----- Original Message -----
From: Mary Wolden <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, April 22, 2000 1:15 AM
Subject: Re: [PCBUILD] New system problems?


> Some motherboards allow you to assign IRQ's to the PCI slots so that
you can
> force some cards to share IRQ's by forcing the assignment in the BIOS
or by
> placement on the motherboard.  I checked the manual on your
motherboard and
> it did not have this functionality in the BIOS, nor could I find
information
> on which PCI slots share IRQ's.
>
The BIOS seems to have an option to set IRQs for each slot.  I tried
changing some of these at one time but it did not seem to have any
effect.  I must be missing something here.  The printed manual says that
slots 2 and 5 share an IRQ.  I have the NetGear NIC in slot 2 and slot
five is empty.

> You did not mention which OS you were using but Win95 would let you
reassign
> resources through "Device Manager" on some cards.  I have not found
this to
> be true with Win98 or Win98se.  When you try to reassign resources
through

I'm running Windows 98SE.
>
> From the manual I see that your motherboard does have a PS/2 mouse
port
> which is assigned to IRQ 12.  Since you are using a serial mouse, you
might
> check to see if you can disable the onboard PS/2 mouse port.

I looked for this option in the BIOS and in the manual but cannot find
anything about disabling the PS/2 mouse port.  I may change to a PS/2
mouse to free up an IRQ - I need one for the USB ports.
>
> The manual says that this motherboard comes with on board sound, did
you
> disable the "Onboard Sound chip" option in the BIOS?  This option is
enabled
> by default if your motherboard has the onboard sound.
>
This particular model has an optional sound chip.  Mine does not have
it.  There are no sound options available in the BIOS and the manual has
an addendum that says that none of the sound options applies to this
motherboard.  I does mention that the sound chip, if I had one, would
use IRQ12.

> > 1. When the NetGear card was first installed, it was assigned IRQ12.
> > The system would lock up on boot, just after the Windows startup
> > display.  The manual mentions that IRQ12 would be used by the
on-board
> > sound chipset if I had one and says that any driver installed on
this
> > IRQ must be "sharable".  I'm not sure what they mean by this.  I
finally
> > had to work around this problem by assigning IRQ12 to the ISA bus so
PNP
> > would not try to use it.

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