VIA chipset & capturing

[DaveQB]

just coz we could narrow down if its just the sound card/s or the capture card

but if it does it both ways then thats not it

[blinky]

The PCTV Rave doesn't have an audio input only an audio out. I was capturing from a Sony Video8 camcorder using the Composite input and Line input of the onboard sound.

Done both MPEG 1 and 2 without any dropped frames.

[Fozzee]

is this plugging the source directly into the Line IN or plugging source audio into Capture Card and then using the loopback plug to plug into the Line IN ??

This would make no difference whether u line-in to the sound card direct or via the loop the end result is.....

LINE-IN -----> SOUNDCARD

Right I may have got further with this issue.
If I record just through line-in with creative sound recorder the sound is fine.
It is only when doing capturing that the recorded sound is crackley.

I ran some tests at lower than usual capture rates (eg mpeg1).
The sound was much better.

In my old sysytem I had 512mb SDRam.
At present I only have 256 PC2100.
I plan to upgrade anyhow but...............

COULD EXTRA MEMORY IMPROVE MY AUDIO CAPTURE???

If yes I assume this is because it would improve my captures generally?
E.g the combined capture result would be better.
I haven't expressed myself well. I hope someone understands what I mean.

Cheers

Fozzee

[crahak]

It just sounds to me like a PCI latency problem that you only get in capturing mode (when it's hard on the system). Plugging in other ways, memory or those things won't fix the problem. I fixed mine: I got a SiS based board... (for about the price of a stick of ram anyways) and it's so much better than the VIA board... No matter what, I just don't think your board will really do fine

Oh, one of the VERY few things that MIGHT help very slightly, is playing the old card slot swapping game (to change their IRQ's). You will need a lot of patience and luck, and again, that alone will only do so much.

[Fozzee]

Tried all the solutions I've seen.....

PCI Latency patch..
Changing IRQs etc etc

any danger a different brand soundcard might solve the problem??A
Creative and Via just don't mix

Fozz

[DaveQB]

is this plugging the source directly into the Line IN or plugging source audio into Capture Card and then using the loopback plug to plug into the Line IN ??

This would make no difference whether u line-in to the sound card direct or via the loop the end result is.....

no, if connecting directly to your sound cards Line IN and its fine, but plugging into the capture card and THEN into your sound card brings back the crackling, well you figure it out...

only trying to help mate

[Fozzee]

Oh

See what you mean.
I thought you meant they would record by different methods.

No the problem is the same both ways.

Thnx anyway

Fozzee

[blinky]

Even if IRQ's are not shared some PCI slots and the AGP slots are effectively shared because there are only 4 interrupt lines available (INT#A - D).

Some manuals tell you which slots are shared with what. In almost all cases the AGP slot and PCI slot 1 (the one nearest it) are shared. 2 slots are shared with the USB root hubs.

NICs, Soundcards, capture cards and graphics cards really don't like sharing as they are all high bandwidth devices (NICs tend to be a little less problematic these days).

Try searching some MSI forums (I think they have their own).

[Fozzee]

Hi

Thnx for the advice.
I have posted on about 10 forums :P

More memory and new soundcard this week here's hoping

If not new mobo here we come. (Which is a shame cos I like everything else about it and it runs fine)

Cheers

Fozzee

[Nelson37]

Fozzee, have you tried turning off your overclock to see if that would help?

Have you tried a different cable and/or sound source? Try also reducing Line-In volume level to minimum and increasing volume slightly on output device.

I have had several bad/loose jacks on sound cards, sometimes holding the plug to one side, or slightly farther in or out solves it, unfortunately this means bad connection on jack and you need new sound card.

Moving the card to another slot is definitely worth a try, often farthest slot from power supply works best.

[Fozzee]

Try also reducing Line-In volume level to minimum and increasing volume slightly on output device.

Hi I am capturing from line-in do you mean having the play and record volumes low in audio properies?

Cheers

Fozzee

[crahak]

RAM most definately has nothing to do with this issue, and a new sound card (especially another creative one) won't do it... Should have got a new mobo for less $$ instead :/

[Fozzee]

Unfortunately i was unaware of this problem before i bought it.
They wouldn't let me take it back a day after buying it!!!!
And the computer shops in the UK are s*** so yours options are pretty limited.
I will have to pay over £120 (approx $170/180) for a decent mobo over here.

Fozz

[lpn1160]

I have a VIA chipset and it smooth sailing for me!!!

[Fozzee]

Hi
Yes tried all those.
Recording from line-in only is fine.
It's when I capture video/audio together the problem occurs.
It's possible its my AverTv card the mobo doesn't like.

WHO KNOWS COULD BE ANYTHING!!

Fozzee

[Tbear]

Have you checked out the via Forum to see if they had any more info?

[Fozzee]

Yes I have a thread there too.
PCI Latency patch actually makes it worse and affects video too.

Fozzee

[almostaborted]

try a turtle beach santa cruz sound card...very nice quality for the price

[bbb]

Fozzee,

I was experiencing sound capture distortions with my onboard sound card on my KT333 board too. I suspect it was due to Nimo audio codecs in which I installed all the drivers.

