Audio playback hicks up after 4/5 secs with AC97 chipset

Hi,

I have recently bought a Soltek SL-86SPE-L motherboard with on-board AC97
audio codec. I'm very pleased with it, except for one very annoying sound
problem:

When I play any multimedia file (this can be any file type, such as wav, mp3
or even a MIDI file), the playback stops or hicks up for a while after
approximately 4 seconds. The processor usage peeks for a moment (not more
than 1 second), and after that, the playback continues without further
problems.

The problem occurs in every media player, even in the speaker test of the
AC97 configuration program shipped with the motherboard.

My system looks as follows:
- Soltek SL-86SPE-L motherboard
- Intel Pentium IV 2.8 Ghz with HyperThreading (also enabled in the BIOS)
- 2x 256Mb DDRAM (333Mhz)
- Cleanly installed Windows XP Professional with SP1
- Maxtor 60Gb hard drive
- No virus scanner

I have tried it both with the drivers shipped with the motherboard and with
the laters drivers I've got from the Internet.

Does anybody have any suggestions?

Thanks in advance,

Steven Verstrepen