Half Life 2. That's me on the rightI stole the NEC DVD writer from the Compaq and transferred into the Hermes. Moved the PC upstairs, connected it to the broadband modem, connected to the Internet thingy and ran updates on Windows andAVG, registered Windows and Office. downloaded emails. Nothing of interest.
I tried to install the SB CT4760 again after running the XP driver update program. It froze. Rebooted and managed to distract it for a few seconds during which time I extracted the XP drivers downloaded from the Creative website. All seemed OK.
So I connected the LD bay and rebooted. It hung on the XP loading screen. Bastard. Just when I thought I was getting somewhere. Rebooted again and I got the option to boot in Safe mode, Normal mode or “last good Windows configuration”. I intended to select the latter, but on reflection I may have selected the default “normal” option.
Rebooted. This time XP hung when I tried to select something from the Sample Music folder.
Dosconnected the LD bay and rebooted. Hung on the load screen again.
Not going well, is it?
Rebooted again, this time definitely selecting the “last good configuration” option. This time seemd OK for a while and I managed to play some XP sample music.
I tried to load Half Life 2. Only because this will represent a good benchmark for the system; it’s a very resource hungry program and I know how it performed on the Compaq. Obviously I won’t actually be playing the game. For God’s sake, I’m a 48 year old father of two with a responsible job, (OK, so actually I'm a Radiographer, but you know what i mean) so why would I want to paly computer games?
HL2 and Steam, the online registration element of the game prompt me to download the latest drivers for the graphics card. I do so, after which I am prompted to restart the PC. Guess what?
It hangs again.
Reset; no hang, and run HL2 again, but it won’t run. I can hear the HDD trying to do something but there's no load and the game doesn’t run. I restart again but still nothing happens. I then notice that Steam is still downloading the online component to the game (an anti piracy measure). Maybe this is the cause of the no show?
Hangs again during the download. Reset again and Steam resumes the download; finally it is ready to play. The game does seem to load faster than before, but it freezes on the intro sequence.
I have had enough and I take the “old” soundcard from the Compaq. Looking at it I wonder, although I have had this card longer than the CT4760 with which I replaced it, could it actually be A newer model? The model number is higher at CT4830 and the connectors are colour coded. There also seems to be a port on it which looks as though it can be connected to the Live Drive bay. Hmm. Interesting (for a computer nerd, anyway). I bung it in the Hermes and reboot.
I tried to install the SB CT4760 again after running the XP driver update program. It froze. Rebooted and managed to distract it for a few seconds during which time I extracted the XP drivers downloaded from the Creative website. All seemed OK.
So I connected the LD bay and rebooted. It hung on the XP loading screen. Bastard. Just when I thought I was getting somewhere. Rebooted again and I got the option to boot in Safe mode, Normal mode or “last good Windows configuration”. I intended to select the latter, but on reflection I may have selected the default “normal” option.
Rebooted. This time XP hung when I tried to select something from the Sample Music folder.
Dosconnected the LD bay and rebooted. Hung on the load screen again.
Not going well, is it?
Rebooted again, this time definitely selecting the “last good configuration” option. This time seemd OK for a while and I managed to play some XP sample music.
I tried to load Half Life 2. Only because this will represent a good benchmark for the system; it’s a very resource hungry program and I know how it performed on the Compaq. Obviously I won’t actually be playing the game. For God’s sake, I’m a 48 year old father of two with a responsible job, (OK, so actually I'm a Radiographer, but you know what i mean) so why would I want to paly computer games?
HL2 and Steam, the online registration element of the game prompt me to download the latest drivers for the graphics card. I do so, after which I am prompted to restart the PC. Guess what?
It hangs again.
Reset; no hang, and run HL2 again, but it won’t run. I can hear the HDD trying to do something but there's no load and the game doesn’t run. I restart again but still nothing happens. I then notice that Steam is still downloading the online component to the game (an anti piracy measure). Maybe this is the cause of the no show?
Hangs again during the download. Reset again and Steam resumes the download; finally it is ready to play. The game does seem to load faster than before, but it freezes on the intro sequence.
I have had enough and I take the “old” soundcard from the Compaq. Looking at it I wonder, although I have had this card longer than the CT4760 with which I replaced it, could it actually be A newer model? The model number is higher at CT4830 and the connectors are colour coded. There also seems to be a port on it which looks as though it can be connected to the Live Drive bay. Hmm. Interesting (for a computer nerd, anyway). I bung it in the Hermes and reboot.
