I jump about from rig to rig, testing a lot of stuff. Consequently, it's been quite some time since I tested ISA sound cards in this Epox mobo. I am unable to recall a lot of useful information. Have you tried an AWE64 yet? I do remember it was successful, in terms of eliminating sound crackling problems. Vogons user prophase_j also used this sound card with one of these Epox mobos.

It's interesting that you are having problems with an ISA ESS card. What model / chipset are you using? I also remember having many more problems in Windows 98, than in pure DOS. I seem to recall that pure DOS was more forgiving. This sounds like an interesting project to revisit one day. I want to learn about the BIOS settings, and whether they affect the ISA sound quality in any way.

The next time I stumble upon some suitable old ISA sound cards, I'll test them with this Epox mobo, and let you know the results. Are there any cards you are interested in? I remember that the Terratec EWS was difficult to get going in this mobo. Also, the AWE32 caused the crackling sound problems.

I am not interested in any cards in particular. I just wondered, if you had a particular software in mind, where the AWE64 demonstrably fared much better than the other cards.

So far, I found they all crackle in the Warcraft3 Menues and all play fine in the actual game. So this may just be a WC3 related issue. I was using the Win98SE supplied drivers.

I am trying to make up my mind regarding that all in one machine - P3B-F or 8KTA3Pro.
I plan to test speed issues with DOS and windows based games. To see which machine will be more flexible. The P3B-F had no issues with ISA sound, but lacks the speed range.

One thing I remember is the Windows 98 start up tune. IMHO, that's a good test. It lasts quite a while, and takes place when other important things are going on, to do with the OS booting up, etc. With the AWE32, the tune broke up with crackling noises. But that problem did not occur with the AWE64. Curiously, I had problems with the PCI SB Live! And also with that card, I had similar problems with the first Unreal game.

I've got the Epox board out of storage. I've also downloaded the WC3 demo. I've found that hi-fi cable you need for the AWE64 to hook up some speakers to it. In fact, I've got everything except I can't find the AWE64 itself. I know where it is - inside one of my junk boxes. I'll go and rummage for it, then test out this game, and tell you if the menu sounds are OK or corrupted. Please wait a couple of days though. I need to locate the sound card, and do other stuff too. Cheers.

retro games 100 wrote:

Curiously, I had problems with the PCI SB Live! And also with that card, I had similar problems with the first Unreal game.

I do remember the VIA KT133 chipsets to be buggy with SB Live!'s, it had to do with the way the chipset and cards behaved on the PCI bus.
Something like that.

Yes that's right, and there's a latency patch to help out with it, but I vaguely recall that it didn't fix this problem completely.

OK I'm ready to begin testing. I have set up the Epox mobo like this - FSB 133, CPU is running at ~1.6 GHz, AWE64 Gold, AGP Voodoo5 5500, 1 stick of 256MB SDRAM.

I've downloaded the WC3 demo. I visited the various options screens, and left all of the settings on default. I played the game for about 2 minutes. During this time, I could not detect any problems with the sound or music. Having said that, some "crackling noises" could be heard during the Windows 98 start up tune. Previously, I did not get this with the AWE64. However, I was probably using a different graphics card at that time. Also, I was probably using different BIOS settings.

At the moment, the AWE64 is using a "forced hardware setting" of IRQ 7 (can't use 5 at the moment because it's being used by ACPI), DMA 1 and 5, 220, 330, 388.

I'll mess about with various options/settings/etc, and let you know what happens. If there are any options/settings/etc you want me to try, please say so. I have also dug up an ISA Opti sound card for some further testing. I noticed it was not on your list of sound card hardware, so I thought I'd try it to see how well it worked in this mobo.

I disabled ACPI inside the BIOS set up area. The AWE64 resources have now changed from "forced hardware settings" including IRQ=7, to not "forced hardware settings" including IRQ=5. I now hear crackling noises inside the WC3 menu area. I'll continue experimenting...

