Z60m and firewire soundcard?

[Jungel]

Hi everyone! New to this forum, and thinking about buying a Z60m for music production with a firewire soundcard, specifically the M-Audio Firewire 1814. I'll be using Cakewalk Sonar 4 or 5 for audio recording and soft-synths.

The big question is: Will the Z60m do a good job? Do any of you use it for music production? The specs are more than good enough, especially with 1 or 2 gigs of RAM, but the problem I've encountered on my current TP is the IRQ-sharing in WinXP, that basically places my soundcard, video card and usb-ports on the same IRQ, causing big problems with pops, crackles and cpu-peaks/dropouts during audio recording.

Hope to hear from anyone who's using the Z60m successfully as a DAW!

[bmwtecandy]

I run my Z60t with Traktor 2 F/S to there scratch amp which is basicly a firewire soundcard. My specs are 2.0M/1.5gb memory/XP pro. I did have problems in the beginning with it dropping out the firewire signal. I removed the battery from the laptop and ran it like that for about 7 hours the other night with no hickups. My processor runs at about 25% on a full load.. Hope this helps


-Andy

[Jungel]

I run my Z60t with Traktor 2 F/S to there scratch amp which is basicly a firewire soundcard. My specs are 2.0M/1.5gb memory/XP pro. I did have problems in the beginning with it dropping out the firewire signal. I removed the battery from the laptop and ran it like that for about 7 hours the other night with no hickups. My processor runs at about 25% on a full load.. Hope this helps


-Andy

Thanks, that was pretty interesting info! I've never thought about the battery causing any problems... Perhaps I should try that trick with my T41 before buying a new thinkpad!

But you say that you had problems with the firewire signal dropping out. Unless I just misunderstand you, that sounds more like a problem with the drivers or something than a problem with performance, doesn't it? I've never had any problems with the fw dropping out, and the sound card is perfectly stable, it just makes popping noises when I try to record audio, and suddenly the CPU will peak and the sound drops out.

[bmwtecandy]

Nevermind....... It dropped out alot last night. Removing the battery was supposed to keep the CPU running at full power, rather than having it change power based on use. So i guess i need help too. Any idea how to make firewire higher up on the windows list of priorities. I dont think that you are going to have a problem with processing power and the faster bus speeds on the new units should make a diffrence. Although, you might want to think about dual core. Really proccesor intensive editing is probably alot more of a load than what i am doing. Let me know what i can do and ill test my unit out with waht you are doing. I think im gonna call lenovo today when im done with this hangover.

[Jungel]

Nevermind....... It dropped out alot last night. Removing the battery was supposed to keep the CPU running at full power, rather than having it change power based on use. So i guess i need help too. Any idea how to make firewire higher up on the windows list of priorities. I dont think that you are going to have a problem with processing power and the faster bus speeds on the new units should make a diffrence. Although, you might want to think about dual core. Really proccesor intensive editing is probably alot more of a load than what i am doing. Let me know what i can do and ill test my unit out with waht you are doing. I think im gonna call lenovo today when im done with this hangover.

Hmm... Somehow I don't think dual-core will make much of a difference here. After all, I'm using the same equipment (M-Audio Firewire 1814 with Cakewalk Sonar 4) on my 3-4 years old old desktop computer (P4 1,8Ghz, 512 Mb RAM), and it works just fine.

Isn't there anybody out there using IBM Thinkpads for recording, together with a firewire soundcard???

[a31pguy]

To get the CPU to run at full power - all you need to do is adjust the power management drivers and settings in XP. Instead of automatic CPU and bus control - just set to them to off. Control Panel -> Power Options -> Advanced Options (or on the Z60m - Levono Power Manager -> Global Power Options -> Power Management Options -> Advanced)

Then select CPU Power Management to: Disable
PCI Bus Power Management to: Disable

then restart the system.

There is no way to set the firewire to higher priority through XP. It's really the driver that would need to be rewritten. However you can set the priority of the program in task manager to a higher priority at the risk of making your GUI unresponsive.

I was using a PCMCIA audigy sound card for sound recording on my A31p until the card was stolen in a auto burglary. Not the same level as the M-audio card - but similar problems. If firewire is dropping out - I would check for a hardware issue (loose firewire connector or bad cable) then look into the software and see if there is a recommended driver.

You might want to use MSCONFIG or Sysinternals' AUTORUNS to strip your startup programs and streamline your config. Programs running in the background will effect your performance - also - you might want to mute your onboard mic.

[bmwtecandy]

I think i might be having an issue with shared IRQs. Stay tuned and ill let you guys know if i can fix it.

[Am]

I think i might be having an issue with shared IRQs. Stay tuned and ill let you guys know if i can fix it.

found elsewhere on net:

hey Wheelie, here's a copy and paste of the response I got from Lenovo:

"This is the response I got from our Development team. I hope this helps out and if you have any other questions, please let me know.

IRQ of IEEE1394 device is shared with a USB controller
( Intel(R) 82801FB/FBM USB Universal Host Controller - 2659).

Since we don't have 1394 sound card, we can't confirm it, however, the customer may be able to use sound card with USB disabled.
Z60m has three USB port and USB controller-2659 is assigned to the USB port at rear.
He can disable USB controller-2659 in device manager. Even though one port is disabled he can use other two USB port."