AV Master on Pentium IV 1.7 Ghz

[RobertvdWoude]

I am writing this mail for myself and two other users of the AV-Master 98.
I’ve bought this product less then 2 years ago and am very pleased with the product since I am still using an analog camcorder.

Now after using it some time and faster computers are getting cheaper, I’ve ordered a new computer. A Pentium IV 1,7 Ghz on a Asus motherboard, thinking this will give me extra power when editing and rendering movies. But, the importer of Fast products in Holland (Inside) told that the av master 98 will have problems with computer with processor speeds over 500 Mhz. He told me that there is a problem with timing between the driver and the hardware.

Is this true? I have seen a few posts with processors over 1 Ghz and they seem to be working. And, if this will work, witch operating system is the best i can use?

I hope someone can help me.

Regards,

Robert van der Woude

[RobertvdWoude]

Correction, it will be a Intel Motherboard

[allan]

My Fast AV master works OK on a PIII 700, but you will have problems using windows 2000, which would probably come on a new PC

[RobertvdWoude]

Dear Allan,

Thank you for your reply. It gives me the hope that everything will work. Concerning the operating system, I’ve seen the thread over w2k, and it is obvious to me that I won’t try to get the av-master to work on w2k. I will probably try windows me or stick to 98.

Does anyone know how the tale started, that the av-master won’t work on faster machines? I’ve seen another post from a user who asked nearly the same question (except his perception was that it won’t work over 400 Mhz) and what surprised me was that neither Fast, nor the moderator replied.

I expect to receive my machine somewhere next week. I will update this tread to let everyone know if it will work. I think that all av master users will be updating their hardware sooner or later and that this might help them.

Robert

[FAST]

AV Master definitely does run on systems with processors faster than 400mhz. We have never found that to be a problem. Here at FAST UK we use AV Master on various systems, including one with dual Pentium III, 600mhz processors and it works a treat. Although we have never tested AV Master with processors over 1ghz, I do not see any reason why it should not work.

Your comment 'thinking this will give me extra power when editing and rendering movies' is not really true though. AV Master does not render much faster when you use a faster computer, because rendering is done by the AV Master card, not the computer. This is because computer's were much less powerful when AV Master was designed. So, such a super-fast processor will not give you huge benefits when using AV Master. I am fairly sure it would work with such a powerful computer, but all that processing speed is not really necessary.

FAST UK Technical Support

[RobertvdWoude]

Dear Fast,

Thank you for your reply. I wil forward this to the importer in Holland. Seems he's got the wrong information.

PS: The gain in rendering time i ment was with converting AVI to MPEG and maby by disable hardware support in MSP.

Regards,

Robert.

[RobertvdWoude]

As promised, here is my update on av-master on my new pc. After trying the card in every PCI slot and on all possible irq’s, I gave up. In the bios I can only assign irq’s 9,10 and 11. These irq’s are already used by some integrated components (lan, audio and usb-hub) Strange thing is that the hardware information screen told me that the hardware was working correct but Fast capture could not initialise and all 4 led lights on the card where on (not running as they supposed to do.

Now I am keeping the avm in my Pentium II 400 Mhz for capturing and do my editing on the new machine. I’ve installed de Fast codec and disable hardware support, hoping smart rendering will stay available.

I don’t think the problem has anything to do with the speed of de bus or the processor. I am pretty sure that the problem is irq related.

Thanks to those who offered their expertise.

Robert

[RobertvdWoude]

Never stop trying......

I've got the av master working fine on the new machine. It was a installation order problem.
1) install Ulead MSP
2) install Ulead MSP patch
3) install av master software, reboot
4) install av master drivers, reboot
5) grin.

[Richard5409]

FYI I have got the AV MAster installed on an ASUS motherboard with an Athlon 1Ghz processor and other than problems with a faulty motherboard everything seems to work fine.

[summersglow]

Hi,

I bought my AV Master some years ago, maybe '97 or '98, the box is long gone and it is just called AVMaster in my multimedia settings. I upgraded from FastCap 2.0 to 2.2 and added Power Play if that helps date the thing. My machine is a 200MMX which was about 33 less than top speed at the time.

