Win2K and IRQ Assignments

G

gusman

New member
I've loaded Win2K. 3224 drivers. MUCH better than under Win98se. HOWEVER ... it put the Radeon card, nic, and sound all on IRQ 11. There are many other IRQs free. BUT ... all my stuff plays BETTER than before, and nothing seems to be in conflict. Is WIN2K that much better at resolving this stuff, or is there a way to reassign IRQs? I could do it under 98, but swapping PCI slots, and the usual tricks don't work. I figgure if all is working fine ... don't screw with it. But inquiring minds want to know how all y'all handle this WIN2K IRQ issue.

Thanks!
 
Win2k uses ACPI to assign your IRQs. As I understand it, it assigns the same one or two IRQs to all the devices. When a particular device wants to be used, it is then assigned one of the free IRQs. If you're not having any problems with it, just leave it alone.
 
Hmm, learn somthing new every day. I'll look more into that. Sure seems to work. Crimson Skies was very much improved ... not stuttering at all in Win2K. So it dynamically assigns IRQs. Actually, it seem downright smart to do this, especially on IRQ starved systems.

Thanks.:p
 
Ahh.. I always wondered what the ACPI / IRQ holding thing was doing, and how it actually worked.

What about if you used a number of devices at the same time.. can you run out of IRQ's and right into trouble? :confused:
 
You got me by the ass, bubba. I'm still trying to figure this critter out without going out and paying 35 bucks for a Win2K manual. The "help" function ain't real helpful in explaining this. Is there anyone out there who can explain this one out? :rolleyes:
 
I just switched from seperate IRQ's 440BX mobo to a "Microsoft compliant ACPI" 815ep motherboard and Win2k LOVES it. Everything is more stable and even faster. I have to admit, running multiple devices on 1 irq makes me cringe, but I havent had ANY problems, not even one crash.

Apparently Win2k loves ACPI, but if anyone remembers my signiture from a few days ago I used to have Windows 98se listed as well. I don't know why, but I had problems configuring 98 with an ACPI motherboard. But thats ok, I hardly used 98 anymore anyway.
 
I found the answer! check this thread out:
http://www.amdmb.com/vb/showthread.php?threadid=41409&highlight=ACPI

Sorry it didn't do quite right, but it's pretty clear that IF you have an ACPI compliant MB and PCI cards (AGP too) then Win2K will do it all AOK. Faster and better, in fact. There have been problems reported by folks with poorly written drivers or older systems.

Moral of the story;
Win2K ROCKS! But you gotta have the right hardware and decent drivers.:cool:
 
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