Anyone use an external soundcard for music?

anyone use a external soundcard for music here? I do to record and different things and am having problems with the sound to be distorted. I thought it was my soundcard but have found this Latency tester which I ran on the Gateway. Without anything connected to the laptop and no programs running this thing is jumping up into the read zone which means something on this laptop is causing issues! If anyone would please do a test on there laptop and let me know what kind of results they are getting i would be very apreciative. I am tring to find out if its just something with my particluar P-172s fx or maybe an issue with them all.

Link to the DPC Latency Checker: http://www.thesycon.de/eng/latency_check.shtml

Thesycon's DPC Latency Checker is a Windows tool that analyses the capabilities of a computer system to handle real-time data streams properly. It may help to find the cause for interruptions in real-time audio and video streams, also known as drop-outs. The program supports Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows XP x64, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2003 x64, Windows Vista, Windows Vista x64.

 

nobody use an external soundcard with laptop? I couldnt ever figure out what was causing the conflict within the P-172s fx. I tried disabling and re-enabling different devices but still no luck. For some reason something was causing a conflict that would cause audio dropouts on this gateway.

 

I just downloaded and ran dpc lat chkr and my 172s fx is in the green.

It says: This machine should be able to handle real-time streaming of audio and/ or video data without drop-outs.

 

man i wonder what is wrong with mine? i get very high peaks and it jumps way up in the red! did you update your nvidea driver? i have not and just found another post where someone else using a 8800 nvidea card is having the same issue

 

Yes I did update my drivers. I'm running 175.70's
http://downloads.guru3d.com/ForceWare-175.70-Vista-(32-bit)-download-1926.html

 

i am going to test that out this afternoon and see if that fixes the problem otherwise im going to have to return this one.

 

Maxprime, did you perform any tweaks on your laptop when you got it? I even went thru and reformatted the harddrive to a fresh install and still my DPC latency was steady in the yellow! I have already returned it for a refund but would like to know what was causing the problem because this laptop would have been perfect for my music video mixing.

 

I'm running a fresh install of Vista Ultimate x64 and 175.80 nVidia drivers (all other drivers are fully up to date) and it stays in the green.

 

I had to get another one and this one works fine until I use the graphics card and it seems it jumps inot the red instantly and when I am using an external soundcard this causes cracks and pops and the audio is terrible. Even when I disconected my soundcard the DPC Latency spikes were in yellow and red when the graphics card in use! Otherwise it remains in green.... anyone else having audio cracks and pops?

 

No, but I do get occasional yellow and red spikes. I will get 8 or 9 low 50's then two or three in the yellow with an occasional 2.1 red spike. Using 169.xx drivers.

I would do as others and experiment with drivers. Also I would find an XP user to try it as well.

 

thanks Hydra... It seems to work fine as long as you dont intend on using this thing with an external sound card or for music purposes. Hopefully either Nvdea will find a solution or gateway!

 

Could A IRQ conflict cause this? I noticed both the Video Card and the Firewire Soundcard I am using are on IRQ (16)

IRQ 0 System timer OK
IRQ 1 Standard PS/2 Keyboard OK
IRQ 8 System CMOS/real time clock OK
IRQ 10 Intel(R) ICH8 Family SMBus Controller - 283E OK
IRQ 12 Synaptics PS/2 Port TouchPad OK
IRQ 13 Numeric data processor OK
IRQ 14 ATA Channel 0 OK
IRQ 15 ATA Channel 1 OK

IRQ 16 Mobile Intel(R) PM965/GM965/GL960 Express PCI Express Root Port - 2A01 OK
IRQ 16 NVIDIA GeForce 8800M GTS OK
IRQ 16 Intel(R) ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2834 OK
IRQ 16 Intel(R) ICH8 Family PCI Express Root Port 1 - 283F OK
IRQ 16 Intel(R) ICH8 Family PCI Express Root Port 5 - 2847 OK
IRQ 16 AGERE OHCI Compliant IEEE 1394 Host Controller OK

IRQ 17 Intel(R) ICH8 Family PCI Express Root Port 2 - 2841 OK
IRQ 17 Silicon Image SiI 3531 SATA Controller OK
IRQ 18 Intel(R) ICH8 Family USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 283A OK
IRQ 18 Intel(R) ICH8 Family PCI Express Root Port 3 - 2843 OK
IRQ 18 Realtek RTL8168B/8111B Family PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet NIC (NDIS 6.0) OK
IRQ 18 Intel(R) ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2832 OK
IRQ 18 Intel(R) ICH8M 3 port Serial ATA Storage Controller - 2828 OK
IRQ 19 Intel(R) ICH8 Family PCI Express Root Port 4 - 2845 OK
IRQ 19 Intel(R) ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2831 OK
IRQ 21 Intel(R) ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2835 OK
IRQ 22 High Definition Audio Controller OK
IRQ 23 Intel(R) ICH8 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2830 OK
IRQ 23 Intel(R) ICH8 Family USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 2836 OK

 

It's common to share an interrupt request..and you have the OK.

