Dead Audigy2 Drive

billcow

Yeah, I know this probably isn't the best place to post this, but I'm totally out of ideas.

A few weeks ago my Audigy2 Drive (hereafter referred to as the a2d) stopped working. Neither the creative drivers nor the kX drivers recognize it as being present. It is getting power, the cables connecting it to the main audigy2 card is connected and intact, as is the SB1394 cable. The front-panel firewire port still works, BTW. I've tried just about everything except a complete reinstall of windows. Moving it to a different slot, removing every other PCI card, connecting it with a power cable that doesn't split to connect with a hard drive, switching the ribbon cable end-to-end, and probably a bunch of other stuff.

Anyone have any ideas?

Mata Hari

maybe its just plain broken? equipment sometimes does that I'm avraid...
If it just "happend" all of a sudden, then I think you have to dig up your warranty card...

Eugene Gavrilov

with kx drivers installed, open the 'about...' dialog box and find the 'DB Name' line
you should see 'Aud2ELiveBay' there
if you don't, then, probably, a warrenty card might be of use

btw, I suggest you don't mention you tried kX drivers -- otherwise your warrenty might become void

/Eugene

billcow

----Hardware / Software configuration---------------
Driver Name:kX Audio Driver (Debug)
Driver Date: May 28 2003 00:28:30
Driver Version: 5.10.00.3533 - debug
DB Name:none
SB0240 10k2 [b400]
PCI Information:
Device: 41102 Subsys: 10021102 ChipRev: 4
Card is '10k2'
Card has MPU device
Card model is '5.1'
Card is Audigy2-compatible
Card HAS AC97 codec
Codec name: SigmaTel STAC9721/23
3D Extension: SigmaTel 3D Enhancement
Codec is 2.0 compliant
Capabilities[6940] :
DAC resolutions : -16-bit- -18-bit-
ADC resolutions : -16-bit- -18-bit-
Ext Capabilities [200]: -slot/DAC mappings-
Port: b400 Irq: 12
Playback buffer: 20a0
Record buffer: 4000
Number of AC3 buffers: 4
Tank memory: 256 kb
GSIF buffer: 512 samples
OS version: [2 5 1 Service Pack 1; 2 5 1 Service Pack 1; 156 148]


nope. I figured it wasn't a driver issue - apparently i was right. How is the "dbname" detected? Is it through a read/write operation with a memory-mapped register, or is it determined based on part of the PCI PnP data (subsystem ID or something like that).

I was looking around the boards and while I couldn't find anything like this for the audigy2, there were a couple vague references to an "EEPROM bug" with the original audigy that I couldn't quite decipher the meaning of. Long story short, the 3COM 900-series network card and hardware changes were listed as possible causes. I had added a new hard drive right before it stopped working, but based on other info in the posts I gathered that it was a PnP bug that caused the problems, and IDE is completely seperate and thus wouldn't affect it. This brings me to the network card. I have a network card of the same line mentioned installed in my computer. It has been installed the whole time i've owned this audigy2.

Longer story short, can the "EEPROM bug" affect audigy2s or only the original? And for that matter, would that cause the problems i have even if it could occur with my card?

TIA for the help,
- Andy

Eugene Gavrilov

as far as I know, kX Drivers aren't affected by the EEPROM bug (it refers to EEPROM located on-board, which has nothing to do with external drive detection)

kX Driver assumes all the connections are available by default
so, even if the drive isn't detected via auto-detection procedure, most of its functionality should be available (except, for instance, Remote IR)...

unfortunately, Creative introduced a special 'sequence' required to initialize certain drive models (audigy 2 ex's drive needs it, too). previous 'drives' didn't require such sequences and were enabled by default

however, this sequence is not required in order to work with spdif and analog inputs/outputs, but with UART/MIDI/RemoteIR only

so, if the only working component of your a2 drive is sb1394, then, probably, either the connection cable or the drive itself is broken

/Eugene

billcow

okay, I should have been more thorough in my checking - 'cause I just determined that the analog inputs work.

So apparently, I just need to send that initialization sequence to get MIDI working again.

How do I do that? I'm guessing that it's something I could do with a set of calls to kxctrl.exe - "kxctrl -dbr" doesn't seem to do anything, BTW.

Eugene Gavrilov

so, what isn't working then?
spdif? or remoteir? or just midi?

I doubt the initialization sequence will help you simply because kX driver sends it automatically on start-up
anyway, here's the SysEx you need:
0xf0,0x00,0x20,0x21,0x61,0x0,0x00,0x00,0x7f,0x0,0x f7

send it to Uart1 and Uart2

btw, what happens if you press any buttons on your remote?
does the red light located on the drive flash?

/E

billcow

MIDI in definately isn't working, RemoteIR isn't working either. MIDI out seems to work fine, as do all the analog ins and outs. I can't test the SPDIF as I have neither the needed cable nor anything to plug the other end in to.

I tried sending that sysex, but it doesn't seem to do help. I even tried connecting the same cable between the input and output and sending the sysex - still didn't help.



[edit]
Make that TOSLINK that I don't have the cable for, seeing as the SP/DIF is plain RCA. I just tested the SP/DIF as loopback and it worked fine.
[/edit]

Eugene Gavrilov

definitely a hardware problem then

/E