Evert wrote:

Thanks for doing this Phil! It would've been nice to see how it drives a Roland MT-32 / SC-55 / SC-88 through SoftMPU, but other than that, great video.

Just like any other card with a MPU401 interface! 100% compatible 😀

philscomputerlab wrote:

Does anyone else have / use this card? What did you think? Any comments?

A few years ago I bought a socket 7 board on ebay and the seller's bundle included this card, I believe it's the same model:

I'm not sure if it was defective or else, but it didn't sound right compared to a normal SoundBlaster - I made comparison recordings of this card, a SB16, and a SB 2.0 and the YMF sounded strange and kind of "out of phase". I tried resetting the drivers many times to default to no avail. Also, I think I wasn't able to disable the WSS interface and this was giving me trouble with a few games, don't remember which ones exactly. I ended up giving the card away.

Specs wise it looks like an ideal replacement for Creative cards but too bad this one didn't work out 🙁

Here is the Prince of Persia theme recorded with this card:

I have the Audician version of this card too and agree that it's interesting and useful, but it never did quite cut the mustard in my experience. I've only tried it in DOS I must admit, and by the time this card was released DOS users probably weren't the target audience anymore, but the DOS mixer isn't very user friendly. And yes the OPL3 output is nice but the FX are dry and lifeless compared to most clones I've tried. If I'm in the market for a clone, then personally I prefer Audiodrives over the 4 or so OPLSAx cards I've tried.

Thanks for the feedback guys!

Got another quick video 😀

Clean CPU Processor remove Thermal Paste

A quick video showing you how you can use Clearwipe, or similar cleaning products for glasses, to remove thermal paste from your CPU / processor and cooler.

I like this solution because Clearwipe is readily available at pharmacies, post office and super market!

badmojo wrote:

(...) the FX are dry and lifeless compared to most clones I've tried.

I'm curious about this statement. I'm not sure what you mean by dry, but i have a Yamaha Audician 32 along with GUS Classic, AWE64 Gold and Pro Audio Studio XL.

The YMF-71x chipsets are capable of 16bit 44KHz mixing, something that Sound Blasters up to the Pro 2 can't do. Then, while they can do the former, all the SB 16's and AWE32's i tried have way more line noise than my Audician 32's, believe it or not. The OPL output from the CT-1747 also sounds a bit harsher on my ears but some people might like it, i have no real gripes with CT-1747's.

The best analog output from SB's come from the AWE64 Gold which is still far from impressive. It is difficult to compare 2 cards on a fly but i have the advantage of using a mixer. So i can compare thm head to head on real time without having to make recordings. Same mixer, same cables, same speakers.

The most silent card in my system is the GUS classic, followed by the Audician 32 and the Pro Audio Studio XL. If you ask me, the Audician 32 still wins versus the XL, as it outputs louder than the XL. To hear hissing from the Audician i have to crank the volume really loud to a point the XL makes pretty much a comparable level of hissing against the former. The GUS Classic is awesome with less hiss than the former cards, and while some people might find it hard to believe, the AWE64 Gold is the card that hisses the most. The AWE64 Gold will however become the best card if one uses SPDIF. But were talking analog output here.

What i am trying to say is the Audician 32 is as nice PCM wise as the PAS XL, or even the AWE Gold. Try some Inertia Player with a true SB Pro 2.0 and then an Audician 32. If one still finds the Audician to be dry, whatever that means, well i guess dry is good. At least on my ears. 😎

carlostex wrote:

badmojo wrote:

(...) the FX are dry and lifeless compared to most clones I've tried.

I'm curious about this statement. I'm not sure what you mean by dry

Less... "coloured", maybe?

Okay a Vibra may be considered a worst-case scenario..

Might do a "speech" roundup again. Did one many years ago, but now I've got more cards. Could be interesting.

Did anyone listen to the recording attached to my previous post? Is it the way this card is supposed to sound?

Sounds like you have this "Ymersion" thing enabled.

philscomputerlab wrote:

Might do a "speech" roundup again. Did one many years ago, but now I've got more cards. Could be interesting.

How about a comparison with PCM music? The bonus level in Jazz Jackrabbit comes to mind...

carlostex wrote:

I'm curious about this statement. I'm not sure what you mean by dry, but i have a Yamaha Audician 32 along with GUS Classic, AWE64 Gold and Pro Audio Studio XL

I'm sorry but 'dry' is the best word I can think of to explain it! I don't know what the 16bits or the 44KHz mean in practical application - i.e. my technical knowledge is non-existent - but using DOOM as my test suite, all 3 of the OPLSAx cards I've tried (701,718,719) produce very clear, but very lifeless FX when compared to most other sounds cards I've tried recently (AWE64, SB Pro2, PAS16, ESS Audiodrive, SB16, etc). Also - from memory - FX in Mortal Kombat were even more hit and miss than usual, and this is a big no no in my book (see my new avatar!)

