Never having heard the sound in that game before, my thoughts went as follows:

Adlib: 'Ewww.'
Game Blaster: 'hey, not bad, it's amazing what a difference a sound card can make.'
LAPC-I: 'Oh.' 😳

Nice one, Amigaz! Glad to hear the Game Blaster in action! 😀 I was looking for one since I first saw in a Sierra game's install screen (Hero's Quest, EGA version, I think.)

Though the Adlib sounds much better than the Game Blaster, it's still worthwhile to keep it for historical sake.

Yes, I too prefer to have a Desktop casing for a 386 and older systems. But what you're having there is a rarity too.

swaaye wrote:

BTW, I'm sick of black PCs. We need beige back hehe. I recently purchased a brand-new-in-box 1999 Enlight 7237 case off ebay for $35. Ecstatic I was. Side panels + Beige baby!!

Yep, I agree. I prefer the beige cases. The black is not suitable for a retro pc, imho. I guess it comes down to personal preferences.

And... The LAPC-I sounds!!!! Awesome!! I mean, just look at the Intro screen... Only the LAPC-I had the opening tune at the first title screen!!!

Nice sound card collection. Never would have thought I'd hear of a GUS, LAPC-I and Game Blaster in the same system. Will have to check out the video later.

My cousin used to have a 386SX25 with an LAPC-I and an SB Pro. Was pretty much top of the line sound hardware at the time (he was into music composing) - X-Wing sounded awesome on it.

Hmmm, it seems that your SCSI drive is taking a while to power up. I believe this might have something to do with "send start command" option in the BIOS set. It should be possible to disable that, and jumper the drive so that it spins up when the power is connected, rather than wait for the controller to issue the command.

Anonymous Coward wrote:

Hmmm, it seems that your SCSI drive is taking a while to power up. I believe this might have something to do with "send start command" option in the BIOS set. It should be possible to disable that, and jumper the drive so that it spins up when the power is connected, rather than wait for the controller to issue the command.

Yeah..it's on my "to do list" along with hooking up a cable from the PC speaker connector to my ps speaker input on the Sb Pro
It's only during cold reboots it takes time so I'm not suffering 😉

Malik wrote:

Nice one, Amigaz! Glad to hear the Game Blaster in action! :happy: I was looking for one since I first saw in a Sierra game's in […]
Show full quote

Nice one, Amigaz! Glad to hear the Game Blaster in action! 😀 I was looking for one since I first saw in a Sierra game's install screen (Hero's Quest, EGA version, I think.)

Though the Adlib sounds much better than the Game Blaster, it's still worthwhile to keep it for historical sake.

Yes, I too prefer to have a Desktop casing for a 386 and older systems. But what you're having there is a rarity too.

swaaye wrote:

BTW, I'm sick of black PCs. We need beige back hehe. I recently purchased a brand-new-in-box 1999 Enlight 7237 case off ebay for $35. Ecstatic I was. Side panels + Beige baby!!

Yep, I agree. I prefer the beige cases. The black is not suitable for a retro pc, imho. I guess it comes down to personal preferences.

And... The LAPC-I sounds!!!! Awesome!! I mean, just look at the Intro screen... Only the LAPC-I had the opening tune at the first title screen!!!

The Lapc-I blows away all competition easily but what I've heard not many could afford it back then
I was an Amiga user back then but I remember the first time I heard a Lapc-I in a game...it was at a friends place..he showed me Monkey Island 2..I was completely blown away by hearing the opening theme 😳

Old Thrashbarg wrote:

Never having heard the sound in that game before, my thoughts went as follows: […]
Show full quote

Never having heard the sound in that game before, my thoughts went as follows:

Adlib: 'Ewww.'
Game Blaster: 'hey, not bad, it's amazing what a difference a sound card can make.'
LAPC-I: 'Oh.' 😳

yeah..the game blaster isn't too shabby

The Adlib should sound better but it feels like it's cababilities were never really used in games...it's cousin is in the Sega Megadrive which has some stunning music sometimes

Ironically I think one of the reasons that a lot of Adlib music sounds mediocre is because a lot of game developers were just using it as a low-quality MIDI synthesizer to play music originally arranged for MT-32/LAPC-I or General MIDI synths.

Console and arcade games, on the other hand, often have some pretty impressive FM synthesis music because that's all the developers had to work with.

(Yay, first post!)

Nice machine, but you should tweak the booting a bit.
Didnt stop it, but it felt like a minute till the BIOS found the harddisk.

And the LAPC-1 blew me away too. 😀

That video was tight!!!!

The boot up on that thing did take a while but afterwords to was really snappy, using the era software. It seems like if you allowed the hard disk to automatically spin-up it would save at least a few seconds.

I just noticed the video. Nice work there! I am actually torn between the Adlib and LAPC-1. That Adlib sound just hits me hard with the 'ol nostalgia for my old SBPro2. 😀

Your 386 has too much RAM.. wow on that RAM count time! Reminds me of my VS440FX as it is about the slowest RAM counter that I've seen.

Amigaz, if you feel like making another video, please would you consider doing Wing Commander, because then we can see how it should look and feel being played at that "just right" 386 speed. Thanks a lot if possible. 😀

retro games 100 wrote:

Amigaz, if you feel like making another video, please would you consider doing Wing Commander, because then we can see how it should look and feel being played at that "just right" 386 speed. Thanks a lot if possible. 😀

Will do my best...don't think I can play it with one hand and I got ny tripod but I'll think of something.

Plan to do other video's too now when I'm at it 😀

swaaye wrote:

I just noticed the video. Nice work there! I am actually torn between the Adlib and LAPC-1. That Adlib sound just hits me hard with the 'ol nostalgia for my old SBPro2. 😀

Your 386 has too much RAM.. wow on that RAM count time! Reminds me of my VS440FX as it is about the slowest RAM counter that I've seen.

16MB is definitely not "too much" for a 386, although it's definitely a very good amount.

I think you may be able to hit Esc to speed up / skip the memory check, or possibly set a BIOS option.

HunterZ wrote:

swaaye wrote:

I just noticed the video. Nice work there! I am actually torn between the Adlib and LAPC-1. That Adlib sound just hits me hard with the 'ol nostalgia for my old SBPro2. 😀

Your 386 has too much RAM.. wow on that RAM count time! Reminds me of my VS440FX as it is about the slowest RAM counter that I've seen.

16MB is definitely not "too much" for a 386, although it's definitely a very good amount.

I think you may be able to hit Esc to speed up / skip the memory check, or possibly set a BIOS option.

During a cold reboot with the powrer button my keyboard is rendered useless somehow by the system.
There's no "quickboot" option in the BIOS setup

Wow, bummer.

*uploading crappy made Wing Commander film to youtube made without a proper tripod* 😜

Amigaz wrote:

*uploading crappy made Wing Commander film to youtube made without a proper tripod* 😜

Link please - I can't seem to find it, using your O.P. youtube link...

retro games 100 wrote:

Amigaz wrote:

*uploading crappy made Wing Commander film to youtube made without a proper tripod* 😜

Link please - I can't seem to find it, using your O.P. youtube link...

Still uploading...it's in HD quality too and youtube will probably take some hours until they finished processing it.
I'll ring a bell when it's ready.

Nice video, I didn't realize how bad Sound Blaster sounded back then, well compared to the awesome sound of that Roland. Just for curiosity, what was the price points of the 3 sound cards at the era of the popular 386 33mhz? (my friend had one and I was so envious, I had nothing but my aging TI 99/4A)