Computer Problems FAQ

I have been around computers for nearly 14 years. For the last little while, computers have gotten much easier to use and put together. However, there are still some not so common problems that will still baffle users. I don't intend to write about problems that have easily found solutions. The ones that are on this page are problems that have hard to found solutions. Hopefully this page will help people who are looking to fix their computers.

Windows Problems

• Sound Blaster Audigy not recognized by Windows 2000 or XP
  • This usually happens to a PC with an Audigy card and uses a VIA chipset. The problem seems to be worse with the use of VIA Althlon chipsets but I can not concretely confirm that. Usually this will surface during driver installation with a message saying that there is no Audigy card installed.
  • The solution that I found to work is to first manually install the card through device manager. In Control Panel->Systems->device manager, do a driver update by specifying the directory where you have extracted the Audigy drivers. This driver update will end up with a partially working driver that says "Audigy Audio Processor (WDM)" or "EMU10k1 audio". Once this is performed reinstall the driver normally by running setup.exe. If you can get the driver to partially install then the second time around the system will be able to recognize the installed audigy card.
  • In 2003, Creative finally releaased updated drivers for SB Live! and Audigy. The new drivers should solve the above problem for most people.
• Sound Blaster Live!/Audigy crackles with static and/or corrupts files
  • This again usually happens to PCs using a VIA chipset, particularly the ones that has a 686B southbridge (KT133(A), Apollo Pro 133A/Z/T chipsets). A major symptom is that the speaker will crackle with static with or without music. Another symptom is that media files like MP3 will skip. Also, in some cases this problem will cause major file corruptions in the hard disk.
  • There are many theories on this problem (do a Google search for that) Initally, some of the motherboard companies have a workaround with a BIOS fix. However, in order for the following to work you have to update to the latest BIOS version as the previous BIOS fixes may conflict with the proper fixes.
  • One solution is to update the VIA Hyperion driver to the latest version. This helps in some cases but in some cases does not solve anything.
  • Another solution is to use George Breese's unofficial PCI latency patch The stable version is 0.19d but does not support the latest chipsets.
  • A third solution is to manually adjust the PCI latency value (if available) from 32 to either 0 or to 64. I don't recommend this unless you know what you are doing.
  • In 2003, Creative finally releaased updated drivers for SB Live! and Audigy. The new drivers should solve the above problem for most people.
  Lack of UMAX parallel port scanner drivers for Windows 2000/XP
  • The UMAX US website claims that there is no driver available for this device or requires you to purchase a driver CD. (I have the 1220P model myself) However, this driver is freely available from the UMAX Germany site. Just go through the menus and download the parallel port driver version 3.55. Windows XP uses the same driver as the 2000 one. When the prompt comes up for "unsafe drivers" just click "continue anyway" and it will be installed properly.

Linux Problems

• ISA sound devices not recognized (Redhat Linux 7.3,8.x and 9.x)
  • Since version 7.3, Redhat have removed support for ISA devices. If you have a older computer that uses an ISA sound device (such as my Asus L7200 laptop with Yamaha OPL3 chip), the ISA device will not be recognized. What you need to do is to download the ISAPNPTOOLS package. Unzip and untar the file and then follow the readme file's instruction to compile, install and configure it. You will also need to add the sound device module to /etc/modules.conf. After that the sound should work. Refer to the Linux Howtos for more information.
  • Since 2005, Linux ALSA sound architecture support pretty much have eliminated that issue even for ISA sound devices.
• Tulip driver does not work (DEC 21x4x and AMD AMDtek chips)
  • A lot of linux distribution comes with a modified driver that does not work in many cases. If you find that your card does not work, it's very likely that this is the cause. To correct this, you will have to download and compile the driver from Scyld.com The mailing list is also very useful. The original writer of the drivers, Donald Becker is usually there to help answer your questions.
  • In Ubuntu Linux (6.10 and 6.06), the Tulip driver causes lockups during the installation routine. However, once Ubuntu is installed the Tulip driver works properly. Quite a strange problem.
  • If the above does not work, and you are using a Cardbus PCMCIA card, then it may be the following problem:
• Kernel Cardbus card (YENTA socket) problems
  • When I installed Linux on my Asus L7200 laptop, this problem took a long time to diagnose. With many distributions with the later 2.4.x kernels (>2.4.15 I think), the PCMCIA cardbus services has been merged into the kernel with the YENTA socket. While this works with most laptops it also have problems with many others. Usually, the kernel messages will state that the card is detected correctly but then the ard will not respond to any ping messages in or out.
  • If your laptop does have this problem then you will need the older modular cardbus services through the PCMCIA-CS package. The information and source can be found at the Linux PCMCIA Information page. The solution for this is not for the faint of heart. It requires a recompilation of the kernel in order to disable the kernel PCMCIA implementation and install the PCMCIA-cs as a module. Again, the best source for Linux information such as kernel compilation can be found at the Linux Howtos. Also, Linux on Laptops provides many useful information on installing Linux on laptops
  • As of 2006/2007, the Yenta socket in the 2.6 series kernel is quite stable. It should now works properly with most if not all previously unsupported laptops.
• Screen garbles after changing between X Windows and console
  • This is a relatively common problem with Linux on laptops. In the kernel call line in Grub or LILO, make sure that the vga=7xx line is included so that the kernel locks to a particular native LCD resolution. Some common vga= values for 16-bit color are:
    • 800x600 vga=788
    • 1024x768 vga=791
    • 1280x1024 vga=794