How to identify ANY mysterious “PCI Device”

. Tuesday, August 18, 2009
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I get a lot of request to assist people with different pcs – from self built white boxes, laptops and netbooks to help them to identify and install right drivers for the “PCI Device”

To really help yourself guys and girls, just do couple of simple steps before asking for help.

Open your device manager and look for details tab on than “PCI Device” (Check out for Sample here)
Write down Hardware ID Tab info (or copy/paste it) into site below:

http://www.pcidatabase.com/

In example above note the first line:
PCI\VEN_1106&DEV_3059&SUBSYS_140117F2

In this specific example there is a hint, Windows was able to guess it’s Multimedia-audio controller, but lets do more scientific approach.

VEN stands for vendor and numbers after underscore are 1106. Quick search in database reveals its VIA Technology, but device search is even more detailed – 3059 – Notice the third line from top (Vendor ID 0x1106 – Via Technology). Also take a note of 3 last entries mentioning AC’97 Audio controller, since it’s probably what we looking for anyhow, but lets not jump the horse yet.

Click on the vendor name links and just scroll down till you find your device id (or just search for it :)

and there you go, device ID 0x3059 refers to VIA South Bridge VT8235.

VIA provides special website for drivers/final users support – ViaArena.com and few clicks – Drivers/Audio brings us to this page – and right there second line from top is our here – VT8235 or as Via calls it - VIA Vinyl Audio.

Enjoy!

DFI Lanpary NF4 SPD/IF in Windows 7/Vista

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I’m still happen to be one of these old fools who think investing hefty amount of money should help to last your pc longer times without updates (given smart choices of course) and the motherboard in title is still powering my main pc running o/ced x2 3800 at humble (nowadays) 2.4Ghz. Not much, but still plenty for day to day stuff, even some occasional game or two.

My Windows XP was getting old and decided to put a new OS – its was long overdue.
Windows 7 Ultimate is the natural choice, since I got access to MSDN version of current RTM – basically same one you’d buy at store then it’s official out.

Install went without any glitches, with only a couple small driver issues, and one of them was Windows 7 recognized my onboard sound as Nvidia audio codec – given my chipset it Nvidia nForce4 – sound worked out of the box and most people won't even bother ever messing with it, except it was limited only to analog input/output and only stereo.

I use my creative card to process my day to day audio like windows sounds etc, but since it’s lacking real digital output – SPD/IF – I use the outboard sound card to output sound to my home theater.

DFI Lanpary NF4-Ultra used Realtek ALC850 audio codec, and in addition to “Karajan” module (basically slightly isolated 8 channel audio output) got coaxial SDP/IF Input and Output on board, which Windows 7 refused to utilize.

Initially my fight with drivers was fruitless and Realtek High Definition audio didn’t seam to fix the issue…

The fix:

Self Slap on forehead !!! ALC850 isn’t HD Codec, but AC/97 !!!!

Realtek does provide AC/97 for Vista/7 32/64 bit. Just install them, ignore the compatibility warnings and it’ll work fine.

p.s: Don’t bug for links, ffs just Google Realtek