Thanks Brian. :-)

walt, what are the specs for your harddisk. Speed and cachezize of the harddisk are also important things to keep in mind. if your harddisk is too slow than your system is always waiting for more information (like textures) from that harddisk. also take a look in the system manager if your harddisk is running in UDMA-5 mode and also try to disable the full hardware acceleration of your soundcard, try to set it back to basic acceleration, this is done either in the system manager or with dxdiag (through start -> run -> dxdiag). Full hardware acceleration of sound is also a big performance hog. Another advice regarding your audigy is to take a look in the documenation of your mainboard to check which pci slot shares the same irq line with the agp port (graphic card)or which pci slots do share any irq line and put the audigy in a slot that doesn

I seem to get nasty sounding crashes every once in a while and am pretty sure its a hardware issue. That could be my problem, the same assigned IRQ port as the graphics card... Thanks for the tip!

>walt, what are the specs for your harddisk. Speed and>cachezize of the harddisk are also important things to keep in>mind. if your harddisk is too slow than your system is always>waiting for more information (like textures) from that>harddisk. also take a look in the system manager if your>harddisk is running in UDMA-5 mode and also try to disable the>full hardware acceleration of your soundcard, try to set it>back to basic acceleration, this is done either in the system>manager or with dxdiag (through start -> run -> dxdiag). Full>hardware acceleration of sound is also a big performance hog.>Another advice regarding your audigy is to take a look in the>documenation of your mainboard to check which pci slot shares>the same irq line with the agp port (graphic card)or which pci>slots do share any irq line and put the audigy in a slot that>doesn

Hi Walt, your HD probably accepts UDMA5-mode aka 100MB/s. Mode5 is equally and probably what your mainboard can do max. A question, did you install the 'Intel Application Accelerator' (IAA) or 'Ultra ATA Storage Driver' for your chipset/system? Case not, perhaps head over to Intel's or Dell's support site and check this out. The right one for your sys should help big times. Hope this adds to thoughts. Good luck and kind regards Jaap >>DirectX 9.0b<< Re-reading, I noticed you mention DX9.0b, perhaps update to 9.0c too?

>Hi Walt, your HD probably accepts UDMA5-mode aka 100MB/s.>Mode5 is equally and probably what your mainboard can do max.>A question, did you install the 'Intel Application>Accelerator' (IAA) or 'Ultra ATA Storage Driver' for your>chipset/system? Case not, perhaps head over to Intel's or>Dell's support site and check this out. The right one for your>sys should help big times. Hope this adds to thoughts. Good>luck and kind regards >>Jaap >>>>>DirectX 9.0b<< >>Re-reading, I noticed you mention DX9.0b, perhaps update to>9.0c too? Thanks for the info, Jaap. I don't think I've updated my system BIOS since I bought it. I did it once before with my old system, guess I should look into it again.(I've got courage when it comes to most PC tinkering, but messing with the BIOS always makes my knees shake ;-) )I didn't know there was a DirectX 9.0c available. Maybe it was installed when I installed XP SP2? I'll have to check.Thanks again.-- Walt

You're welcome, Walt. While a bios upgrade never hurts, I was refering to additional chipset drivers (beyond Intel's 'inf' files) to properly enable your chipset's UDMA features. Afaik they should be listed in the software section of your OS, if installed. You should see either of the two I mentioned. To check your DX-status, simply run 'dxdiag' from the 'Run' command. Good luck again and kind regards again Jaap

>You're welcome, Walt. While a bios upgrade never hurts, I was>refering to additional chipset drivers (beyond Intel's 'inf'>files) to properly enable your chipset's UDMA features. Afaik>they should be listed in the software section of your OS, if>installed. You should see either of the two I mentioned. Hi Jaap,I've got DirectX and my system BIOS updated, but I'm still trying to figure out how to enable my chipset's UDMA features.Dell's website doesn't offer any soft upgrades for my system that (directly) addresses this. You say that the UDMA features should be listed in the "software section" of my OS--do you mean in the Device Manager? or maybe in Add/Remove Programs?FYI, here are some of my HD details:Intel® 82801BA Bus Master IDE ControllerMaxtor 6Y120P0 114.4Gb WDC WD1200JB-75CRA0 111.7GbThanks again for all your help.-- WaltFlying FS9.1 at 1600x1200x32Intel Pentium 4, 2.0 GHzWindows XP Pro SP2512MB PC800 RDRAM,8100128MB ATI Radeon 9600 ProATI Catalyst Windows XP 4.11 video driverDirectX 9.0cViewSonic P95f+ 19 inch Ultrabrite CRT MonitorSound Blaster Audigy2 ZSCreative I-Trigue 2.1 3300 SpeakersMS ForceFeedback 2 joystick