Edit: With the ACPI disabled inside the BIOS, I set the AWE64's IRQ to 7. The sound quality in the WC3 menu has improved. If I constantly click around inside the menu area, I don't hear any crackling noises. When I go to leave the menu area, I hear one crackle, but that's it.

The more I mess about with this, the worse it gets. At least that proves one thing. It does matter what resource settings you use. This is how my Windows 98 start up tune now sounds like. I've removed the AGP V5, and replaced it with a simple PCI VGA card. But that didn't fix the problem.

I've tried various IRQs for the AWE64, and switching ACPI on and off. I can't seem to get the Win98 start up tune to play without sounding odd, or breaking up with crackling noises. This is strange, because several months ago, when I last tested an AWE64 in this mobo, it sounded OK. I guess I haven't accidentally stumbled upon the "magic" resource setting yet, to resolve this problem...

I tried an Opti sound card, but I guess I've got the wrong driver for it, because it wouldn't play any sound or music inside Windows 98. I wonder if it's worth using a PCI sound card for Windows games, and using the AWE64 just for DOS? I'll test the AWE64 in DOS, and see if it sounds OK...

I removed the PCI VGA card, and replaced it with a Radeon 9800 Pro AGP card. The Windows 98 start up tune now plays without any crackling sounds, or any general weirdness. However, during WC3, I can hear an occasional quiet "pop" noise during gameplay. Using the WC3 menus, I hear no problems at all. DOS games seem to play fine. No problems in either a Windows "dos box", or in pure DOS.

ux-3, have you tried any PCI sound cards yet? I will try to dig one up, and see if it works well in Windows. If it does, you could have a PCI sound card for Windows, and use the AWE64 (or other ISA sound card) for DOS.

I think I've found an acceptable solution to this problem. The AWE64 works OK in DOS. No problems. That's either "pure" DOS, or DOS in a Win98 "dos box". For Windows, the AWE64 seems to not behave perfectly. So, I tried a PCI SB Live! card. I tried the CT4760 model. I used the LiveWire 3.0 driver package. It's on DriverGuide, at ~30MB. I'm sure it can be found elsewhere too.

I did a quick sound test, and found the sound quality to be unsatisfactory. So, inside the System resources area, I disabled all of the SB emulation resources. I reran my sound tests, and found no problems. Good, that solved that problem. I then ran WC3, and found no problems at all. The CT4760 card provided good sound quality, with no crackling or pop or "drop out" sounds. Inside the WC3 sound options area, I selected Creative Labs EAX2, environmental effects, and 3D positional audio.

Edit: I got the 2 cards to co-exist inside the same system, without any problems. If I want the Live! to work, I just disable the AWE64 inside the System resources section. And "vice versa" if I want to use the AWE64. Sound tests for both cards work fine. With both cards installed, the DOS sound and music work perfectly for the AWE64, and for Windows the Live! card works without any noise problems. Seems like a good solution. 😀

BTW, it would be fun to set up these 2 sound cards using Windows 9x's "hardware profiles". The idea is that when Windows 9x boots up, you select a hardware profile from a menu. Eg 1) Live! 2) Awe64. When you pick 1 or 2 at boot up time, only that sound card is enabled. This method is quicker and more efficient than enabling and disabling each card inside the Control Panel resources section, depending on what sound card you want to use.

BTW, for the Live! card + LiveWire 3.0 driver installation, a useful tip is the go to the options/preferences section for that very large "drop down menu" application. This is the menu bar which is at the top of the screen, and appears when you move the mouse to the top of the screen. Inside the options/preferences section, tell it not to run at start up. This way, when you use the AWE64, it won't try to load. If it does, it will likely cause the operating system to hang, because it has nothing to do with the AWE64, and also it will be confused because the Live! card is not enabled.

I only stumbled upon this now.

WC3 turned out to be speed sensitive. Sound was OK with fsb 100 and 500 MHhz on the Epox board. Too high a clock or fsb 133 and it would stutter.

How do you set up hardware profiles? I need ISA for Games with Cache Off. Maybe another card would be nice in Windows.