Syntrillium Backup Forums :: View topic - Aardvark crashes w P4P800 mobo (i865/ICH5 chipset)

Elameno · Posts: 64

I just upgraded to an ASUS P4P800 Deluxe motherboard with a Pentium 4 2.4Ghz Hyperthreading processor. I'm running WinXP pro and I've been running into some problems with the aardvark.exe process crashing on me while using Cool Edit Pro 2.1.

First off, does anyone else have a similar setup that is running well?

I've started doing some diagnostics on my system, I ran some memory tests on the 1Gig of Corsair DDR400 RAM I just purchased. It's running in Dual Channel mode for 800Mhz bandwidth, but the memory tests I've run indicate everything is fine there. I used the memtest utility.

I've disabled the onboard sound and that has had no effect, either way it will crash.

One thing I just noticed a about an hour ago is that when I boot up, if I look at the LAN connection, which uses the onboard 3Com Gigabit ethernet controller, it initially says it's sent over 12,000,000,000 packets!!

I did a reboot and, before starting up Cool Edit Pro I hit the "Repair Connection" for the LAN and the "packets sent" meter went back to what it should be, almost nil. I have since been running a cool edit session for the past half hour with no troubles at all. This may be a fluke, but I may be on to something as well...there's something obviously wrong with the network setup since it's reporting such an insane number of packets having been sent right after bootup.

Anyone have any experience with this setup?

Elameno

Elameno · Posts: 64

I think I jumped the gun. I realized that I hadn't opened the Aardvark Manager (mixing console) yet. I was running my recording session fine until I opened that, and it crashed almost immediately.

So the network card has been ruled out as the big issue.

Any ideas would be much appreciated.

Elameno · Posts: 64

Hmm, this is turning out to be the diary of a man madly trying to get a DAW working.

I uninstalled the Aardvark 7.04 drivers and installed the Aardvark 7.0 drivers off the CD that came with the audio card. I haven't had any troubles yet running Cool Edit Pro with the Q10 Control Panel open. This is an excellent sign...the 7.0 mixer doesn't look nearly as nice as the 7.04, but heck, you gotta go with what works.

I'll post more if I have issues with the 7.0 drivers. I'm going to contact Aardvark to see what they have to say.

Elameno

clintfan · Location: USA Posts: 455

Yes, I was thinking drivers also. Especially since XP is still relatively new. Strange that the latest 7.04 drivers off their website would not work, even after being out there since December, but older ones would. But it's happened before with other companies. And I've added many a bug to my own company's drivers over the years, sometimes it just happens, an dumb mistake you kick yourself for afterwards.

I think you're doing the right thing by contacting Aardvark directly.

-clintfan

Elameno · Posts: 64

Aardvark got back to me fairly quickly. I offered to go back to 7.04 for them and do some tests, and they asked me to turn off Hyperthreading to see if the 7.04 drivers and control panel would run properly. I now have Hyperthreading disabled and the crashes appear to be a thing of the past.

There is a performance hit though. Hyperthreading was a really nice addition to my setup as Cool Edit, and my system in general, can handle more, and handle it better with Hyperthreading enabled. After I've run this setup to be sure there is no more crashing, I'm planning on going back to the 7.00 drivers and enabling hyperthreading until they get a fix out.

The tech support guy said that they'd be working on getting the best of both worlds from the 7.04 and the 7.00 drivers, so hopefully we'll have a fix sometime, and hopefully soon.

Elameno

clintfan · Location: USA Posts: 455

Sounds like pretty responsive support. Thanks for the update.

-clintfan

AMSG · Location: Sweden Posts: 594

Yes, aardvark is a good company in my opinion. They answer quite fast and their q10 is great for recording live bands if you ask me.

Btw. elameno, what soundcard do you use? I'm just curious:D

Elameno · Posts: 64

I use the P4P800 Deluxe onboard SoundMax sound card for my windows sounds, and then the Aardvark Q10 for recording purposes.

AMSG · Location: Sweden Posts: 594

Ok!

But it is good to actually turn off the windows sounds. They can cause trouble I know if you use the Q10. Aardvark themselves recommend the users to turn it off.

Elameno · Posts: 64

From what I understand, that was only if the Aardvark was your only sound card. You definitely don't want windows sounds going through your Aardvark since they're at such low quality, and that'd mess around with the sample rate setting. I'm not sure it makes much of a difference if you're using a separate sound card for the windows sounds.

Elameno

AMSG · Location: Sweden Posts: 594

It shouldn't be because it is as you say. That the sounds can disturb when they go through your q10. But I had some problems with the soundcard on the motherboard. The problems did disappear when I turned of the windows sounds completely (which went through the cheap soundcard anyway). I don't know if this is was the solution actually but I just turn them off now to be on the safe side:D