Long term IRQ solutions (discussion)

Dameon

Banned
Oct 11, 1999
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OK, as a tech support rep and techhead, I am personally sick and tired of this IRQ hellhole that is the current state of PC architecture. Is it just me, or did PCI IRQ sharing just make this whole thing even move of a mess than it already was? Now we have crap like the ATI TV Wonder that insists on having an IRQ all to itself, just like Adaptec SCSI cards which tend to hog IRQs. Not to mention although most NIC's can share correctly, their performance is often degraded in the process. Over and over again I see people wanting a 2nd parallel port or whatever and getting into IRQ hell. USB only helps with external devices, and who wants to have to put their CD Writer externally on USB because the SCSI card can't find an IRQ?

Why can't we insist on a new architecture or a manner of adding another 10 IRQ's or so?
 

backWERD

Senior member
Nov 20, 2000
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IRQ's suck

On my board I cant seem to get my MODEM and onboard soundcard to not share an irq with each other I can disable everything serial vga/irq parrallel usb. take out my szci and still the modem and the onboard sound card share that irq. its ok till i try to get online and then as soon a sound comes out of my sound card the system kinda shakes and the sound echoes for a few seconds and the phone line goes dead.
 

Slacker

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 1999
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Why can't we insist on a new architecture or a manner of adding another 10 IRQ's or so?

We will be rid of irq's soon enough, when we move away from the x86 architecture, 'till then we will have to juggle, adding more irq's, if it is even possible, would add latency.
 

Dameon

Banned
Oct 11, 1999
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Realistically, when are we going to get away from the X86 architecture?

Seems like Intel and AMD keep finding new ways to breathe life into the old dog. The problem is that the only competition RISC is in serious need of help, and can't seem to get the Mhz necessary to get things going...
 

Slacker

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 1999
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There are ways to deal with the irq shortage, I use lots of usb stuff, I have no sound card, instead I have the MS DSS80 usb sound system and usb game controllers, mouse, keyboard, wintv, scanner,

also I am using win2k which does a fine job with the irq sharing, this is my irq set in win2k,

IRQ Number Device
5 NVIDIA GeForce2 GTS/GeForce2 Pro
11 D-Link DFE-530TX PCI Fast Ethernet Adapter
11 Intel(R) 82801BA/BAM USB Universal Host Controller - 2442
10 Network Everywhere Fast Ethernet Adapter(NC100 v2)
10 Intel(R) 82801BA/BAM SMBus Controller - 2443
14 Primary IDE Channel
15 Secondary IDE Channel
3 Intel(R) 82801BA/BAM USB Universal Host Controller - 2444
1 PC/AT PS/2 Keyboard (84-Key)
4 Communications Port (COM1)
6 Standard floppy disk controller
8 System CMOS/real time clock
13 Numeric data processor
12 Standard PS/2 Port Mouse
 

miniMUNCH

Diamond Member
Nov 16, 2000
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RISC is not in need of help, it's in need of software support. Look at the stats of how many copies of NT PRO/Engineer sell compared to copies of UNIX PRO/Engineer...why?...because RISC processor systems still stomp the crap out of CISC architectures like x86.

Megahertz is for advertising...

If all of the UNIX developers (IBM, AT&T, DEC, etc.) would've got together in the early 1980's and standardized UNIX as one platform, MICROSOFT would not exist today and we'd all be typing at our RISC processor computers.

The problem is software support...where can you buy Office2000 for AIX or Solaris for $300? If the cheap software solutions would have been there from the beginning, DOS, let alone windows, would've been pointless.

The same argument applies to RISC system pricing...standardization leads to economy of scale...ie: a nice SGI R10000 station would cost about $2,000 instead of $10,000 or $15,000.
 

Shukaido

Member
May 15, 2000
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<<
Why can't we insist on a new architecture or a manner of adding another 10 IRQ's or so?
>>





<<
We will be rid of irq's soon enough, when we move away from the x86 architecture, 'till then we will have to juggle, adding more irq's, if it is even possible, would add latency.
>>



We will never &quot;be rid&quot; of IRQ's. Hardware interrupts are a feature of every chip architecture around, including any architecture that could replace the x86. MIPS? It's got hardware interrupts. Alpha? Yup. PowerPC? You bet. IA64? Of course.

We are not moving away from the x86 architecture, at least not in the next 5 years, probably not in the next 10. Compatibility is too important to most PC owners. While binary emulation could help ease the transition for business users whose applications can afford to give up 75-80% of their CPU cycles, game players (who, ironically would stand to benefit the most from a new architecture) would never tolerate the loss of CPU cycles.

I know the x86 opcode map like the back of my hand, and believe me, I'm not any happier with the x86 than you are. Still, alternative architectures would have to outperform x86 machines by a really wide margin for a switch to happen, and that won't happen in the next 5 years.

Adding more IRQ's would mean adding more lines to the peripheral bus. Every IRQ needs its own signal wire, although I think the PCI bus uses a multiplexing scheme to reduce the number of wires on the actual bus connector. It would be difficult, to have an arbitrary number of IRQs.

What we need are PCI and USB peripherals that weren't designed inconsiderate idiots. Just why does the SB Live behave badly in some people's machines when forced to share IRQ's? Because no one has held them to account for it.

This is actually where review sites like Anand's could could make a real difference. Punish vendors like ATI and Creative in reviews for producing unruly peripherals. Or maybe compile a list of peripherals that are known to behave badly.
 

miniMUNCH

Diamond Member
Nov 16, 2000
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Shukaido:

I wasn't even going to go there about every architecture having IRQ's channels...:D

But since you breached the topic...EVERYBODY who wants an intro to IRQ's read this at pcguide.com.