When I capture audio to an AVI file, the sound was fairly clear. But, after I encoded to MPEG2 with 48kHz sound frequency, I would hear occasional distortions (like peak cutoffs). When I transferred the MPEG2 file to another computer without Nimo codecs, it sounded better.

At the time of the problem, I should have done a clean installation OS to help narrow down the problem. But I felt the need to splurge and found a good deal on a Santa Cruz card and bought it. Afterwards, my sound problems were gone.

As of today, I don't know if it is was a drivers issue causing the occasional sound distortions or if it was hardware bug.

You can try a fresh OS install with the latest drivers to narrow down the culprit and possibly save some money. If a fresh install still causes sound capture distortions, get a Santa Cruz sound card. The Santa Cruz is unaffected by the VIA latency bug (which should have been fixed in the KT333 and KT400 chipsets).

[crahak]

No one ever reported problems like that with the nimo codec pack, and I used to have those back then without the codec pack. It is not to blame. All my problems went with the VIA board

[gf]

Hi crahak,
Well I HAD a Asus A7V333 w/raid and a Abit KT7 w/raid. The Asus A7V333 has a Via KT333 chipset and the Abit has a KT133 chipset. Well I tried to get my Realmagic card to work with either motherboard, well after owning this mess and after NUMEROUS calls to Realmagic they finally admitted that the Via chipset is incompatable with this card and they performed a modification on it so it can work with via chipsets. Well I scrapped the Asus board because the raid performance is so poor its worse that 1 drive alone on the standard ide cable. So my point is Via does things on there chipsets a little bit different than the rest and it may affect the performance of the boards you put in the computer, and all capture board companies will NOT tell you that. I found Canopus to recommend motherboards to use with their stuff.

[bbb]

It never hurts to try a clean installation. It's certainly cheaper and less painful than installing a new motherboard.

Also, Nimo codecs do cause a lot of different wierd problems to different people hence the creator of Nimo codecs gives a warning about his package.

Last, I find it rewarding to hunt down the exact nature of computer problems instead of guessing at them and giving up. Also, I don't find it economically sound to replace a whole system just because of a minor issue without exploring possible software solutions.

[crahak]

Well, this is the classic VIA chipset thing... Trust me, I've been down that road. You have no idea how many times windows was ever reinstalled clean by VIA board users.... Billions I bet. Also swapping PCI slots and PCI latency patches and what not... It never fixes it perfectly.

The nimo codec pack can do some funny things (mmswitch.ax crashing a lot..., some conflicting codecs, vide upside down and the like) but nothing like this. It is most definately NOT that.

There are LOTS of places on the web about this issue, and the outcome basically always it, well, "VIA"... It's the classic case. Some cards (definately not creative nor promise) manage to cope better with those VIA chipsets...

There is no guessing. The problem is obvious. The Ram thing might have been a random attempt, but it's not software. We're not talking abotu replacing a whole system (sure, the RAM and Sound card might be some $ too), but it's the mobo. There are many thousands of people who have been down that road before and tried all those fun things. Oh, there is more to it if you read more onto it than sound crackling, like data corruption. (actually, there might be more VIA threads even on this forum)

I bought VIA once, I gave the board away, all my problems went. I'll never buy VIA again.

[thebach]

I have VIA chipset board, and NOTHING I do will get rid of the sound crackling, I have tried everything ever suggested, is buying a new board the only answer? Cause if so I will buy a new board cause I'm pissed good!!!

[DaveQB]

It never hurts to try a clean installation. It's certainly cheaper and less painful than installing a new motherboard.

Also, Nimo codecs do cause a lot of different wierd problems to different people hence the creator of Nimo codecs gives a warning about his package.

i have had problems with the nimo pack, cant rememeber what it was (couldnt encode with DivX5 ?? ) not sure

but that does coz lots of problems from my experience,
not to say that this is definately that cause

[Fozzee]

It never hurts to try a clean installation. It's certainly cheaper and less painful than installing a new motherboard.

Also, Nimo codecs do cause a lot of different wierd problems to different people hence the creator of Nimo codecs gives a warning about his package.

Last, I find it rewarding to hunt down the exact nature of computer problems instead of guessing at them and giving up. Also, I don't find it economically sound to replace a whole system just because of a minor issue without exploring possible software solutions.

I do not use the nimo video pack. the only codecs I install are DivX, Xvid and AC3 (Mpeg2 comes with PowerDVD)
I have tried clean re-install.
I have tried the latency patch.
I have tried changing IRQs.
I have tried moving the cards.
I have tried Onboard Sound.
I have tried changing the APIC.
I have tried 2 different SB Live cards.

Not a lot left to try now.
As I said before I will be buying more ram and a new soundcard.
This was going to be the case whether I changed the mobo or not.
So I will do that first. With a clean re-install.
If that doesn't work..........

NEW MOTHERBOARD TIME

Fozzee

[thebach]

more ram won't make a difference, either will new sound card and clean install, I've tried it already and everything else, unless someone has a new answer it's time to change motherboards

[crahak]

Same out come than me 2 years ago All problems solved!

Oh, also, just for the record, even though VIA has problems... It's best to get a non-creative sound card too. Those are really known as problem causing too. Not just VIA related ones.

[thebach]

How did you solve the problem?

[crahak]

By buying a SiS based board. Total cost: 50$ or so. No more problems with anything