Here try this
http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch000208.htm
I also try in a diff system

Thanks -- I will give that a shot.

I can't try the MX300 in another system as I do not have another Win98 system built. I suppose I could put one together and try it, but would rather try other options.

I should also not that there is nothing under Device Manger for the Aureal hardware after a reboot, however the drivers are installed and the Aureal program says "No Audio Driver Found".

I'm actually wondering if the P3V4X has enough IRQ's -- I have a AGP card, two Voodoo 2's in SLI, a NIC and the MX300 -- 5 total cards. I know most systems shouldn't have an issue, however I've read that this board was the first wave of Via chipsets for Intel based processors and they were a bit "flaky".

Most BIOSes show a status screen with detected PCI hardware right after the POST screen - does the MX300 show up there?

If you suspect the mainboard running out of free IRQs, try to disable devices like unused serial/parallel ports, thus releasing their IRQs.

I will also try disabling the serial ports to see if that helps.

Honestly, I can't see any PCI hardware posts because the damn thing goes to fast -- is there any way to stop the bios boot screen to see the specs?

there may be a quick boot option turn it off

Voodoo2 cards don't need an IRQ. Use them on PCI slots that share IRQ with other slots or devices. Usually a good choice are PCI slots sharing IRQ with onboard USB controller. For an Asus P3V4X motherboard, this leads to PCI slots #4 and #5. Yeah, this is a RTFM scenario!

EDIT: I'll add more detailed info and my very personal recommendation for your system.

INT-A: AGP slot (GF3) and PCI slot #1 (empty)
INT-B: PCI slot #2 (NIC)
INT-C: PCI slot #3 (MX300) and #6 (empty)
INT-D: PCI slot #4 (Voodoo2), #5 (Voodoo2) and USB.

- or press the "pause" key when you suspect the devices screen comes up... it works for me 😀

Hudson187 wrote:

Via chipsets ... a bit "flaky".

Not true. Arm your pitchforks.. time to burn a heretic! 😁

batracio wrote:

Voodoo2 cards don't need an IRQ. Use them on PCI slots that share IRQ with other slots or devices. Usually a good choice are PCI […]
Show full quote

Voodoo2 cards don't need an IRQ. Use them on PCI slots that share IRQ with other slots or devices. Usually a good choice are PCI slots sharing IRQ with onboard USB controller. For an Asus P3V4X motherboard, this leads to PCI slots #4 and #5. Yeah, this is a RTFM scenario!

EDIT: I'll add more detailed info and my very personal recommendation for your system.

INT-A: AGP slot (GF3) and PCI slot #1 (empty)
INT-B: PCI slot #2 (NIC)
INT-C: PCI slot #3 (MX300) and #6 (empty)
INT-D: PCI slot #4 (Voodoo2), #5 (Voodoo2) and USB.

Excellent -- I'll have to give this a shot. PCI 5 & 6 have had either the MX300 and/or the NIC. I think I may have tried the V2's in 3 & 4 with the NIC on 6.

I will give this a shot later tonight/tomorrow and report back.

swaaye wrote:

Hudson187 wrote:

Via chipsets ... a bit "flaky".

Not true. Arm your pitchforks.. time to burn a heretic! 😁

🤣! 😁

Personally, I've never had any issues with Via chipsets and have built numerous AMD based systems. My next build is actually going to be a WinXP box based on the Athlon XP series! 😉

Yeah you will often need to juggle cards around to figure out where they are happy. Slots share resources with each other and other board components and some cards/chips don't get along. Even Intel chipsets have this problem.

However, if you get a lot of pops/clicks/static out of the sound card, you will need to get the VIA PCI Latency Patch. Some VIA boards have poorly written BIOSs that configure the chipset wrong.

swaaye wrote:

Yeah you will often need to juggle cards around to figure out where they are happy. The PCI slots share resources with each other and with some types of onboard components. Some cards/chips do not get along.

What is odd though is that the card is completely missing from the device manager upon reboot; I always remembered that it would still show up, but it would say its disabled with a IRQ conflict. Would a IRQ issue make the card (and its associated hardware) just not show up?

Hudson187 wrote:

Would a IRQ issue make the card (and its associated hardware) just not show up?

Yup it does happen. This is where as mentioned you can watch the power on test screen for the PNP card listing. If there's no "multimedia device" (the sound card usually) the card is not working properly most likely because of a device conflict. Moving it to a different PCI slot will resolve this.

My Abit BF6 (440BX) is extremely picky about this sort of thing. I have a MX300 myself and it is trouble on this board if in the wrong slot. NICs, IDE cards and other sound cards are also problematic like this.

I wish I wasn't at work now so I could go home and try this! 🤣

Tried the PCI config setup and that still did not work. I am going to try and re-flash the bios to a version behind and see if that fixes it.

Flashed bios to older rev and still nothing in bios boot (hitting pause to stop the boot screen). Card might be defective... going to try another MX300.

OK -- so I just tried another MX300 card and the bios did not find that one. I don't think the board likes the sound card! Any other suggestions? I think I'm going to try and disable USB, then if that doesn't work try to remove the NIC and V2's to see if that helps.

Took the NIC out and the sound card is found! Going to mess around and see if I can get both working...