I was interested in this thread because I long ago I read something on the fastmultimedia site that said the AV Master wouldn't function with any CPU over a 233 MMX. Well, I really need a new box, not for the AV Master, but for my graphics and website design.... but I'd like to take the AV Master out and reinstall it into an AMD 1 ghz machine with a 64 mb graphics card & DDR memory and give the old box to my daughter for her games.

Now I'm reading on the forum tonight that it can be done, I can sucessfully move an old AV Master to a modern machine. But then I have to be careful as to what motherboard I use, what version of Windows and so on. There used to be, on the Fast Multimedia site, a list of compatible motherboards, graphic cards and so on. I'd like to know just what I can use that is compatible.

Another thing... when I bought the card, Fast guarenteed it would be upgradeable. LOL. Can I upgrade it to an AV 2000, for example?

[RayL]

The two Intec AV Masters are still providing great service. The earlier one (bought in May '97) has been through the following motherboard chipsets :

Intel HX
Intel VX
(Using Pentium 1 / AMD K6 133MHz- 300MHz)

SIS 5591 /5595
Aladdin AL 1542 /1543
(using AMD K6-2 and K6-3 350 / 400 MHz)

AMD 751 /756
(using Athlon 500MHz slotA

VIA KT 133
(using Athlon 900 / 1000 MHz FSB 200 sktA

VIA KT133A
(using Athlon 1000 MHz FSB 266 skt A

The only motherboard where it behaved oddly was one that used the old VIA MVP3 chipset, and that was down to the chipset.

So in answer to the question, yes, you can use a modern motherboard / processor. Just don't expect the results to be startlingly different from a much older computer - the AV Master's hardware codec sets the rendering efficiency, not the speed of the processor.

Ray Liffen

[ajaques]

Hello Robert,
While I take the point that others have made that there may not be
any obvious benefit in using a high speed processor, I suspect that it
may lead to a more usable result when editing. My experiance is not
enough to amount to evidence, but it may be worth bearing in mind.

I use a Fast AV Master in a computer built on an Abit PX5
motherboard, with an Intel 233MHz Pentium MMX processor. The AV Master
came with a cut down version of Media Studio (V2.5), but I have been
also able to try Media Studio Pro V5.2 and Premiere V5.1c. It may then
seem strange that I stick with Premiere V4.2!
Why? Well I find that the other three editors to be totally
unsatisfactory in use (on my machine). Just one example of many that I
could give is that setting in and out points on a clip is like nailing
jelly to the ceiling. (Not that I have actually tried that.) They
crash more often too.

However my Brother-in-law also uses the AV Master, but on an Abit
BH6 board with an Intel 400MHz Pentium II processor. On his machine
both MSP and Premiere V5.1c are both stable, and smooth in operation.
My brother's 400MHz (I think) Pentium II machine also runs Premiere
V5.1c nicely, though the comparison is even less valid because his
motherboard is a Jetway.

Of course there could be many other factors apart from the
processor speed. For instance the chipset on all three is different.
But it is possible that processor speed may be one factor in the
stability of the editor.

Tony ...

[RobertvdWoude]

Summersglow

I use the Intel B850GB motherboard without any problems now.

RayL & Tony

You should think that a faster processor would not make any differences in rendering time, but disabling hardware support used to make rendering slower and now its up to at least twice the normal speed. Besides, it gives the performance an enormous boost with converting to mpeg for SVCD.

Tony

I am still using MSP. I find it is easier to use and the interface suits me better than Premiere. But I must say that I never gave Premiere a real chance, was hooked on MSP since version 5.0.

Robert

[parkinpants]

what is this Ulead patch that
one person mentioned ?

my story is
1) brand new PC, 1.8 GHz etc
2) installed card
3) detected by Windows Me
4) restarts after installing AV Fastcap
5) computer hangs
6) lose loads of drivers for graphics etc
7) restore drivers except for sound
8) install WIn2k, even worse !!!
9) back to W Me, seems IRQ is being shared
but I can't change it in the BIOS as the
USB IRQ changes with it
10) anyone had this problem ?

thanks
Nick

[RobertvdWoude]

The ulead patch for MSP can be found at: http://www.ulead.com/tech/msp_ftp.htm

It seems to be very important that you first install MSP (Media Studio Pro) before installing the drivers for the AVM.

