I noticed that my onboard sound card and my IEEE 1394 FireWire Card share the same IRQ (10) I also noticed since I installed the drivers for the sound I get intermittent system lockups, and have to reset the PC. Is there a way to change the IRQ setting in RedHat Linux 8.0 or is it ok the share a IRQ?

Thanks,
Larry

Yeah its rare for newer motherboards to doink up on a shared IRQ, but there's a number of ways around it. First off, and by far the easiest, is to go into your machine's BIOS and hand assign an IRQ per PCI slot. Second, check to see if you can modprobe the module for the sound card with an irq=X argument, some take it, some don't. Its rarer with PCI cards... Same I guess could be said for the 1394 module, but I don't think that takes IRQ re-assignment offhand. Lastly, there's the pure voodoo of yanking the card and slotting it elsewhere. For dumb BIOSes, sometimes that's the only trick that seems to work.

Cheers,

Finegan

Hey thanks I will try some of your sugestions.

One other thing I noticed is the lockup problem only happens with KDE Desktop not GNOME Desktop. Also when I try to use Hardward Browser in GNOME it launches then 2 seconds later it shuts down without displaying any infomation.

My System

MSI MS-6712 KT4V-L K7 Mainboard with onboard LAN & Audio
AMD Athlon 2100+ XP
512MB DDR PC2100 RAM
AMI BIOS 1.7

Thanks,
Larry

Every time I add my printer, I hose up my modem and my sound. I was following the advice above about checking my IRQs, and found out that they share the same IRQ # (10). I tried to change it, but it gave me the choice or 9, 10, or 11 (all of which have multiple services assigned to them). The Dell helpdesk is not very helpful. I mentioned the word "Linux" and he acted like I have the plague and mumbled something about voiding my warranty and hung up as quick as possible. Is there some way to add additional IRQs to the listed items?

see my sig for my specs

Its pretty amazing how most don't want to support Linux. I even get bad support from RedHat Linux which I registered with, thats why I come here for support. I have been trying to get my sound to work so I downloaded the driver from RealTek. RHL support stated they cannot support the driver I downloaded, nice huh? Even tho the driver I downloaded is from the alsa-project.org site which RHL told me to use. Crazy?

Without their help I finally got my sound working. Then I get an email from RHL stating I needed to update the kernel to 2.4.18-27.8.0 so I do it and now no sound again. I get messages I have to configure the source kernal again. If I go back to the older kernel 2.4.18-26.8.0 the sound works. So now I'm really frustrated. Seems every thime I do an update I have to reconfigure the whole PC.

Can someone tell me if this seems right or am I missing something?

Thanks,
Larry

Yeah, no one (RHL etc) wants to support anything that they didn't write even if they recommended it. too much liability or something. I really like these boards too because for the most part, everyone is very helpful.

So any sugestions on what to do about updating the kernel and now no sound? Oh tell me this also: every time I update do I have to reload or compile drivers?

Yeah, you have to recompile alsa against your new kernel. The Redhat new patched kernel supports a root vulnerability, although its only local so only a local user can spawn a root process, still... its a bummer, and maybe someone can figure out how to casnargle Apache or something into spawning a nasty thread as root... so it was pretty important one... most of the rest of RH's updates are pretty trivial for the home user.

Cheers,

Finegan

Well I don't really like that I have to recompile every time there is a minor update to the kernel.

BTW: I could not recompile til I trashed the ALSA directory and unzip the directory again. Does this seem right? I did get the sound working again but I didn't like trashing the directory.

Also now my Grub Bootloader has all these other kernels on it why?

Thanks,
Larry

When RedHat ships a new kernel upgrade (which is rarely ever a kernel upgrade really, just different options applied to the same source tree.), in order to match alsa up with it, you have to recompile alsa as they're just another part of the kernel, they're modules...

Now, Alsa got added to the 2.5.x series kernel, so when someone releases on 2.6 this summer-ish, redhat will finally knuckle under and ship alsa.

When you upgrade your kernel, its good to keep the old one around if for some reason RH doinked up their "oh so generic" kernel and it horks on you. Heck, on my main workstation/toy I had 14 kernels before I zapped the crate last night.

Cheers,

Finegan

Well I don't really like all the extra kernels, but thats ok for now. I did get my sound working again afer recompiling, and still have that IRQ thing IEEE FireWire & Sound Card using the same IRQ (10). I only get minor freezing with KDE Desktop, NOT GNOME

Larry

Wait, it happens in one desktop, but not the other? Then its probably nothing having to do with the IRQ, but KDE doing something stupid. That's pretty common, for the longest time KDE's arts mixer made my sound card flake out every once in a while, took the longest time to track that one down... it could be something as simple as that... its not hanging the machine, so its getting logged:

dmesg
/var/log/messages

One of those may do it.

Cheers,

Finegan

Yes it does hang the PC. I have to reset it. Only in KDE though, not GNOME. LOL go figure?

Larry