Re: Ion Fury Aftershock on Oct 2nd

Posted on 2023-10-27, 18:07

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Release Announcements

in Release Announcements

Indeed, the level design is phenomenal, all the little details (and especially inside jokes like "build engine" section in the mall level) and interative elements that were the hallmark of a build engine game. But I feel like something is really amiss (both in original and expansion) and I think it …

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Re: Nvidia adaptergate

Posted on 2022-11-06, 20:10

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Milliways

in Milliways

I'll keep my 3070 for quite some time and watch how it all unfolds. I was somewhat skeptical of the new connector prior already, particularly after they announced power draw of 4090. Seeing both FE and AIB cooler designs it's all just getting very silly at this point. Ridiculously big and stupidly …

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Re: Using a Roland JP-8000 for vintage games

Posted on 2022-09-05, 19:20

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Roland JP-8000 is a VA (virtual analog) synthesizer, but as mentioned it's not GM/GS, it is mono-timbral, and it won't work for MIDI game music playback. But yeah, enjoy supersaw oscillator, the quintessential sound of trance music. Now JV/XV series of synthesizers is a different topic, some (if not …

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Re: AWE64 Legacy

Posted on 2022-07-25, 15:21

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Got one. Looks nice and clean, I like switch descriptions on the back. But yeah, got to be careful with those switches. Perhaps just use bottom ISA slot, if available, and may be avoid having anything below it. awe64legacy_box_top.jpg awe64legacy_box_bottom.jpg awe64legacy.jpg awe64legacy_01.jpg

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Re: AWE64 Legacy

Posted on 2022-07-24, 17:32

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Yep. Ready to buy. PM sent.

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Re: SC-55 Japanese import vs Dreamblaster X2GS

Posted on 2022-05-03, 08:55

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

SC-55 uses external power supply (9V, center negative). You can use a modern one, like Roland PSB-1U. No issues at all, I use one. Be aware that SC-88 models use internal power supply.

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Re: Did you create maps for games?

Posted on 2022-04-09, 15:34

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by Tree Wyrm

in Milliways

in Milliways

I've made some maps back in the day. The first editor I used was Lode Runner built-in editor for ZX Spectrum. Once I got PC it was Wolfenstein 3D and few other games. Making maps for Doom and Heretic was cumbersome until a better crop of editors appeared like WadAuthor. Then it was Duke3D and I used …

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Re: Fortex: Vortex2+YMF744

Posted on 2022-03-26, 12:09

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Looking forward to this! Aureal Vortex cards were always my favorite at that time. Would love to buy assembled board when it's done. As I understand this is essentially a Vortex2 card with real YMF for genuine OPL FM (instead of crappy software emulation Vortex cards had), right? Time to dig up a …

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Re: People underestimate hardware they have and it's annoying

Posted on 2022-03-25, 13:16

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

What a fun little thread there. But yeah, there is a bit of familiar sense that's been gnawing for some time. Not to the extent that retro computers are of practical use, while they're fun to tinker with I'm under no illusion that I could use my old socket 7 system as a daily driver. That being said …

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2022-03-24, 10:53

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

This is my anectodal experience. I'd be happy to know if any figures exist that could shed light into the penetration of MT-32 or Sound Canvas as a gaming peripheral. I doubt there is, though. While neither MT-32 or SoundCanvas my old PC (dad's) had SB16 CT1770 SCSI with WaveBlaster (first one, not …

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Re: An analysis of Warcraft 2 MIDI music on Roland synthesizers

Posted on 2022-02-05, 13:17

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

I always preferred Warcraft 2 soundtrack on SC-88 (but then again I tend to favor 88 over 55 most of the time anyway even if I know it was a different model used to compose). Not sure if Glenn Stafford composed it on SC-88 but it definitely was some Sound Canvas.

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Re: VGA Capture Thread

Posted on 2021-12-02, 11:18

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

Check if there's any of those PCIe x1 slots is linked to CPU and not chipset, it might help. GPU going through chipset is never going to be good performance. But yeah, E1(S) is a 4x slot card, but it may work with 1x slot too, albeit limiting bandwidth is probably going to limit what maximum …

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Re: Roland sound module dc adaptor

Posted on 2021-10-28, 12:47

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

daisychaining power for audio devices is bad practice, ideally you want each device on it's own isolated power supply. in reality though, it might not have much impact... but then again, it also might. Doesn't have impact for me, saves a lot of space too. Ones I listed are all 9v 500mA devices with …

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Re: Roland sound module dc adaptor

Posted on 2021-10-28, 10:07

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Get a modern Roland PSB power supply, it's 9v 2a, more than enough to power multiple devices through daisy chain. I've got one and it's sufficient to power MT-32, SC-55, MPU-105 switch and M10-MX mixer.

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Re: Voyetra Sequencer says: "Sound Blaster cannot receive and transmit MIDI simultaneously."

Posted on 2020-12-01, 11:55

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

You may need MIDI splitter/multiplier that takes one MIDI input and duplicates it to multiple outputs. A step above there are also MIDI routers that provide control over what goes where, but they also tend to be more expensive.

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Re: VGA Capture Thread

Posted on 2020-11-21, 20:05

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

I am wondering if someone could recommend an ideal PCIE VGA capture card for the purpose of playing games - not capturing/recording them? In other words, retro machine outputs VGA to the capture card, which then turns up in a window (perhaps streamed by VLC) on the modern host machine. I made VCS …

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Re: VGA Capture Thread

Posted on 2020-11-17, 15:53

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

Yeah, we're quite lucky those used professional cards are available at such affordable prices on ebay, while supply hadn't been exhausted yet it's not unlimited either. E2S is just a dual-head full height PCIe card, it is the same as E1S in every other regard. There was a sale of those a year ago at …

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Re: WP32 McCake : MT32 compatible waveblaster board

Posted on 2020-11-17, 12:21

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Ah, MT32 emulator via RPi on waveblaster board. Ought to be quite useful considering MT32s continue to rise in price. Even though I have one I still want this one, if only to tinker with it. What's next, CM-500 on WB? Like this with Yucatan FX in one board (and sysex to switch between MT32 and GM …

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Re: VGA Capture Thread

Posted on 2020-09-25, 13:30

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

Yeah, well, that's analog VGA capturing, it was never going to be easy. We are lucky though there are good solutions, like aforementioned Datapath cards. I think I have G450 PCI with DVI as well, though being a recent item I got I haven't been able to give it a good test run yet. In my experience …

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Re: VGA Capture Thread

Posted on 2020-09-08, 12:45

by

by Tree Wyrm

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

You can feed either digital or analog signal to Datapath cards with DVI input, no need for any special cables, just a decent VGA cable and passive converter to DVI-I. Might get confusing if video card has both analog and digital video output through DVI, in which case it will default to digital …

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