FINALLY! Happy to hear a positive post about these. Mine have been sitting in a box untouched due to the negativity surrounding them.

The S-MPU/AT...

- Is not 100% MPU-401 compatible
- Can exhibit "pausing" when switching from native mode to its MPU-401 emulation mode
- And, using your own sample set data, failed with 22% of the games tested, making it the most incompatible of all supposed "MPU-401 compatible" cards

The S-MPU/AT isn't a MIDI interface for "gamers," frankly.

Cloudschatze wrote:

The S-MPU/AT... […]
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The S-MPU/AT...

- Is not 100% MPU-401 compatible
- Can exhibit "pausing" when switching from native mode to its MPU-401 emulation mode
- And, using your own sample set data, failed with 22% of the games tested, making it the most incompatible of all supposed "MPU-401 compatible" cards

The S-MPU/AT isn't a MIDI interface for "gamers," frankly.

- Is not 100% MPU-401 compatible.

That is what everyone have been saying in the past, but I've not been able to find a list of the specific games that causes issues. What if those games are obscure Japanese releases? Do the games that cause issues have workarounds? Then it won't matter and also it should be left up to every person if they want to use the S-MPU/AT based on their own preferences. I compare this to the Voodoo2/3 cards and their compatibility with DOS Glide games. In the past it was believed that the compatibility was very limited on those cards, but now there are lists and people can themselves make a decision if the games that don't work are important to them or not. I paid 10 dollars for my S-MPU/AT and I had no other bidders. People shun this product with little information on exactly why and when I see little documentation on statements/myths I tend to make my own test data.

The list is a work in progress. You can't make a 22% statistic based on that. I specifically tested WC and the Legend games since they are the known to be the hardest to get running and which also is known to cause problems on some other MPU-401 clones (Midiman, Musicquest). Also I've only tested on one machine, and I can't rule out the S-MPU/AT being the cause for the problems untill I've replicated the results on another system.

- Can exhibit "pausing" when switching from native mode to its MPU-401 emulation mode

Can you explain what to look for? I have not noticed any "pauses".

so it behaves a little better than a SoundBlaster mpu port but still needs softmpu for those tricky titles... kind of pointless imho

just read vets'z new post above :
but you did test Wing Commander and Gateway and they both have issues so the card is not 100% MPU401 compatible. Using softmpu to solve the issues is a way but this also works on uart-only mpus (like a sb one) . It is 99.9% certain that using another machine won't change it's behavior 😐

Really it's a cool Roland card but it doesn't seem it offers more than a sb-mpu in gaming usage... I bet it's the other way around for serious stuff.

I'll test more intelligent mode games, but WC and Gateway are considered the tricky ones. So if it works with 54 out of 56 intelligent mode games I would call that much better than a normal Soundblaster MPU. Its not 100% compatible, but if you can live without those two last games (and/or use SoftMPU workaround) then I would call it a good option, especially regarding the much lower price.

looking forward to see how it performs with other "intelligent mode" games , ofc if the ratio is 54 out of 56 then it's a nice deal

Why not just use SoftMPU? Honest question here, is there an advantage to using this?

SoftMPU advantages:
- Seems to be 100% "intelligent mode" compatible at the moment;
- Works with the great majority of cards with a UART interface
- Some cheap sound cards can be used as a "poor man's" intelligent MPU-401 (OPL3SAx cards can be configured to use little resources and act as a single MPU interface sitting on IRQ2/9 which some games require)
- Runs on DOS;
- Works with a simple gameport to MIDI cable;
- Costs NOTHING; (we must send bjt and the DOSBox devs a medal)

SoftMPU disadventages:
- Needs Virtual 8086 mode, a minimum of a 386 is required;
- Has a small performance impact due to the emulation overhead (this can be actually an ADVANTAGE for a 386DX-40 system on games like Wing Commander);
- Emulation needs to be reset every time a computer starts or restarts;
- It's a TSR program, takes some memory. Memory footprint is low enough and can be loaded high;

Hardware MPU-401 advantages:
- Real time hardware MPU-401 processing;
- 100% "intelligent mode" compatibility for the Roland MPU-401 units;
- No software emulation, no CPU overhead;
- Takes little hardware resources, one port and one IRQ set on the card;
- Ready to go when computer is on or restarted;

Hardware MPU-401 disadvantages:
- Some MPU-401 "intelligent mode" clones are not 100% compatible/have problems with some games;
- Some clones are system speed sensitive;
- The Roland MPU-401-IPC is speed sensitive, is meant for XT systems;
- Takes an extra ISA slot;
- Can cost a LOT of money nowadays;
- Somewhat rare, hard to find;

These are only the main things i might have forgot something.