How many processes do you have running and are you running at max power/performance settings? FWIW I have 57 processes running

Who said vista is a resource hog?

You need to get Maxprime1 on this. you know which video driver he's using so if he's in the green, it's a process of elimination.

BTW I hooked up my old $25 SB-USB external. At least I have SPDIF and optical working in Vista; sounds clean with no clicks or pops. I'm running it to my old Onkyo with Sub and ancient AR2-ax. This thing rocks in my small lair!

 

hydra your a big help! I have 35 processes and have dissabled a few unneeded processes and hardware items to try to get this thing bare as possible! I am a dj and tring to use VirtualDJ to mix music videos. I have my turntables hooked up to my soundcard (edirol fa 66) and my soundcard ran into my firewire port of the computer! this setup works great on my toshiba for audio only want cut it for video. I was hoping with this nice video card this computer would perform well. It seems when I just use mp3's the sound is pretty descent but when I hook up an external screen to display just the music videos and load up the videos is when I experience problems. The DPC Latency goes up into yellow and sometimes red and my sound becomes distorted. I have tried this without my sound card hooked up and it seems the spikes are there but thru the small speakers on the laptop I hear no distortion. I just cant figure out if its the video driver I am using or if its a conflict with my soundcard! I am using vista 64 bit and my soundcard does have a 64 bit driver!

 

I fail to see how a powerful GPU is going to help you. AFAIK most of your music programs use 2D graphics? I would think you would be better off with a strong CPU.

You might search here to see if Vista could be your problem; http://www.soundonsound.com/forum/postlist.php?Board=PCMus

 

I have asked there as well! it seems there are so many possibilities its endless! I found this on another site think it might be worth looking into? is this something possible i could do with the P-6860? I dont know much about the inner workings:


The moderator (Martin Walker) at SOS Forums had started a discussion on DPC latency results here:
http://www.soundonsound.com/forum/showf … 1&vc=1
He suggested that some current motherboards want the OS to be on a SATA drive. I was using IDE/ATA drives.

In recent weeks, I have likely tried every DAW optimization commonly known and recommended. With so far no solution for the DPC latency spikes. (Still a 312,000 one this morning)

This evening, I put a SATA-IDE adapter on my primary IDE OS drive and hooked it up via SATA. Made the change in the BIOS to make it the primary boot drive, and voila: a WORKING MACHINE!!!

I tested DPAlat: humming along at 5-6 microseconds. 30-120 with programs running. No spikes!!!
I tested Windows Media Player, iTunes, and Samplitude: No audio glitches, no stuttering, no Fireface errors, no lost Asio buffers -- just clean music!

 

There you go, it seems that making music is not on most laptop makers mind. I know the mac laptops were good pre Intel, today, I would have do as you and ask around. If you get lucky let us know!

 

I am sorry Hydra I may have miss guided you! I found that statement of someone elses solution to a similar problem:

The moderator (Martin Walker) at SOS Forums had started a discussion on DPC latency results here:
http://www.soundonsound.com/forum/showf … 1&vc=1
He suggested that some current motherboards want the OS to be on a SATA drive. I was using IDE/ATA drives.

In recent weeks, I have likely tried every DAW optimization commonly known and recommended. With so far no solution for the DPC latency spikes. (Still a 312,000 one this morning)

This evening, I put a SATA-IDE adapter on my primary IDE OS drive and hooked it up via SATA. Made the change in the BIOS to make it the primary boot drive, and voila: a WORKING MACHINE!!!

I tested DPAlat: humming along at 5-6 microseconds. 30-120 with programs running. No spikes!!!
I tested Windows Media Player, iTunes, and Samplitude: No audio glitches, no stuttering, no Fireface errors, no lost Asio buffers -- just clean music!

I was wondering could this be causing my problems and how would I go about doing the same thing this person did on my gateway? Is it possible?

 

Kev, sorry I don't have a clue. I would make up your driver disks and be ready to restore if you experiment.

Have you posted your problem on the SOS boards? Someone may have some ideas for you. You also have the option to do an XP install, you if follow the links in this forum, to rule out a Vista problem.