Changing the IRQ in XP

Some card have jumper settings on the card, also look in the bios and see it you can change the IRQ there. Second try booting in safe mode and see if it lets you then.

XP does not have any option for changing the assigned IRQ.

Unless you are having a problem with either device, the shared IRQ should not be an issue.

On my PC, I have 7 devices using IRQ 9 with no conflicts or issues.

Network, video, Sound card, USB, IDE controller, and my Modem are all on IRQ9.

There is one possible way to force an IRQ change.

You need to move your plug-in cards to different slots and / or assign a specific IRQ to a specific slot in BIOS settings.
CAUTION: if you do force an IRQ assignment make sure to use an IRQ that Windows is NOT using for another device.

Chas

try looking in the BIOS at boot and at the PnP settings.
By default these are set to AUTO but in some BIOS you can set a slot a specific IRQ
Else try setting in in the OS via safe mode boot.

I'm afraid Chas is right, XP offers VERY limited ways of changing IRG settings.
Set the HD as slave with another HD, manually select HD settings in BIOS and see if you are able to access this way.
Sounds like the HD is about on it's last spin. Good Luck

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