Anyway, i wanna thank Vetz for testing. I'm actually surprised the Super MPU works with Sierra game adventures, i thought it wouldn't work with those so its good to take down the myths. For me it really doesn't make sense. I have a MIDIMAN MM-401 which i got cheap and Keropi made a cable for me (its great to meet/befriend with such extraordinary people here on VOGONS), but i don't intend to use it for something greater than a 286. SoftMPU will do a great job on my 386 build.

However its great to have these things tested!

I prefer hardware MPUs and I exclusively use the MIF-IPC-A (replica) with a MPU-401 BOB. This way I can very easily switch to MT-32/SC-55ST by just switching the 25PIN cable from one PC to the other. I currently have 6 PCs (one more on the way) that all have a MIF-IPC-A (replica). Always works 100%: no TSRs or any requirements/limitations.

I had a couple of S-MPU-ATs as well but never really used them.

Roland MPUs:
MIF-IPC & MPU-401 ist das original fuer PCs in die 80er. 5V. Funktioniert nicht 100% >= 8086/8088 PCs. 1985. Sehr selten.
MIF-IPC-A & MPU-401 war die naechste Version (funktioniert auf alle 5V ISA MOBOs). 198X. Sehr selten
MPU-IPC & BOB: nachfolger des MPU-401s, 100% Kompatibel. 5V. Kein I/O & IRQ auswahl. 1988. Ziemlich selten.
MPU-IPC-T & BOB: nachfolger des MPU-401s, 100% Kompatibel. 5V. I/O & IRQ auswahl. 1989. Relativ verfugbar.
MPU-IMC & BOB: nachfolger des MPU-401s, 100% Kompatibel. MCA. 1989. Sehr selten.
LAPC-I & MCB-1: CM-32L & MPU-IPC-T auf PCB, 100% Kompatibel. 5V. Einfach verfugbar.
SCC-1: SC-55 PCB & MPU-401AT auf PCB, 100% Kompatibel. 5V & 12V. 1991. Einfach verfugbar
MPU-401AT: nachfolger des MPU-401s, 100% Kompatibel. 5V & 12V. 1994. Relativ selten.
RAP-10AT & MCB-10: UART only
S-MPU-AT & BOB: not 100% intelligent (as discussed above)
S-MPU-IIAT & BOB: not 100% intelligent: requires TSR to be loaded
SCP-55 & MCB-3: no idea (never checked really)

Thanks carlos, that settles it 😀

F2bnp wrote:

Thanks carlos, that settles it 😀

Don't thank me, thank bjt! 😀

SoftMPU is a great program and I use it on all my later Pentium and 486 systems, but I was planning on installing this S-MPU/AT in my newly working Zenith Z386/20 (DX20). I was hoping to avoid the performance impact of having an additional overhead with the SoftMPU TSR on this system. Its a small hit as Carlotex said, but on lower end machines real MIDI hardware gets more usefull (imo).

Tested today (working):
- A-10 Tank Killer (v1.0 and v1.5)
- David Wolf
- Ecargxus

There's certainly available information regarding problematic playback with the S-MPU/AT, but apparently only on the Vogons forum is such anecdotal information flippantly dismissed as being "mythical" if it hasn't been personally experienced.

In any event, here's what I mentioned about the "pausing" behavior back in 2006:
http://queststudios.com/smf/index.php?PHPSESS … g18263#msg18263

As far as troubleshooting some of the problematic games, I would be interested to know the result of sending FFh to the MPU command port (via debug, etc.) prior to starting one of the troublesome games, in the off chance that a game's MIDI driver isn't sending it by default. It's the reception of this reset command byte that switches the S-MPU/AT into intelligent MPU-401 emulation mode.

Finally, if anyone cares, here are the MPU-401 commands not implemented in the S-MPU/AT (but for which it will still send an ACK):

• 81h FSK Clock
  92h FSK to Internal
  93h FSK to MIDI
  83h Metronome ON 〈with primary accents〉
  84h Metronome OFF
  85h Metronome ON 〈with primary and secondary accents〉
  40h - 4Fh Channel Reference Table A
  50h - 5Fh Channel Reference Table B
  60h - 6Fh Channel Reference Table C
  70h - 7Fh Channel Reference Table D
  98h - 9Fh Channel Reference Table A-D ON/OFF
  C3h Timebase 72
  C6h Timebase 144
  C7h Timebase 168
  C8h Timebase 192

So the roland s-mpu/at works under dos? Any special things I need to do apart from setting the right irq and adres?

I have bought this card with the breakout box 10 months ago for 10 euro. And just got my second MT32 unit with original powersupply for 30 euro. So I hope this setup works under dos.

My other MT32 setup is with the MPU-IPC-T which I found for 90 euro 1.5 years ago 😀 and that MT32 was 45 euro.