Sound card hosing my computer... I'm grounded.

[Nash]

Woe is me. Hopefully someone here has ran into this and knows what to do.

Out of the blue, when I boot up the computer, I get an error message just as it gets to my desktop that says "msgserv caused an exception 10H in module devcon32.dll"... then a complete freeze.

At work I searched the net and found out it was related to my sound card (SoundBlaster Live). What they say to do on the Creative website is: Start in safe mode, disable sound card in the device manager, reboot, reinstall sound software, reboot, activate the card in the device manager and reboot again.

I've done this now I don't know how many times (and it's a loooong process). No joy. So I yank out alla my sound software, then re-installed Windows (grrr), then re-installed my sound software. When I enable it in the device manager, it starts up and works, and I can hear sound... but when I reboot with the card activated, I get that damned error message again. So I reboot in safe mode, disable the sound card, reboot again, get on the net, get an updated driver from creative and install it, then reboot with the card activated.....and I get that FREAKING ERROR MESSAGE AGAIN.... then freeze.

Add to this that I can't use my joystick without the sound card being activated. Nor can I seem to run AH with sound off due to it's connection with RW.

I'm hooped!

Has anyone run into this? I've completely exhasuted everything I can think of to do. If you've got *any* suggestion of what might help I'd be grateful.... like I said, I'm stumped.

And grounded...

[Westy]

I went to www.hotbot.com  and did a generic web search for devcon32.dll and I had alot of returns. Here's one to start:
 http://computing.net/windows95/wwwboard/forum/10970.html

 Try www.hotbot.com  or www.lycos.com,  do search and start weeding through the sites till you find the answer or someone posts a possible fix? Good luck.

 -Westy

[Tac]

If you are using windows 98 or 95, I hope you FORMATTED the hard disk before you reinstalled windows.

NEVER EVER install windows over itself. You will fek yer system up.

If you using win98 and still have that problem put the win98 cd in the cd rom. Go to START ->FIND->Files or Folders and search for devcon32.dll. Write down the directory its in.Then go to START, RUN type in sfc and press enter

Select EXTRACT ONE FILE FROM INSTALLATION DISK, type in the file that is giving you that error message. When you find it (if its a windows file, not a SBLIVE file) just follow the wizard and copy the file from the cd into the directory its supposed to be in (remember you wrote it down when you SEARCHED it). Overwrite file.

Restart system and try it out.

If its still fubard and you dont want to format the hard disk, then uninstall the sound card completely and re-install it (be sure to reboot after the uninstall, then install it then reboot again).


If it fails, do a complete fdisk and format. Better to be safe than sorry (plus your system will run better after it). If you get to this point let me know, I can give ye the details on how to do it.

Good luck!

-Tac-
PC Tech Support
(warning you NEVER to buy Compaq, Packard Bell or GATEWAY!).

[Mark Luper]

It also sounds like an IRQ conflict to me. Go to start\programs\accessories\system tools\system information. Click on Hardware resources then IRQ's. See if something else is using the same IRQ. If it is then you can RIGHT click My Computer\properties\device manager and click on your sound card in the Sound, Video and Game controllers section. Click on properties there and see if you can change the resources as it applies to IRQ's.

This may not be your problem, but that is what it sounds like to me.

[SKurj]

Try placin the soundcard in a different PCI slot too..

AKskurj

[Nash]

 

If it fails, do a complete fdisk and format. Better to be safe than sorry (plus your system will run better after it). If you get to this point let me know, I can give ye the details on how to do it.

Ok....it's gotten to that point.  

 I haven't formatted before... details would indeed be welcome Tac.

[Westy]

 What kind of hard drive and what OS (Win98,win95, etc) are you running?

 (more tommorow. i'm out of time)

-Westy

[bloom25]

There is one very last thing you can try.  I wouldn't recommend it unless you are at the end of your rope though.  (Note: You only have 5 days total to do this at the max.)

Start the computer in Msdos mode.  Type regedit \restore.  Unless I told you the wrong command  , you should see a list of available registry backups from the last 5 days.  Pick the earliest one and Windows will pretty much go "back in time" to that point.  If you are lucky all modified drivers and files will be the way they were.  If you aren't lucky, well, you will probably have to reformat.

Good Luck!  



------------------
bloom25
THUNDERBIRDS

[Nash]

I got it werkin!!

Since I figured I had a bit of time still till I learned abit more about reformatting (haven't done that before - relatively new to PCs, actually).... I figured I'd try a few more things.

So I went back and read that link Westy posted... there were like, 50 messages on that board about people having the same problem. I kid you not - it wasn't until the second to last post... a guy gave a link to a certain version of a Devcon.dll file. Turns out all I had to do was toss that in my windows folder.

I'm baaacck!

Thanks fer all yer help, guys. I totally appreciate it! I had no idea about IRQ conflicts or restoring the regestry etc. Helluhvah learning process. Thanks again - it was totally nice of you guys to help.

<S>

[Eagler]

Yep, as Westy mentioned, if you can get net access and do a newsgroup search with your problem or error as the keywords, it may take a little digging, but 9 times out of 10 you'll find the fix.

Eagler

[Westy]

Well, this was a happy ending story       <S>

 -Westy

[bowser]

I have to echo what Eagler said..there are tons of forums, etc. out there with the answers, or you can just use a search engine.  Though I know their intentions are good...I cringe ever time I see someone recommend a format, knowing how much work is involved.  
Below are two links I use a lot, the first one had a fix for this particular problem.  Maybe others can post other useful links?
 http://discussions.hardwarecentral.com/Forum1/HTML/000624.html
 http://search.support.microsoft.com/kb/c.asp?FR=0&SA=GN&LNG=ENG

bowser

[Tac]

Yep. Format only as a last resort. I dont particularly trust those "fix it" sites. If a DLL in your system got fediddleed up its very likely that a LOT more DLLS are fediddleed up as well.

Thats why win98 has cfg (go to start->run->sfc and pop the win98 cd and extract the faulty dll file from the windows cd.

I prefer to format than to waste a day or 2 trying to find out wtf is wrong with the system... I keep all the stuff I want to backup in a CD-R so I know my format/reinstall of windows will only take me 20 minutes and after it I will be MUCH better off (formats are really healthy for systems... do one every time you change your toothbrush!).

[sprint]

TAC ... I just reinstalled Win98 without any
problems.*** I renamed a file by the name of IEMIGRAT.DLL to iemigratold.dll, and reinstalled. I got that tip from a friend and he got it from the Microsoft Knowledge Base in article Q250928 reviewed Jan31/2000, but checking that article now I see they've removed that advice, so I'm not sure
how relevant it is now. The article was reviewed Jan3/2001.. so it's pretty
recently that they've pulled those instructions. You can see for yourself:
 http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/Q250/9/28.ASP?LN=EN-US&SD=gn&FR=0

***  I pretty much copied my friend email that he sent to me ..I'm just passing along info that helped me.

 
sprint