NB: Can't you set a irq in your bios per PCI Slot? This was essential when installed.

Greetings

Robert.

[staf]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by FAST:
AV Master definitely does run on systems with processors faster than 400mhz. We have never found that to be a problem. Here at FAST UK we use AV Master on various systems, including one with dual Pentium III, 600mhz processors and it works a treat. Although we have never tested AV Master with processors over 1ghz, I do not see any reason why it should not work.

Your comment 'thinking this will give me extra power when editing and rendering movies' is not really true though. AV Master does not render much faster when you use a faster computer, because rendering is done by the AV Master card, not the computer. This is because computer's were much less powerful when AV Master was designed. So, such a super-fast processor will not give you huge benefits when using AV Master. I am fairly sure it would work with such a powerful computer, but all that processing speed is not really necessary.

FAST UK Technical Support<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

[staf]

I am still trying to install the AV master on my new system.(Packard Bell 1 ghz - win98se)
Always get the following message http://www.dvdoctor.net/cgi-bin/ubb/frown.gif C007)

AVmaster cannot allocate continous memory for DMA ( fastavm.vxd not loaded?)

Can anyone please help me?
Thank you in advance.

Staf

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by FAST:
AV Master definitely does run on systems with processors faster than 400mhz. We have never found that to be a problem. Here at FAST UK we use AV Master on various systems, including one with dual Pentium III, 600mhz processors and it works a treat. Although we have never tested AV Master with processors over 1ghz, I do not see any reason why it should not work.

Your comment 'thinking this will give me extra power when editing and rendering movies' is not really true though. AV Master does not render much faster when you use a faster computer, because rendering is done by the AV Master card, not the computer. This is because computer's were much less powerful when AV Master was designed. So, such a super-fast processor will not give you huge benefits when using AV Master. I am fairly sure it would work with such a powerful computer, but all that processing speed is not really necessary.

FAST UK Technical Support<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

[10rsaxman]

As you are aware, you need to get the AV Master to use a different IRQ.

One of the problems often encountered with the PCI bus specification is that there are only four interrupts available for use by all devices connected to the PCI bus (the AGP slot also shares one of these). This includes add in cards, as well as I/O built into the motherboard (USB, Audio, NIC...)

The details of how IRQ's are assigned to individual devices is rather complex, each PCI slot has four physical Interrupt pins available, IntA IntB IntC and IntD, and the systems BIOS routs the four interrupts that you may change PIRQ1, PIRQ2, PIRQ3, PIRQ4 to the four pins in each PCI slot in a mix and match fashion. Your motherboard documentation will have more specifice about how the assignments actually take place.

The problem you have is right now, your AV Master is in a slot that uses the same IRQ as your USB port. Changing one changes them both. In order to resolve this problem, you will have to try other PCI slots until you find one that will leave the AV Master on its own IRQ.

Optionally, if you do not use the USB ports on your PC, you can disable them in your PC's BIOS. There will probably be two options, one to completely disable USB, and one that disables USB's use of an interrupt. I have tried both of these methods, and found that completely disabling USB was the only option that worked on my setup, but you may have different results.

Depending on how loaded up your system is, you may not be able to find a single IRQ for your AV Master without removing or disabling some other hardware :-(

You should be able to get your settup running with Win2K, but make sure to check Fast's site for information on how to do this.

None of these options will work until you resolve the IRQ conflict!!

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by parkinpants:
what is this Ulead patch that
one person mentioned ?

my story is
1) brand new PC, 1.8 GHz etc
2) installed card
3) detected by Windows Me
4) restarts after installing AV Fastcap
5) computer hangs
6) lose loads of drivers for graphics etc
7) restore drivers except for sound
8) install WIn2k, even worse !!!
9) back to W Me, seems IRQ is being shared
but I can't change it in the BIOS as the
USB IRQ changes with it
10) anyone had this problem ?

thanks
Nick<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>