IRQ Holder fro PCI Steering?

[quattro_xxph]

I just installed an Audiophile (twice) and now it shares an IRQ (10) with a device called "IRQ Holder for PCI steering". I have a problem with clicks and pops. Is this the cause? If it is, how can it be remedied? I already tried uninstalling it and reinstalling it on another PCI slot. The IRQ no just moved from 12 to 10 and both shared this "device". Is this a significant problem (because the pops and clicks surely are)?

[DS_Sultan]

Uhm..... OS and hardware descriptions would help a diagnosis in your case.

[quattro_xxph]

Um, its Windows 98SE OS

P3 500 mhz, 192MB SDRAM, Audiophile card, not sure of the chipset but its not VIA, System Drive 10G 5400 rpm, Audio Drive 20G 7200 rpm

[DS_Sultan]

As long as your system is set up to use ACPI it will continue to use the IRQ holder. But that should not really be a problem. I would look to see if changing slots helps. 98se has power management on it as well so I would make sure these things are turned off. What other apps are running? What does device manager say about your hardware? What tweaks have you done to the OS for performance? Is the Audio drive on it;s own controller (secondary master with no slave device) or is it sharing the main drive cable? If so, move it to the secondary port as master. Where is your swap file located and how big is it? Be sure it's on the main drive, not the audio drive.

Check a few things out and get back to us.

[knowdoubt]

"IRQ Holder for PCI steering". All I can tell you at this point is that's not a problem. That currently shares IRQ 10 with my MOTU card & has I believe shared with my Delta 1010 card & every audio card I've ever had in my computer on Win98 over 4 years & never caused a problem.

Are you sure your hard drives have DMA enabled in Devise Manager?

If you don't know what chipset you have how do you know it's not VIA?

Are you using the latest drivers from M-audio?

[GZsound]

The IRQ steering function means it is directing the IRQ's of the various PCI devices. If you disable the steering function, the odds are good your equipment won't work.

Pops are usually caused by buffers settings. Also, if you are using your computer for dedicated audio and no modems, printers, etc. you can disable write ahead and disk cache for better performance.

You should be using one hard drive for your programs and another for your audio files.

You may also not have enough ram and that can cause pops too. Don't worry about the IRQ steering, it is not your problem.