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Troubleshooting:
My experiment stops in the middle!
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This problem can arise after a hard disk has been
replaced/reformatted and Windows and the Gamry software have been reloaded, or
when a Potentiostat is moved to a new (or at least different!) computer.
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Symptom:
An
experiment may unexpectedly stop in the middle. Pressing
"Pause" and then "Continue" causes the experiment to
resume. At the completion of the experiment, the status line at the bottom of the runner window contains the
message "Interrupt Overrun."
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Cause:
An interrupt is a signal generated by a hardware device such as a Gamry
potentiostat which tells the computer that the device requires attention.
Gamry potentiostats generate interrupts whenever a data point has been
acquired. If the computer cannot read that data from the potentiostat before
the next data point is taken, an "Interrupt Overrun" error occurs.
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Solutions:
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Turn off display hardware
acceleration.
From the Control Panel select
Windows 98: Display -> Settings -> Advanced
Properties -> Performance.
Windows 2000: Display -> Settings -> Advanced -> Troubleshooting
Windows XP: Display -> Settings -> Advanced -> Troubleshoot
Set the Hardware Acceleration slider to
"None".
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Check
that no other device is using the Gamry Potentiostat's IRQ.
 Open
the Device Manager from the Control Panel by selecting:
Windows XP: Performance and Maintenance -> System
-> Hardware -> Device Manager
Highlight the computer icon at the top of the list and then click
View/Resources by Type. Selecting IRQ will bring up a list of the possible
interrupts and the device assigned to them. The Gamry PC4
Potentiostat family can use IRQ values 5, 10, 11, and 15. Interrupt
5 or 10 is preferred. Make sure that no other device is assigned to
the Gamry's IRQ. The Gamry Potentiostat will not appear in this
list. If another device is using the desired interrupt, such as a
sound card or network card, it must moved to another interrupt, or
physically removed
from the computer.
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Reserve
the IRQ as a "Legacy IRQ"
This requires changing the settings of your computer's Bios. When
your computer is booting up, a special key should allow you access to your
computer's Bios settings. The boot screen generally tells you which
key. Often this is the Delete key (DEL) or the F2 Function key. The Bios setup program
varies quite a bit from computer to computer.
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Turn off Power Management.
Turn
off all the Power Management features so that all portions of your
computer stay powered up at all times. From the Control Panel select
Power Options/Power Schemes. Select
Power Scheme: "Always On"
Turn off Hard Disks: "Never"
System Standby: "Never"
It's OK to turn the monitor off after a time. That
does not interfere with running experiments. It just keeps you from
seeing the results!
On some older computers you may have to re-boot your computer and enter the BIOS setup program (observe
monitor during power-up to determine Hot Key). Go to the Power Management Section and disable all power management
features so that all peripherals stay ON while the computer is ON.
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Disable the Screen Saver.
They can tie the processor up needlessly.
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Disable any Anti-Virus applications.
If this works, try adjusting the application’s settings to
allow for manual scanning only.
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Remove the Network card and its
driver.
Network Interface Cards and their supporting drivers may also play
a part in inducing interrupt overruns. You should remove the NIC driver
completely to see if it is causing the problem. Heterogeneous networks
with more than two protocol stacks are notoriously balky. Also try getting
the latest NIC drivers from your vendor.
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Remove unneeded background applications
Often
there are background utilities that are running while the Gamry Framework is running.
Use
Ctrl-Alt-Delete to bring up a task list. OSA.EXE and FINDFAST.EXE often interfere with interrupts.
These are installed as part of the Microsoft Office Standard
Installation and automatically start when Windows finishes loading. OSA.EXE is responsible for loading the Microsoft Office shortcut
bar and helping various Microsoft applications load and initialize faster.
FINDFAST.EXE is a notoriously unstable program that indexes
your office files on your fixed drives for full-text content searching.
You
should remove FINDFAST.EXE and OSA.EXE from your Start Up folder. While you’re there, remove the Microsoft Office shortcut as well.
After all, that silly bar just gets in the way most of the time.
Reboot
and check the task list again. It
should be much cleaner.
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Give up!
If you still have a problem -- you can call Gamry so we can try to figure out the problem.
If it is a machine not purchased from Gamry, there will be a repair
charge. You must send the
machine with all of its hardware. No
fair leaving out the culprit that is causing the problem.
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Gamry
Instruments © 1997-2005
Last
revised on Monday, August 21, 2006
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