, but this requires one of the RME cards to occupy PCI 1, because the Maga host cards needs PCI 4 in order to work with all four UAD-1 cards. If an RME card is in PCI 1, it's sharing IRQ with the AGP and eventually this causes a freeze.

I've got one of these Gigabyte boards here and I'm going to try it. If I can keep the AGP from sharing with any of the PCI slots, thin I think I'm going to be good. If not, it's going to be time for an RME MADI system I guess (sigh). The MADI configuration really doesn't have enough I/O for what I need to do. I need 70 x digital I/O and 8 x analogue I/O, all simultaneously addressable. The only configuration I can find that does this is 2 x HDSP 9652's and an RME HDSP Multiface. If I can't find a way to deal with this, I may have to go back to an older mobo with 6 x PCI slots.

 

[Steve Oxford]

Would another 4 or seven slot magma work? One for uad's and one for the RME's? Is that technically possible?

 

[Animix]

Would another 4 or seven slot magma work? One for uad's and one for the RME's? Is that technically possible?

Might work. Hard to say.

 

[Akis]

You can have up to 3 Magma's connected to the same machine.

 

[Commodor]

I have the A8V non deluxe mobo and its the same.. 1 & 5 share with the AGP regardless and I've found nothing that can be done BIOS wise that changes that, so.. I bought a magma.. :wink: Where there's a will there's a way or something like that.. LOL

what I am findeing is that my 3 x RME HDSP cards will run in the Magma all alone but will not tolerate a UAD-1 card being in the Magma. Even one UAD-1 causes crackling if an RME card is in there. I can run all 4 x UAD-1 cards in the Magma if the RME cards are in the mobo PCI slots, but this requires one of the RME cards to occupy PCI 1, because the Maga host cards needs PCI 4 in order to work with all four UAD-1 cards. If an RME card is in PCI 1, it's sharing IRQ with the AGP and eventually this causes a freeze.

I've got one of these Gigabyte boards here and I'm going to try it. If I can keep the AGP from sharing with any of the PCI slots, thin I think I'm going to be good. If not, it's going to be time for an RME MADI system I guess (sigh). The MADI configuration really doesn't have enough I/O for what I need to do. I need 70 x digital I/O and 8 x analogue I/O, all simultaneously addressable. The only configuration I can find that does this is 2 x HDSP 9652's and an RME HDSP Multiface. If I can't find a way to deal with this, I may have to go back to an older mobo with 6 x PCI slots.

Hi,

I don't know if this would do what you want or not... but it might and is probably worth a look at least. Sydec/Soundscape has some interesting looking Madi soundcards either already available or about to be available... as I understand it. I've been using their products for many years and can vouch for their quality and the support from the company.

Also look at the iBox I/O units... several different configurations available, including MADI versions.

I have the iBox/Mixpander 48-TA system for my "native" box. That box provides 24 analog I/O as well as 24 digital I/O when used with their Mixpander soundcard. Or you can use the iBoxes with other soundcards and each unit provides a LOT of I/O.. 24 channels in one unit at a great value.

I have 2X UAD-1 and 2X Powercore running in an expansion chassis along with the Mixpander 48-TA and it's all working fine for me on a daily basis.

I realize this isn't as many I/O as you need but some combination here might provide what you're looking for. I'd suggest that you contact Erik Wijnen at Sydec and tell him exactly what you're wanting to do and see if he can offer a solution. They're great guys to deal with and will, I'm sure, try to help.

Here's a few links if you want to have a look:

http://www.sydec.be/Products/iBox/Configurator/

http://www.sydec.be/Shop/Catalog/

http://www.sydec.be/Products/Details/ID ... adixtreme/



Best of luck,

Perry Barrett

PS: You can tell Erik I referred you if you like. And btw... nope... I don't get a commission. :wink:

 

[Animix]

You can have up to 3 Magma's connected to the same machine.

I'm getting ready to try this. One Magma (a 13 slot unit) will host all 4 x of my UAD-1 cards, the other one (a 7 slot unit) will host the 3 x RME cards. If I can get these RME cards off the IRQ that's sharing with the AGP and I don't overload the PCI bus, I should be good. If I put all three RME cards in the mobo PCI slots there is no crackling audio at all. If it would just play back reliably without screen freezes, I'd be good to go. I'm really hoping this 2nd Magma will work. I need 56 lightpipe I/O and 6 x coax spdif I/O along with 8 analog I/O all simultaneously available at mixdown. I know I'm right on the edge of ridiculous wretched excess here using 7 x PCI cards in one computer but a MADI system that would provide what I need is more than I want to spend, unless absolutely necessary. It's worth a try anyway.

The 2nd Magma should arrive Thursday. I'll post up the results.