Seagate Cheetah 36LP 15K and SB Audigy 2

[andrey]

Not really sure if that's suppose to be that way, but here is what happens.

I have Seagate Cheetah 36LP 15 SCSI Hard Drive, which spins at 15,000 rpm and Wester Digital 120GB SE, which is 7200 rpm. In the same machine, I have Creative Sound Blaster Audigy 2 with Creative Cambridge FP2000 speakers. Everything works great except one thing. Whenever my Seagate hard drive spins copying files or doing some other hard drive intensive activities, I get a lot of static out of my speakers. While WD hard drives works, there are no problems at all. Both hard drives are close to each other and I don't really have any audio or speaker wires next to them.

Could that be due to 15,000 rpm speed or is there is anything special about Seagate Cheetah that I should be awere of?

Thanks,
--Andrey

 

[Pariah]

Move the audigy to another slot, the SCSI card and Audigy are probably sharing resources. I had the same problem that SCSI drive accesses caused static, but moving the card fixed the problem.

 

[WebDude]

andrey,
I don't think there's anything inherent in the Seagate that would cause the noise. There must be something peculiar going on with your Cheetah, I would guess, or maybe your audigy card is not right in some way. I say this because I have an x15 36lp running in my system, about 6 inches away from my Audigy 2, and I have no noise problem whatsoever. My adaptec 29160 scsi card (with the lvd cable connection) is in the slot next to the audigy too. Wished I could help more in the trouble shooting, but don't have any clues to give you.

WebDude

 

[andrey]

Originally posted by: Pariah
Move the audigy to another slot, the SCSI card and Audigy are probably sharing resources. I had the same problem that SCSI drive accesses caused static, but moving the card fixed the problem.

It appears that moving Audigy 2 to the different PCI slot solved the problem, although even in my original configuration Adaptec 39160 and SB Audigy 2 were not sharing the same IRQ by using 18,19 and 20 IRQs respectively. Right now Adaptec 39160 is still on the same IRQs, but Audigy 2 is on 23. Gotta love the amount of IRQs I can have in Windows XP

Thanks again Pariah,

--Andrey

 

[IgoByte]

I have two X15-36LP drives and an Audigy[1], and my case [PC 70] is pretty tightly packed around the PCI compartment, because I have an Audigy Platinum eX mounted internally and the fat cables run through the case. I think that if this were supposed to happen, I'd likely be affected by it, but I'm not. I can hear some static coming out of my 5.1 Klipsch speakers when I use the paper shredder, but that's about it.

Which case are you using, what kind of PSU and have you tried moving the Audigy?

EDIT: Sorry, didn't notice your last post.

 

[Bovinicus]

To avoid problems like this in the future, you might want to tweak your BIOS a little. Disable all devices you are not using: Onboard sound/LAN, COM ports, Serial ports, MIDI ports, etc. These can take up resources, and could potentially, though not probably, cause problems.

 

[andrey]

Originally posted by: IgoByte
I have two X15-36LP drives and an Audigy[1], and my case [PC 70] is pretty tightly packed around the PCI compartment, because I have an Audigy Platinum eX mounted internally and the fat cables run through the case. I think that if this were supposed to happen, I'd likely be affected by it, but I'm not. I can hear some static coming out of my 5.1 Klipsch speakers when I use the paper shredder, but that's about it.

Which case are you using, what kind of PSU and have you tried moving the Audigy?

EDIT: Sorry, didn't notice your last post.

Before upgrading to Audigy 2 I had regular Audigy [1] and I haven't experienced the static. Right now I set-up my cards in the following order and everythings seems to be working okay:

AGP_1: Visiontek GeForce Ti4600
PCI_1: <empty>
PCI_2: <empty>
PCI_3: SB Audigy 2
PCI_4: Lucent WinModem
PCI_5: Intel Pro/100+ Management NIC
PCI_6: Adaptec 39160 SCSI Card

The interesting thing is that static was coming out out of speakers only when hard drive was spinning, but when CD-ROM or CD-RW, which are connected to the same SCSI card, were reading the disk, everything was okay.

--Andrey

 

[andrey]

Originally posted by: Bovinicus
To avoid problems like this in the future, you might want to tweak your BIOS a little. Disable all devices you are not using: Onboard sound/LAN, COM ports, Serial ports, MIDI ports, etc. These can take up resources, and could potentially, though not probably, cause problems.

Thanks! That actually was the first thing I've done, since when I have SB Audigy 2 there is no need for me to use onboard audio

 

[pillage2001]

Originally posted by: andrey

Originally posted by: Bovinicus
To avoid problems like this in the future, you might want to tweak your BIOS a little. Disable all devices you are not using: Onboard sound/LAN, COM ports, Serial ports, MIDI ports, etc. These can take up resources, and could potentially, though not probably, cause problems.

Thanks! That actually was the first thing I've done, since when I have SB Audigy 2 there is no need for me to use onboard audio

How do you like the audigy 2??

 

[andrey]

Originally posted by: pillage2001

How do you like the audigy 2??

I love it, Audigy 2 is an awesome sound card and definitely worth every penny!

 

[chas40]

I just bought the audigy2 sunday . the sound card works great , but where do you find a 4 conducter 1/8 th inch Jack to connect to the analog line out 3 so you can output center ,sub ,rear center? I went to bestbuy monday to see if get this cable but no luck. The saleman let me open a new set of creative 6.1 6600 speakers. The cable was in there.Where can find one?

 

[Pariah]

The cables are commonly bundled with camcorders, so try a local camera shop.