Asus K7M dma problem

System configuration:

Athlon 600
Asus K7M
256 meg ram
64 meg G-Force 2 MX 400 (41.09 Nvidia drivers)
80 gig seagate barracuda IV
Soundblaster Live 5.1DE
Liteon 40x12x48 CD burner
Win98se

Problem - Can't enable DMA on hardrive without problems

First some background. I use to use a 20 gig IBM deskstar with 98se and had no DMA issues. Early last year I gave the IBM 20 gig hardrive to my dad and got myself a 60 gig IBM deskstar GXP and installed XP on it and had no DMA related problems. But with XP having some crashing issues, I decided to go back to good ol 98se. But damn...

Enter problem-

One of the first things I did upon installing win98se on my IBM 60 gig was to install the latest VIA 4in1 drivers, this was about 7 months ago. Upon rebooting I noticed that in device manager yellow question marks had been placed next to all of my IDE controllers; Primary IDE controller (dual fifo), Secondary IDE controller (dual fifo) and VIA bus master PCI IDE Controller. Can't remember clearly if the 4in1's added another IDE controller or alike in there under hardisks. Under the peformance tab in system properties it said that "One or more of the hard disks in your computer is using MS-DOS Compatibility mode" and "Compatibilty Mode Paging reduces overall system performance". I installed some older 4in1 drivers but still had the same problem.

I eventially discovered that disabling DMA on my harddrive would remove the yellow question marks in device manager and also the MS-DOS compatibilty mode warnings under the performance tab. However without DMA gaming performance suffered considerably and I imagine general system responsivness is not as good as it could be. So I decided to try the original IDE hardware drivers that came with my K7M motherboard on a CD. Installing the Via bus master IDE drivers 2.1.43 caused my computer to hang after the windows splash screen with some sort of short error. Now I can't remember clearly if I weant into safe mode and removed the driver or was forced to format the drive and re-install 98se, sorry. I have just checked the Asus site for the latest AMD Bus Master IDE Driver and the version available for download is "AMD Bus Master IDE Driver v1.40C for Win 98/ME". However I think I have already tried this driver and may have experienced a similar problem after installation and restart. I decided to install the latest 4in1's again and just turn DMA off and continue using the computer albiet with much less gaming. But overall there didn't appear to be any problems other than the obvious performance loss of no DMA.

Some information I got from a Microsoft Windows 98 trouble shooter regarding MS-DOS Compatibilty mode stated:-

<i>If the hard disk controller is listed in Device Manager but has a yellow exclamation point over it, there is an IRQ, I/O, DMA, or RAM address conflict with another device, the protected-mode driver is absent or damaged, or the "Disable all 32-bit protected-mode disk drivers" check box is selected in File System properties.</i>

About a month ago my IBM Deathstar finally carked it and so I went out and bought the 80 gig Seagate baracuda IV (expecting the DMA problem to remain) which I am currently using. I installed Win98se on it and decided to check dma on my hardrive before installing any drivers for my hardware. Unfortantly my computer wouldn't seem to load windows as I think it was stuck on or before the splash screen with an IDE booting related message. I went into safe mode and stupidly deleted the hardrive thinking that it would go back into windows and redetect it but what I think I should have done was delete the Bus master driver and then let windows redetect that but anyways I formatted and re-installed windows and have refrained from installing any drivers other than my video card drivers from Nvida (latest denators) and direct X8. I have the latest bios update for my K7M and I have my Seagate drive as Primary Master using a IDE cable with blue plug ends. This cable came with my motherboard all those years ago. I think it's an ATA/66 (80pin?) IDE cable. My burner runs as Secondary Master and is connected to the motherboard via a plane grey IDE cable which I guessing would be an ATA/33 80 pin cable. I can enable DMA on my burner with no dramas and have checked in device manager to ensure it has remained checked. My bios seemed to detect my IBM 60 gig GXP alright but with my seagate I have to just set it to Auto in the bios because the detect harddrives option hangs my bios when I press enter on it.

I recetly was enlightened by the VIA driver page that standard VIA 4in1 packages are not recommended for hybrid chipsets such as mine which has an AMD northbridge and VIA southbridge. I found another thread by someone with the same motherboard wondering what drivers to install and read some replies but would like some further advice or information please because I would like to install the correct parts of the 4in1 package and then the relevant Asus drivers. The DMA problem has complicated matters (although may explain some) as I need to find the drivers that will also allow DMA to be succesfully enabled. I am guessing it is a driver problem. The Via 4in1 version 4.28 drivers are the most recent listing on the Asus driver page for my motherboard so perhaps I will try them later to see if they don't have the problem that perhaps some later drivers do with my system. However it's possible I tried these originally when the DMA problem croped up last year, but I'll wait for some input here before taking that chance.

That's about as much relevant information I can give you regarding my problem. I must appologise for the uncertainty of some of my claims, alot of the experience took place mid 2002 and so I've been working at the problem ON and OFF and also for any incoherrency or ramblings. I really will appreciate any and all help I receive as the problem has put a big dent in my PC gaming and I would love to be able to get back respectable frame rates and hence playability with alot of my games. Please stick around to help me through this problem, It could be a long haul of experimentation and research of which I'm gunna need your assistance! I just hope their is a viable solution at hand otherwise I'll probarly have to get my old ATA 33 (I think) 20 gig IBM off my dad and stick it back in here and use it as a games drive. Btw the Asus site like many other corporate sites (as you probarly know) isn't that great when It comes to helping the customer through information on it's site. It's descriptions of drivers often just repeat the freaken name of the driver!

Obviously I'll report any findings.

Cheers.

I originally posted this thread at the VIA forums last night but would like to get some further feedback from people around here.





Technology comes in 3 sizes - small, medium and RETRO!