Ok Walt!! Since you mentioned your FlyTendo and RAM-type, I'm presuming you have an Intel i850 or i850E chipset. Case so, check this page and install the according 'Intel

Hi Jaap,Thank you very much for all of your invaluable help and assitance! I'm slowly coming up to speed here, but I think I'm beginning to catch up to what you've been talking about.Per your link to Intel, I've installed the latest chipset drivers and the IAA. Not smelling any smoke yet, so that's a good sign ;).The IAA is pretty slick. :-) One question: The IAA reports that my Current Transfer Mode is UDMA-2, but that the user-configurable Transfer Mode Limit is "No Limit". I assume that's where I want it, right? I'm going to stop here for now and take FS9 for a spin tomorrow and let you know what happens.Thanks again!-- Walt

Great stuff Walt, you're welcome Nevermind when smoke starts to come out of your FlyTendo, it's a positive signal!! Hehe Just for the record, my favourite Intel chipsets are still everything from the i815s to i850s. They're (usually!) so slick and easy to install. Now, regarding your question, your HDs should be reporting UDMA5 which is equal to 100MB/s. Not sure about 'No Limit' mention. UDMA2 (aka 33MB/s) is the proper speed for your CD-ROM and that of HDs from the Pentium2 aera... Did you check the 'EnableUdma66' and 'EnableBigLba' registry entries before you proceeded? Both should be set to '1' (enabled). Anyway, the IAA and WinXP-SP2 will more or less do it for you afaik. Also -very important- are you certain you have an intact 80-pin IDE-cable connected to the HDs? Finally, another method might be, to remove your primary and secondary IDE channel in the 'Device Manager' and let the machine reboot, so your system re-installs everything automatically. Perhaps check this page to start enabling UDMA to the max (you're almost there!) and case what I've written didn't help: http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/device/storage/ide-dma.mspxOr here: http://www.mdgx.com/xp.htm#WXPOr here: http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_abc.htmOr here: http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp.htmHope this helps, again good luck and kind regards Jaap

Hi Jaap,>Now, regarding your question, your HDs should be reporting>UDMA5 which is equal to 100MB/s. Not sure about 'No Limit'>mention. UDMA2 (aka 33MB/s) is the proper speed for your>CD-ROM and that of HDs from the Pentium2 aera... Yep, my HDs appear to be stuck at UDMA-2. The IAA won't let me select anything faster. :(>Did you check the 'EnableUdma66' and 'EnableBigLba' registry>entries before you proceeded? Both should be set to '1'> (enabled). Anyway, the IAA and WinXP-SP2 will more or less do>it for you afaik. Haven't messed with the Registry yet, but I'm not afraid to. >Also -very important- are you certain you have an intact>80-pin IDE-cable connected to the HDs? Purty dern sure, unless something has pulled loose. The connections are plenty snug enough, at least. (I hate opening my box.)>Finally, another method might be, to remove your primary and>secondary IDE channel in the 'Device Manager' and let the>machine reboot, so your system re-installs everything>automatically. I make a note of it.>Perhaps check this page to start enabling UDMA to the max> (you're almost there!) and case what I've written didn't help:>http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/device/storage/ide-dma.mspx>>Or here: http://www.mdgx.com/xp.htm#WXP>>Or here: http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_abc.htm>>Or here: http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp.htmOnce again, A BIG THANK YOU for all the help! :)I'll let you know what happens.-- Walt

You're welcome Walt and thanks for your kind remarks Anyway, if you were able to get rid of those texture reloads at least one BIG goal was accomplished. Sometimes, OS-mentions aren't precise... Indeed let us know what happened. Cheers Best to you and kind regards Jaap

>Did you check the 'EnableUdma66' and 'EnableBigLba' registry>entries before you proceeded? Both should be set to '1'> (enabled). Anyway, the IAA and WinXP-SP2 will more or less do>it for you afaik. FYI, full searches of my Registry turn up neither EnableUdma66 nor EnableBigLba.As always, thanks! :-) -- Walt

Okay, I contacted Dell customer support and it's their take that my system won't support UDMA-5. Best it can muster is UDMA-2. ;( While I don't ever accept Dell as the last word in anything, all other evidence points to the same conclusion. Here's a link they sent me:http://www.pcguide.com/ref/hdd/if/ide/modesUDMA-c.htmlThanks again Jaap and everyone else for your assitance! I've resolved some issues, optimized my system, and now I know what to look for in my next system.-- Walt