Evil sound card
All seems well…er hang on…NO FUCKING SOUND. HL2 crashes; due to the HL2 engine according to the MS error report generated by XP.
Rebooted and ran the driver program again, but the card is not detected, no plug and play, it is not listed under Device manager. I uninstall all Creative software, switch off and take the card out. Reboot with no card, switch off, reinstall card in a different PCI slot and reboot; still not detected.
Ran the live Creative Live Drive Unidrive extractor again and “set up could not detect any SB Audio card on your system” so maybe it’s ceased to function. I need to try this card again in the Compaq.
Put the CT4760 back in the PC. Sound on the XP load! Run HL2. Hangs. No idea what to do now.
Now let’s remember that this card ran fine in the Compaq until a few hours ago. And it seems to work intermittently in the Hermes until it crashes or hangs. So surely it must be an issue between it and the MB?
Hangs again on launching HL2
Look at Creative forums in the web and as a result try downloading a different driver package from a comletley different site.
I run it;
Restart the PC.
HL2 loads
And runs,
I play it
And there is sound.
Graphics are excellent and very smooth; definitely a big improvement on the Compaq, presumably due to more RAM, fsaster CPU and also a faster AGP bus (8x rather than 2x) so although it’s the same graphics card, it can now perform better. Remember that the Live Drive bay is still not connected, so I have to try that.
I load Toca Race driver. Again, I must emphasise, purely to test the system. The PC hangs again as it loads, aborting the installation. So there are still problems. Rebooted and retried Race driver; “Registry error; check installation” Maybe this is not a SC issue…please?
But it hangs again.
It is now very late and I am going on a walk tomorrow with a couple of friends. I should have been asleep a couple of hours ago. So I am giving up for tonight. Some thoughts…
Do I need a newer sound card for this system, say like a Creative Audigy; similar vintage to the MB?
Should I try reinstalling Win XP over the current setup, ie with the soundcard installed? Might this make a difference? Isn’t this what I ended up doing last time on the Compaq to get it working?
Should I reset the BIOS to the original default BIOS, maybe thaen I can set the AC97 Audio to Disabled rather than Auto in the BIOS Setup?
Or should I just take a big heavy hammer to the whole thing?
Goodnight.
A couple of days later...
Last night and today I have made several more attempts to reinstall/uninstall drivers and soundcard. Somewhere along the line I have deleted something I shouldn’t have done, as now when I boot up I get the error message, “Error loading cmicnfg.cpl. The specified module could not be found.” I have looked this message up on the web and perceived wisdom seems to be that this is of little consequence.
Getting mightily pissed off with the whole business now. I try and put the other SC in again, the CT4830. this is the one (are you keeping up with this?) that was previously not detected by Win XP. This time however it is detected, and Win XP seems to load drivers for it (presumable XP generic drivers as I had tried to uninstall any Creative software I could find, and I am not prompted for a disc). I am prompted to reboot. I do so.
Get the cmicnfg.cpl error again but no hang. Run HL2; no hang. I play the game. So far so good.
Interesting. (no, it really is)
Bearing in mind that it seems likely that the CT4830 which now appears to be working might be a newer card than the pesky 4760, what are the relative specs? Will the 4830 work with the Live Drive bay, giving me a high quality headphone outlet and proper phono inputs? And what should I do about the cmicnfg.cpl error?
Rebooted and ran the driver program again, but the card is not detected, no plug and play, it is not listed under Device manager. I uninstall all Creative software, switch off and take the card out. Reboot with no card, switch off, reinstall card in a different PCI slot and reboot; still not detected.
Ran the live Creative Live Drive Unidrive extractor again and “set up could not detect any SB Audio card on your system” so maybe it’s ceased to function. I need to try this card again in the Compaq.
Put the CT4760 back in the PC. Sound on the XP load! Run HL2. Hangs. No idea what to do now.
Now let’s remember that this card ran fine in the Compaq until a few hours ago. And it seems to work intermittently in the Hermes until it crashes or hangs. So surely it must be an issue between it and the MB?
Hangs again on launching HL2
Look at Creative forums in the web and as a result try downloading a different driver package from a comletley different site.
