Pulsar 2 Hardware Problem???

buddhaboy · Post by **buddhaboy** » Mon Jul 26, 2004 6:39 pm

I have been having a recurrent, albeit sporadic problem with my Pulsar 2 card losing it's "Connection" with Windows 2000 and basically everything else. The main symptom is that the DSP meter jumps from 0 to 100, the task manager processes for SFP.exe reflect the same jump in system resource usage. The problem comes and goes, not always corrected by a restart. I have just reinstalled W2K (standard PC mode), disabled ACPI, made sure I have no IRQ conflicts/sharing with Pulsar, enabled PCI DMA, made sure I had the latest BIOS version and switched the Pulsar PCI slot location, all without correction of the problem. I did note however, that in my BIOS, PCI slot #5 was greyed out (did not allow IRQ selection). My Device manager was also reporting an unknown PCI device in slot #0 (which has nothing in it!) that I disabled. My System Stats:
Intel D815EEA Motherboard
Intel 933Mhz Processor
512MB RAM
60 Gig Harddrive x2
Matrox Dual Head 32MB AGPx4 Video
Network adapter PCI slot 2
Pulsar 2 Plus PCI slot 3
Adaptec SCSI 29160 Ultra160 PCI slot 4
Windows 2000 all Critcal updates performed
Scope Fusion 4.0
Nuendo 1.5
Reason 1.0

Please any suggestions are welcome!

Namaste!

alfonso · Post by **alfonso** » Mon Jul 26, 2004 6:49 pm

I don't know your Mobo, but something that I can remember well is that my first system with pulsar had scsi controller in the pc bus and it was unstable as hell for that reason, crashes, loss of connection etc.

Currently I have an 815e chipset (815 family like yours) only ultra ata 100 disks and its super stable with 3 cards.

Eon · Post by **Eon** » Tue Jul 27, 2004 3:02 am

Try to clean PCI slot with vacuumcleaner. I am doing this every month cause of dust which make problems with connections. Also clean pulsars pci part, the part which is going into the pci slot.

Counterparts · Post by **Counterparts** » Tue Jul 27, 2004 4:16 am

Sounds like a poor PCI slot connection to me too. After cleaning the contacts as Eon suggested, ensure that the card is properly seated in the slot.

Welcome, by the way!

Royston

Stige · Post by **Stige** » Tue Jul 27, 2004 5:53 am

There has been losts of talk about not to use vacuum cleaner for cleaning computers. They might produce lots of static electricity. I'd suggest using pressured air in a 'spray' bottle.

oxygenial · Post by **oxygenial** » Tue Jul 27, 2004 6:53 am

On 2004-07-27 06:53, Stige wrote:
There has been losts of talk about not to use vacuum cleaner for cleaning computers. They might produce lots of static electricity. I'd suggest using pressured air in a 'spray' bottle.

Not if the tip of the vacuum cleaner is plastic! which ofcourse should be the case!
But if you have compressed air, it's absolutely ok to use. Though you tend to get the dust stuck more often

astroman · Post by **astroman** » Tue Jul 27, 2004 7:11 am

absolutely right !
the airflow of a vacuum with plastic tip generates several 10kV of static electricity which will unload on the circuit boards.
Keep in mind that each 10KV 'jumps' to ground over a distance of about 10 mm through the air.
You don't even have to touch parts to damage them - and those damages are the most annoying because the parts usually don't fail completely, but just from time to time.

Unless the computer is in a high moisture environment, dust isn't a problem at all.
In all my service years I never had a failure due to dust.

Imho most of the reported contact problems here are due to corrosion of connectors, typically at closed to sea locations.
Simplyfied manufacturers try to cut downs costs by using less gold plating.

cheers, Tom

Eon · Post by **Eon** » Tue Jul 27, 2004 9:20 am

I think not cause I have been user of vacuum cleaner for a years and do not have any problems with static electricity.

Interesting that some parts close to the sea have the problems with soil in the air

blazesboylan · Post by **blazesboylan** » Tue Jul 27, 2004 11:18 am

Also I'm not sure what the point of an air spray bottle by itself is... Poof, the dust goes up -- the dust settles down again.

Spray bottle with vacuum cleaner (not touching circuit boards, just ready to suck the dust out of the air) sounds like the best option to me...

BingoTheClowno · Post by **BingoTheClowno** » Tue Jul 27, 2004 11:33 am

Sometimes the computer case is badly manufactured or the mobo is not correctly aligned with the PCI cutouts. When screwing a PCI board to the case in those cases, it might pull it partially out of the PCI slot.

astroman · Post by **astroman** » Tue Jul 27, 2004 4:38 pm

On 2004-07-27 10:20, Eon wrote:
...Interesting that some parts close to the sea have the problems with soil in the air
...

yeah, in this case it's just interesting (and possibly annoying), but sometimes your life may depend on it

I know it from the protection rules for sports climbing routes on rocks close to the sea.
There's a common agreement to apply only inox type safety bolts today. Regular steel bolts aren't considered reliable after a couple of years in that climate.
And that stuff has 8-12mm in diameter

The effect of static electricity is of course depending on the material of the hose.
Metal doesn't react (for obvious reasons), but PE and PVC (very common) develope heavy loads.
Some synthtic materials (like 'Bakelit') are also safe.
If the tip of the hose reacts 'magnetic' to hair or fur, then static electricity is present.

cheers, Tom

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: astroman on 2004-07-27 17:39 ]</font>

Eon · Post by **Eon** » Tue Jul 27, 2004 4:51 pm

yeah my girlfriend is always static electric hair opsessed

I do not know about putting anything fluid in comp. or PCI, it can harm your comp forever.
Some guys said to use spray or something, hmmmm isnt that destroyable??

blazesboylan · Post by **blazesboylan** » Tue Jul 27, 2004 7:26 pm

"Spray cans" = pressurized air, bought at computer stores...

Shayne White · Post by **Shayne White** » Tue Jul 27, 2004 7:29 pm

If you have some pure alcohol you can try cleaning the contact edges of your Scope card with the alcohol and a Q-tip; if that doesn't work, you either have a weird motherboard or a broken card (the latter is what happened to me recently).

Shayne

Eon · Post by **Eon** » Wed Jul 28, 2004 4:02 am

On 2004-07-27 20:26, blazesboylan wrote:
"Spray cans" = pressurized air, bought at computer stores...

Didnt understand, ok with pressure air.

Yo have to watch with alcohol, it is a fluid so be careful

Post by **garyb** » Wed Jul 28, 2004 1:13 pm

actually, pure h2O even will cause no problem if the computer is immersed in it as long as the computer dried completely before plugging it back in.....

99% or purer alchohol and many other solvents such as hexane are safe if you just let them evaporate as they do that quickly and completely. just be sure the computer is disconnected from power.

blazesboylan · Post by **blazesboylan** » Wed Jul 28, 2004 1:39 pm

I don't know about "pure H20", but water certainly causes corrosion. I wish I had a photo of the ADSL filter I fried while watering plants. The connector was green! The telephone company repair guy laughed at me... *Sigh*.