WINXP BSOD (damn IRQs)

[ZaijiaN]

The system:
Asus M6BNe laptop shell w/ radeon 9700, gigabit ethernet
1.6Ghz Pentium-M Dothan
512mb ram
60gb hd
intel pro wireless 2200 802.11 b/g mini-pci card



So I'm using Eudora 6.1, and every time I try to send an email, I get this error:

IRQL_NOT_LESS_THAN_OR_EQUAL

After doing some research, I found that it's probably because of an IRQ conflict between my wireless card and something else - and there's a buttload of devices sharing IRQ 11:

Radeon Mobility 9700
Intel USB Controller
Broadcom gigabit ethernet
Ricoh CardBus Controller
Intel Pro 80211b/g
SigmaTel C-Major audio

So I decided to do a little test:
I was having the BSOD whenever I tried sending email from Eudora while using the wireless ethernet connection. I had already tried different versions of Eudora to no avail. So, I plugged directly into the network using an RJ-45 cable and disabled the wireless. Viola! Sending email works fine. So I'm going to guess it's a conflict between the two network connections (wired and wireless) that's causing that BSOD.

So here's the question:

Is there any way, besides changing the winxp acpi driver to get the wireless card on it's own IRQ?

 

[Fencer128]

Hi,

Just a quick point - I'm sure you've already done this - but if not, make sure to have updated all drivers with the latest versions you can get hold of. This is often a driver issue.

Good luck,

Andy

 

[Calin]

If the wireless card is on a PCI slot, moving it on another PCI slot might help
I know there were some mainboards that had fixed IRQ allocation depending on the PCI card on which the card was installed

Calin

 

[MrChad]

IRQ conflicts are extremely rare in this day and age. Windows XP along with any modern motherboard with ACPI will automatically share the same IRQ among multiple PCI devices. This is well within the PCI spec and should not cause any problems (let alone BSODs). Text

My bet is that a driver is misbehaving on your system. Do you have the latest driver updates for everything on your system?

 

[dclive]

Originally posted by: ZaijiaN
The system:
Asus M6BNe laptop shell w/ radeon 9700, gigabit ethernet
1.6Ghz Pentium-M Dothan
512mb ram
60gb hd
intel pro wireless 2200 802.11 b/g mini-pci card



So I'm using Eudora 6.1, and every time I try to send an email, I get this error:

IRQL_NOT_LESS_THAN_OR_EQUAL

After doing some research, I found that it's probably because of an IRQ conflict between my wireless card and something else - and there's a buttload of devices sharing IRQ 11:

Radeon Mobility 9700
Intel USB Controller
Broadcom gigabit ethernet
Ricoh CardBus Controller
Intel Pro 80211b/g
SigmaTel C-Major audio

So I decided to do a little test:
I was having the BSOD whenever I tried sending email from Eudora while using the wireless ethernet connection. I had already tried different versions of Eudora to no avail. So, I plugged directly into the network using an RJ-45 cable and disabled the wireless. Viola! Sending email works fine. So I'm going to guess it's a conflict between the two network connections (wired and wireless) that's causing that BSOD.

So here's the question:

Is there any way, besides changing the winxp acpi driver to get the wireless card on it's own IRQ?

I agree this is probably a driver. IRQ issues are a nonissue with an ACPI OS and ACPI motherboard, and it's difficult to impossible to find a system today that isn't ACPI compliant.

Please read over the URL in my .sig, and then if it's not resolved by following those directions, send me the MPS Reports and any dump files you get *after* you've updated all the drivers, and I'll tell you what I find.

 

[Smilin]

Having multiple devices sharing IRQ 11 is perfectly normal. Under ACPI it really doesn't matter much at all. Interrupts are now packet based communication and no longer tied to one-wire-per-interrupt going into the cpu. The old school (ISA) way of thinking about interrupt conflicts is obsolete.

Also, IRQL has nothing to do with IRQs. Completely different concept, they just happen to share the same three first letters in their acronym. IRQL has to do with what priority software (and hardware) interrupts are handled in the OS.

Do what dclive said. He'll hook you up No cheating and leaning on him before your drivers are updated though

 

[ZaijiaN]

I thought I had the problem licked for awhile, after I fiddled with a few options in Eudora - all was well for about a day, however, as the BSOD again reared its ugly head and defied my attempts at working around it.

I have the latest drivers for all my hardware, and software, with the exception of SP2. I'm still a little hesitant to try it out, I'll wait a few more weeks for all the kinks to get fixed.

dclive, I will be mailing you my dump files shortly!

 

[dclive]

How do you like the Asus laptop (other than this, naturally)? How large is it compared to, say, an Acer 2012WLMi or the Sony V505-series?

 

[ZaijiaN]

Well, I think I managed to solve it.

Once I turned off automatic restart, I could read what the blue screen was saying (duh).

Did some googling, after finding out which exact wireless driver was causing the problem - and I found a beta update to that driver, which seems to have solved the problem! Let's hear it for betas.


As far as the laptop goes, I haven't really done a side-by-side comparison of it with the acers or the sony. I just saw the pics and the specs and decided to try it out. I'm pretty impressed with it. I was considering getting a 14" dell inspiron 600m, because of the light weight, but I figured for 1 lb more, 15.4" widescreen, and the chance to put a laptop together myself, was well worth it. It only cost me $150 more, but I managed to get a much better CPU, screen, memory, hard drive, and video card for that price.

The asus comes with good hardware buttons, as well as very good power-throttling modes. I could probably run for about 5 hrs on the battery-saving mode, then throttle up to slightly overclocked when plugged into the wall.

The only knock I have against it is that the case feels somewhat flimsy, being all plastic. I would have preferred something that felt a little more solid, but I suppose for 6.5 lbs it's not bad at all

And I can play Doom 3 on it! So i'm pretty happy.

 

[dclive]

Cool; glad you found it. SO many issues are drivers - I try to make it clear in that URL how important it is to update all your drivers when you have problems.

Back to laptops - I wish there was a site with good notebook reviews, or more reviews available. I wish there were third parties (ie not notebookreviews, cnet, pcmagazine, etc) that did reviews - like if Anandtech did a review of 15 different notebooks in the 4.5 -> 7.0 pound range, I'd like that a lot. I just feel like there's very little comparison review data out there.

 

[ZaijiaN]

I did all my research at http://www.notebookforums.com/ - they pointed me in all the right directions.