I run it;
Restart the PC.
HL2 loads
And runs,
I play it
And there is sound.
Graphics are excellent and very smooth; definitely a big improvement on the Compaq, presumably due to more RAM, fsaster CPU and also a faster AGP bus (8x rather than 2x) so although it’s the same graphics card, it can now perform better. Remember that the Live Drive bay is still not connected, so I have to try that.
I load Toca Race driver. Again, I must emphasise, purely to test the system. The PC hangs again as it loads, aborting the installation. So there are still problems. Rebooted and retried Race driver; “Registry error; check installation” Maybe this is not a SC issue…please?
But it hangs again.
It is now very late and I am going on a walk tomorrow with a couple of friends. I should have been asleep a couple of hours ago. So I am giving up for tonight. Some thoughts…
Do I need a newer sound card for this system, say like a Creative Audigy; similar vintage to the MB?
Should I try reinstalling Win XP over the current setup, ie with the soundcard installed? Might this make a difference? Isn’t this what I ended up doing last time on the Compaq to get it working?
Should I reset the BIOS to the original default BIOS, maybe thaen I can set the AC97 Audio to Disabled rather than Auto in the BIOS Setup?
Or should I just take a big heavy hammer to the whole thing?
Goodnight.
A couple of days later...
Last night and today I have made several more attempts to reinstall/uninstall drivers and soundcard. Somewhere along the line I have deleted something I shouldn’t have done, as now when I boot up I get the error message, “Error loading cmicnfg.cpl. The specified module could not be found.” I have looked this message up on the web and perceived wisdom seems to be that this is of little consequence.
Getting mightily pissed off with the whole business now. I try and put the other SC in again, the CT4830. this is the one (are you keeping up with this?) that was previously not detected by Win XP. This time however it is detected, and Win XP seems to load drivers for it (presumable XP generic drivers as I had tried to uninstall any Creative software I could find, and I am not prompted for a disc). I am prompted to reboot. I do so.
Get the cmicnfg.cpl error again but no hang. Run HL2; no hang. I play the game. So far so good.
Interesting. (no, it really is)
Bearing in mind that it seems likely that the CT4830 which now appears to be working might be a newer card than the pesky 4760, what are the relative specs? Will the 4830 work with the Live Drive bay, giving me a high quality headphone outlet and proper phono inputs? And what should I do about the cmicnfg.cpl error?
Nice sound card
Is it possible that I didn’t properly seat the card In the PCI slot when I tried to intall it before? It did seem to need a good shove to get it into place this time.
Maybe a repair install of XP would sort the cmicnfg.cpl error out?
Whatever, 45 mins later I am still on HL2 with sound and no hangs or freezes.
Now then. Next problem: the NEC DVD writer is taking a hell of a long time to read the data files I put on a DVDRW with documents and downloads on. Why is this?
However I manage to reinstall TOCA Race Driver and it seems to run very nicely thank you with no recurrence of the registry error. I reckon this was due to the previous hang while it was installing.
Several; hours later the SC is still full functional. I have installed my printer and its drivers, PC Guard from ISP Virgin, and Adobe Acrobat. Uninstalled AVG as PC Guard now offers antivirus package to 2 MB customers.
Don’t know what to do about the DVD read prob. In the meant time I can use CD or CDRW or the dongle to transfer docs etc to Hermes. Now then; let’s just test HL2 one more time…
Maybe a repair install of XP would sort the cmicnfg.cpl error out?
Whatever, 45 mins later I am still on HL2 with sound and no hangs or freezes.
Now then. Next problem: the NEC DVD writer is taking a hell of a long time to read the data files I put on a DVDRW with documents and downloads on. Why is this?
However I manage to reinstall TOCA Race Driver and it seems to run very nicely thank you with no recurrence of the registry error. I reckon this was due to the previous hang while it was installing.
Several; hours later the SC is still full functional. I have installed my printer and its drivers, PC Guard from ISP Virgin, and Adobe Acrobat. Uninstalled AVG as PC Guard now offers antivirus package to 2 MB customers.
Don’t know what to do about the DVD read prob. In the meant time I can use CD or CDRW or the dongle to transfer docs etc to Hermes. Now then; let’s just test HL2 one more time…
You'll have someone's eye out with that thing...
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