Dosbox 0.72, Cycles 15000, Core - normal, Default sound options.....speech doesn't skip a beat. Hmm...must be something on your side.

I'm trying to imagine what it could be. Have you tried playing with the priority? It's defaulted to "Higher", maybe try setting it to normal or higher and see if it helps.

Changing the priority didn't seem to help...I had also noticed it skipping while the process was in the background earlier (normal being the second setting currently).

I'm far from an expert, but it sounds similar to an interrupt conflict, though the behavior of the skipping changes with extreme cycle adjustment.

I notice you said MT32, have you tried instead just setting soundblaster for both music and speech? Just to be sure what is causing the issues?

I just tried the game out with both SB and SBPro modes for music and SFX - both skipping equally as before.

The music plays back correctly in both these modes with maybe a couple of milliseconds here and there of popping (I don't recall any in previous DOSBox versions however), but several sound effects (non-digital) in the intro skips just as much as the speech (digital) does. The rest of the in-game SFX sound OK.

I always assumed all "SFX" in U7 were done with the OPL chip in Ad-Lib or SB modes, and don't know why they would be handled any differently than the music - again, I'm no expert though.

If you have set the game to use a MT-32 then sfx will be played by the MT-32 as well. Only speech will be played by the SB16 then. This doesn't help with your problem though. It might be a speed thing, especially since you don't have the problem with SI (SI had a "speed" regulator - for lack of the correct word - so it would not run too fast on modern computers).

Yeah but <15000 cycles and Ultima VII runs as it should, if a little choppy. So I don't think it would be speed related at 7700 cycles. It's almost like his machine is having difficulty, yet an E6600 shouldn't have any problems with 7700 cycles.

You say at "any" cycle setting it does this? Even at say - 20000 or 30000? Thats too fast to be playable, but does it skip?

Dominus wrote:

It might be a speed thing, especially since you don't have the problem with SI (SI had a "speed" regulator - for lack of the correct word - so it would not run too fast on modern computers).

I would agree, yet the speech/speed worked perfectly up until 0.72 specifically. I've upgraded my video card recently, but other than that there hasn't been any hardware or software changes to speak of.

avatar_58 wrote:

You say at "any" cycle setting it does this? Even at say - 20000 or 30000? Thats too fast to be playable, but does it skip?

Yes there's still skipping at high cycles, although less so than at game playable cycle settings. It's quite odd...I find the reduced skipping at very low cycles settings to be the most head scratching.

On the bright side speech isn't a major part of Ultima VII right? Irritating problem none-the-less though.

Have you attempted an "auto" cycles amount? Not really a good idea for playing this game (too fast) but it's worth a try. EMS is of course disabled right? Stupid question I guess, since it shouldn't even run with it enabled. Have you tried changing the blocksize and sound quality settings? Maybe frameskip?

Something ought to at least work...

Does it behave different if you replace the 0.72 sdl.dll with the one from 0.70 or 0.71?

wd wrote:

Does it behave different if you replace the 0.72 sdl.dll with the one from 0.70 or 0.71?

Hmm...no, the 0.71 SDL.dll produces the same results as 0.72's.

Do you have double buffering enabled? I just noticed when I tried it even my music was skipping for some reason. Turning it off solved it. May or may not be related.

avatar_58 wrote:

Do you have double buffering enabled? I just noticed when I tried it even my music was skipping for some reason. Turning it off solved it. May or may not be related.

Well, I'm playing in windowed (normal3x) mode typically and double buffering was already disabled. Enabling it didn't seem to introduce any changes with regard to audio.

By the way, thanks for all the suggestions everyone. U7 is probably my "flagship" DOSBox title. 😀

Dominus wrote:

It might be a speed thing, especially since you don't have the problem with SI (SI had a "speed" regulator - for lack of the correct word - so it would not run too fast on modern computers).

Alas, I know. 😒 If only OSI hadn't lost the source code to Ultima VII. I bet they would have retroactively patched frame limiting in at some point.

Currently, there isn't really a "perfect" cycle setting for The Black Gate. For example, a good setting inside Trinsic (lots of overlapping tiles, eggs and NPC AI) will cause emptier wilderness areas to run slightly too fast and vice-versa.

Ah well, this is where the flexibility of DOSBox really shines. 😀

I bet they would have retroactively patched frame limiting in at some point.

suuuuuuuuuuuuurrrrrrrrre, like they cared much for any of their older titles once they were under EA orders...
"losing the source" was just one of their excuses, they didn't look too hard or they would have found it on one of their old employees.

speon wrote:

By the way, thanks for all the suggestions everyone. U7 is probably my "flagship" DOSBox title. 😀

It's my fav game of all time personally 😉 It's where I got my online nickname "avatar".

Currently, there isn't really a "perfect" cycle setting for The Black Gate. For example, a good setting inside Trinsic (lots of overlapping tiles, eggs and NPC AI) will cause emptier wilderness areas to run slightly too fast and vice-versa.

Yeah you're telling me. 🙁 It's a shame too, because I prefer the original code rather than Exult (Again, no offence meant Dominus as it's an amazing program) I just like how the AI acts and the overall nuances that only the original game provides.

I chose about 15000 cycles and it seems to do pretty well. It runs faster than I'd like in certain areas, but at least the menu remains responsive.

none taken, Avatar 😀

Theres something hilarious about running Exult in 1920x1200 native on my PC though. 😁 All of Trinsic and then some fits right on the screen.

he he
(though I do have to warn that this is asking for trouble especially in SI since it could set some flags that shouldn't be set)