I'm not trying to be inflammatory - this is just one man's very subjective opinion.

jwt27 wrote:

How about a comparison with PCM music? The bonus level in Jazz Jackrabbit comes to mind...

Was thinking of something newer, like Turrican II. And at least one old game, a classic, like Fate of Atlantis. And maybe Doom.

badmojo wrote:

I'm sorry but 'dry' is the best word I can think of to explain it! I don't know what the 16bits or the 44KHz mean in practical application - i.e. my technical knowledge is non-existent - but using DOOM as my test suite, all 3 of the OPLSAx cards I've tried (701,718,719) produce very clear, but very lifeless FX when compared to most other sounds cards I've tried recently (AWE64, SB Pro2, PAS16, ESS Audiodrive, SB16, etc). Also - from memory - FX in Mortal Kombat were even more hit and miss than usual, and this is a big no no in my book (see my new avatar!)

I'm not trying to be inflammatory - this is just one man's very subjective opinion.

No worries at all, sound cards are a topic that is very dependant on personal tastes.

I will try DOOM with a different mindset now, i can test GUS, AWE64 and PAS XL vs the YMF card. I'll check Mortal Kombat too, although i don't remember having those issues and i think Mortal Kombat is a little iffy on faster systems. As far as i can remember Mortal Kombat and YMF cards worked without any issues on my 386DX-40. But i'm open for putting these cards for a challenge, i might shoot a video too. 😎

carlostex wrote:

I will try DOOM with a different mindset now, i can test GUS, AWE64 and PAS XL vs the YMF card. I'll check Mortal Kombat too, although i don't remember having those issues and i think Mortal Kombat is a little iffy on faster systems. As far as i can remember Mortal Kombat and YMF cards worked without any issues on my 386DX-40. But i'm open for putting these cards for a challenge, i might shoot a video too. 😎

I'll be interested to hear what you find. I play Mortal Kombat on a P166MMX but it's always dropped the odd sound effect from what I can remember, and I've played it on various systems since it was released. There is a 'Sound Blaster 16' patch for it which fixes the problem, but a) it re-introduces the copy protection and b) it makes the game run more slowly.

Building an AMD Athlon 64 Gaming PC

In this video I am putting together a Athlon 64 Gaming PC for Windows XP.

I am talking about the individual parts, put it all on a test bench, walk you through BIOS options, installing Windows and drivers and finally a few benchmarks to see what this machine can do.

It is based around an Asrock Socket 754 motherboard, Athlon 64 3400+ processor, 2 GB RAM and a GeForce 7900 GTX.

badmojo wrote:

I'll be interested to hear what you find. I play Mortal Kombat on a P166MMX but it's always dropped the odd sound effect from what I can remember, and I've played it on various systems since it was released. There is a 'Sound Blaster 16' patch for it which fixes the problem, but a) it re-introduces the copy protection and b) it makes the game run more slowly.

OK so i've done some limited testing, and didn't get around to shoot a video, but i've found out pretty much what i was expecting.

The game is speed sensitive and it does have an impact on PCM sounds being played. If the system is too fast, there isn't enough delay between the end of a round and the clapping sounds, so the latter sounds won't play. This was solved by disabling the internal CPU cache. I tested with both the AWE64 Gold and the YMF-718 aka Audician 32, and the behaviour is exactly the same. Using the AWE 64 Gold won't bring back the clapping sounds at the end of a round unless the system is slowed down. In another note, CQM is horrible in this game, specially when one of the game characters falls on the ground after being punched/kicked/thrown.

Testing was done on my Socket 7 build.

As far as the YMF-718 being "dry", i guess that does hold some water. Now i already was aware that the YMF cards had a flatter frequency response, and jwt27's graph just confirmed it, and this is one of the things why i like the card so much. I prefer flatter response for pretty much every sound device i use, whether sound cards, speakers, amplifiers, etc... The reason is that it is much easier to post or pre-EQ the stuff to sound different, rather than a pre coloured device where makes things a lot harder to hit the sweet spot, at least for me. I know this because i play guitar and i know how important is to have flat response speakers not to colour your preamp settings, when you use amp simulators of course. I know i'm getting out of hand here... but i just prefer this.

I don't want to further derail as this is Phil's thread for his videos and website, but anyway it is always cool for me do get around and do some tests, so these are just my 2 cents.

