Dae error 9019/9031

"i set my system up the way digidesign says to" USB drives are very clearly warned against. Externals must be firewire.

And firewire externals must have an approved chipset and the firewire controller on the motherboard must have an approved chipset. If you can go eSATA that may solve some of your problems. The fact you have a Dell and Sandra could not determine your chipset model doesn't bode well. Dells are not usually the best for Pro Tools and their firewire controllers are sketchy to say the least. Cheers,

ok thanks. so if i buy another external hard drive (eSata) firewire....then i should be ok?

^^^All good thoughts, observations and advice.^^^

i dont have dual boot. i was about to do that but changed my mind. i just named the drives "xp" and "vista". but everything is vista. the vista drive is just my back up "d" drive. "xp" is my c drive.my mybook drive isnt used for anything but for other files. the drive thats named "shaunandrew" is the one i just changed from FAT32 to NTFS so i can record off an external hard drive. but i guess now it isnt worth using. i do have a firewire card that i had purchased about a year ago from the guitar center for my other computer, but when i tried to install it in this new computer i have...there wasnt anywhere to put it. so i've been stuck with the firewire that dell installed. where do i go from this point? do i have a 3 month old computer thats worth nothing?? well....only if im using protools...

What are you using for a firewire CONTROLLER? The drive, as mentioned above, is only half the equation. "the firewire controller on the motherboard must have an approved chipset." Dell FW controllers have a nice reputation for NOT working with Pro Tools.

Right, are you using that VIA controller? They have big problems with PT.