It's a professional sound card resembling Turtle Beach Pinnacle. Like Pinnacle, it has an excellent quality wavetable bank acccessible through MPU-401, and, unlike Pinnacle, Apex is SB Pro-compatible. It is claimed to be working in DOS, Win 3.1, Win 95, Win NT 3.5 and 4.0. Cloudschatze is looking for Apex, if there are more than one, you could have an agreement with him.

*Moved to Marvin

I am ready to buy one too (I want to experiment with its loadable banks).

Nice card; I would snag that in a heartbeat

Found this thread.
Got this card a day ago. Even a box on photo with dents and torn paper the same.
wss/sbpro/opl3/mixer part is not working, only mpu401 work.

easy_john wrote:

wss/sbpro/opl3/mixer part is not working, only mpu401 work.

Not working? Do you have problems just in DOS or anywhere?

bristlehog wrote:

Not working? Do you have problems just in DOS or anywhere?

I've tested in DOS:
- after clean boot all games detect sb pro/wss + opl3, but I don't hear any sound. Manually selected mpu401 - get sound from onboard kurzweil.
- after start dos driver "ad1815_6.exe" - it show all detected resources/pors/irqs. Games - same, all detected, but no sound.
- mixer utility "mixapext.exe" show all volumes at middle level (4 from 8), but can't change it - any volume manipulations not affect anything, and they stay at 4 if you exit and run it again.
In windows 98:
- all drivers and resources detected right (dac, joystic, mpu, ...), no conflicts, no errors.
- windows media player and "apex rack" look like they play wav/midi files - but no sound. Only if I select mpu-401 - i hear midi from kurzweil.
- windows mixer and "apex rack" mixer not affect any volumes:
1) sound from mpu401(kurzweil) not changed in any case.
2) still no sound from other sources,
3) usually if you mute/unmute all volumes, you can hear difference in noise level, but not on this card, noise level is not changed (It's not high. But you can hear it, if you make maximum volume on amplifier)

I recheck board on different computer in a day or two, to exclude any strange incompatibility, but this is my main pc for sound tests and all sound board from my collection work ok.

Found a sollution. And this is absolutely strange.
There 2 out on sound card, named "line" and "speaker" (as usual).
On "line" I can hear only kurzweil and nothing more!
But on "speaker" - I hear all sounds, opl, sb pro and kurzweil too. Mixer works ok (Aux slider for kurzweil).
Manual say, that there "audio output" and "direct midi out", but even a picture on this page is wrong, actually "direct midi" is on "line" jack and "audio out" is on "speaker" jack.
So, for me card is fully working, sorry for bothering you.

I received a broken AVM APEX (REV. B). Some capacitors are missing. I have already ordered some will solder them and then I will give it a try to see if the kurzweil synth is still working.
Does anyone have a manual for the card? I can not find one online!
What about Jumper J12? How to set it correctly? The setting described here: http://museum.ttrk.ee/th99/i/A-B/53889.htm does not seem to be correct, as the jumper consists of 3 Pins instead of 2!
Do I need special drivers for Windows 98?
How can I use the Sample RAM?
Would be great if someone can help me.

moturimi1 wrote:

Does anyone have a manual for the card? I can not find one online!

Manual has 200+ pages, so nobody want to scan them :)

moturimi1 wrote:

What about Jumper J12? How to set it correctly? The setting described here: http://museum.ttrk.ee/th99/i/A-B/53889.htm does not seem to be correct, as the jumper consists of 3 Pins instead of 2!

Yes, manual has same naming convention, but picture helps:
"0XX" named "closed", and "XX0" - named "open".
Use "closed", to disable onboard rom and use simm ram.

moturimi1 wrote:

How can I use the Sample RAM?

You need software, that able to upload samples in ram. Actually that kind of software from AVM released 1 year after they start selling Apex. If I remember correctly, it named "Apex Sample Studio" or something like that. But I still can't find it anywhere.
May be well-known sample converter "AWave" can do this? I don't try this.

"MA-1 Controlling Software
Patch Editor is a program that allows to modify and create new MIDI instruments using all MA-1 chip capabilities. There are three programs available now.

- Everest Editor
Written by Mark Lakata and available directly from his home page. It's a really sophisticated program and pretty easy to use. I like the multilayer view. In my opinion it is the best available patch editor for MA-1 based soundcards.
Latest version available: 1.47
- MAAS Editor
Created by phloobydust. Excellent editor with unusual interface. Includes mixer and visualization plugin. Really nice and easy to use.
Latest version available: 1.00
- Apex Sample Studio
Produced by AVM Technology. A lot of features have not beet implemeted yet. The Apex Editor presents alternative way to control MA-1 synth and may be useful. The *.apex format includes embedded samples. Hope it will be finished soon...
Latest version available: Beta 3.5.
- Pinnacle Patch Editor
Copyrighted by Turtle Beach Systems. Will not work with Apex! I will no longer distribute a fix for this software due to serious warnings from TBS. Compact and pretty intuitve - I really like it's scratch bank feature.
Latest version available: Beta 8 " (q) http://www.pirx.com/apex/
But all links are dead.
Write, if you find something.

Which chipset provides SBPro compatibility? Analog Devices?

carlostex wrote:

Which chipset provides SBPro compatibility? Analog Devices?

Yes.

easy_john wrote:

Yes, manual has same naming convention, but picture helps:
"0XX" named "closed", and "XX0" - named "open".
Use "closed", to disable onboard rom and use simm ram.

Look what I found (http://museum.ttrk.ee/th99/i/A-B/53889.htm):
"Note: If jumper is open, the 2MB ROM set is disabled."
Strange. This would mean: no SIMM installed no ROM available.

Thanks easy_john.
First of all I have to solder the capacitors. Will do that tomorrow.
I'll keep you informed. I hope I don't need more help...

I managed to solder all missing capacitors.
The card is partially working. Under Win98 this means: The Analog Devices Part works (Wave) and OPL FM Sound too.
But unfortunately I don't get the Midi part to work. I did not have special card drivers, Win98 installed them automatically.
So far no luck to hear the Kurzweil Synth. 🙁

Kurzweil work in dos ok, of I remember correctly.
And it have separate out, may be you can hear synt from it?

I have found Everest MA-1 Patch Editor 1.47 and MAAS editor 1.00.

Uploaded them to Vogonsdrivers.

Everest:

MAAS:

Thanks a lot!
Do you have complete samples banks for kurzweil?

easy_john wrote:

complete samples banks for kurzweil

What do you mean by that? Like, GM banks?

I've somehow found Everest 1.4F update (lots of bugfixes since 1.47) and uploaded it too. Also uploaded an image of Apex's driver CD that was included in the box.