Resource Failures and Conflicts for Non-Plug and Play hardware in Windows NT
Hardware: Legacy DAQ Devices
Problem: I am getting one of the following messages when trying to configure my DAQ board:
"Board is not Responding to the Base Address"
"Board is not Responding to the IRQ Level"
"Board is not Responding to the First DMA Channel"
How can I troubleshoot these errors?
Solution: First, see the following KB to check the available resources in your computer:
KnowledgeBase 40GBJ1E1: Available Hardware Resources under Windows NT
Base Address Dip Switch Settings
- You will get a "Board is not Responding to the Base Address" message, if your dip switch settings don't match with NI-DAQ.
- Check your board manual for information on how to set the dip switches on the board. An illustration is shown below:
Example diagram from the manual:
| Switch Settings |
Base I/O Address (hex) |
Base I/O Address space used (hex) |
| A9 |
A8 |
A7 |
A6 |
A5 |
| 1 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
220 |
220-23 |

Corresponding dip switches settings on the board:

Interrupt Request Level (IRQ) Settings
- You will get a "Board is not Responding to the IRQ Level" message, if your IRQ jumper settings don't match with NI-DAQ.
- Most boards will accept only certain IRQ levels. Please check your board manual for the valid IRQ levels. You can also download the manual from our Product Manuals Library.
Direct Memory Access (DMA) Settings
- You will get a "Board is not Responding to the First DMA Channel" message, if your DMA jumper settings don't match with NI-DAQ.
- Most boards needs more than one DMA channels for best performance. The order in which you assign the DMA channels; ie., DMA Channel A, DMA Channel B .. in NI-DAQ should match with the jumper settings on the board. Check your board manual.
DMA Channel A: "6" (Lower Two Rows - R6, A6)
DMA Channel B: "7" (Upper Two Rows - R7, A7)
- Most of our boards accept only 16-bit DMA channels (5, 6, 7). You will get an error for other DMA channels.
Related Links:
Attachments:
- addswit.JPG
- dmajump.JPG
- jumpers.JPG
Report Date: 08/17/2006
Last Updated: 08/25/2006
Document ID: 40GCS4E1