Howdy Phil,

Just wanted to let you know that a couple of weeks ago I saw your slot 1 build and cant believe that I hadn't bothered to think about getting a quadro before. Two minutes after seeing it I was searcing for the best variant for a 2x AGP 440 BX board and found that FX-2000 to be the best solution. Found one on ebay and nabbed it for under $20 shipped. Installed it yester day and started running tests. Everything was perfect....until I decided to install my GUS PNP (without uninstalling my CT3980 or my Maxi Sound Fortissimo). 98se was very unhappy with me and went on strike. Told me that I should have known better to install a GUS with other soundcards already installed in 98 and still left in the machine. The setup program crashed near the end and refused to close. That's when I remembered about removing the other cards and installs, but to late. I did a forced restart and of course the system hung before the desktop. Removed the cards and managed to get back into 98 in safe mode, but even after removing the drivers for all the sound cards, the registry was bricked.

So going to have to rebuild it, but this time I will start with the GUS. Then the CT3980, the Maxi Sound Fortissimo, and the USB to MIDI last. Then the three video cards V2 SLI and the Quadro FX-2000, and the NIC last. But for a little 1.4 GHz P3, she will have options, 🤣. Thanks for the tip about the quadro. Its pretty much the missing link for this little rig.

MMaximus wrote:

Did anyone listen to the recording attached to my previous post? Is it the way this card is supposed to sound?

I listened to the recording and it sounds just like a sound blaster. I compared it to two of mine. A sound blaster pro 2 and a AWE 32. Its spot on. The FM version of Prince of Persia was never very good when compared to the MT-32 or the Apple IIGS versions of the game. It kinda has some warble like effect and I think that's what you may be thinking of as being out of phase. Its not, its just the way they made the music for FM. My guess is it was meant to sound like a hall effect for some added atmosphere, but it ended up sounding like the sound team could care less about their jobs.

Kodai wrote:

Howdy Phil,

Just wanted to let you know that a couple of weeks ago I saw your slot 1 build and cant believe that I hadn't bothered to think about getting a quadro before. Two minutes after seeing it I was searcing for the best variant for a 2x AGP 440 BX board and found that FX-2000 to be the best solution. Found one on ebay and nabbed it for under $20 shipped. Installed it yester day and started running tests. Everything was perfect....until I decided to install my GUS PNP (without uninstalling my CT3980 or my Maxi Sound Fortissimo). 98se was very unhappy with me and went on strike. Told me that I should have known better to install a GUS with other soundcards already installed in 98 and still left in the machine. The setup program crashed near the end and refused to close. That's when I remembered about removing the other cards and installs, but to late. I did a forced restart and of course the system hung before the desktop. Removed the cards and managed to get back into 98 in safe mode, but even after removing the drivers for all the sound cards, the registry was bricked.

So going to have to rebuild it, but this time I will start with the GUS. Then the CT3980, the Maxi Sound Fortissimo, and the USB to MIDI last. Then the three video cards V2 SLI and the Quadro FX-2000, and the NIC last. But for a little 1.4 GHz P3, she will have options, 🤣. Thanks for the tip about the quadro. Its pretty much the missing link for this little rig.

That's a ton of cards in one machine 😀

Yes, the Quadro cards are totally overlooked. Everyone is chasing GeForce. I've got two FX-2000, they are very good. Well built, nice cooler and plenty of speed. Sure a FX5950 Ultra is faster, but the prices are much higher as it's a highly sought after card.

You can also find very good OEM motherboards / hardware. Also often overlooked. Who chases old Acer OEM motherboards? Well I did 😀 Got two Tualatin boards for next to nothing. Both with the Intel 815 chipset and faster than the AOpen 815 and Gigabyte VIA Tualatin boards. Not sure why it's faster, but who cares 😀

The GUS PnP has always given me trouble. I actually never used it with Windows 98, never saw a reason to do so with all my Roland gear 😀

Just to try different sound options on genuine hardware. When I get my ARGUS going I will have one in a dos game rig and another in a bare bones test rig that will double as a demoscene rig. The test rig is a simple P5A with a 233mmx, SB pro 2, and Diamond s540 agp, 16mb ram, and 4GB DOM. Perfect for quick testing new vintage acquisitions, and demoscene run through.

DreamBlaster Synth S1 Wavetable Board Review

This is a review of the DreamBlaster Synth S1, a newly produced wavetable board for sound cards with wavetable header. The review features recordings of Doom, Doom 2, Duke Nukem 3D, Privateer, Descent, Raptor and Dune 2.

Link to the item: http://www.serdashop.com/waveblaster

There are time markers in the video description for jumping to the specific game recordings.

My take:

- Good value
- Sounds good, but not as good as a Roland Sound canvas or Yamaha MU
- Compact, so it fits on cards that have issues with large boards (Yamaha Audician 32 Plus for example)
- Free shipping

Let me know what you think! Do you like the sound? Thanks 😀