VOGONS


sbpnp32 vs sbawe32

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First post, by ElBrunzy

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I have a sbpnp32 and a sbawe32 and I could interchange them anytime and not tell the difference. The awe32 was supposed to come with a special effect controller. All special effect I've ever see was the reverb and the chorus who where also available on the pnp32. Am I missing anything ? Was is that the fx was rendered on the emu8k on the pnp32 and on the awe32 it was on a dedicated chip so it can mix with higher quality ? I always had a pnp32 and just recently received an awe32 and I couldnt find anything different in the windows awe32 control panel. Was it that the fx support of the awe32 was very seldom supported by software? The sblive carry very good fx support as seen on multi effects stomp box, was that the same for the awe32 ?

Reply 1 of 83, by Anonymous Coward

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As far as I know (from reading VOGONS), the main difference between the SB32 and AWE32 were the lack of onboard soundfont RAM (512k), Wave Blaster header, CSP/ASP chip and real OPL3 on the SB32. The SB32 is vibra based, and is supposed to have cleaner quality output.

There are probably several models of both AWE32 and SB32, so it's difficult to make an exact comparison.
I think what it comes down to is that both do SB16, EMU8k and have SIMM slots for soundfonts, and that's all most people cared about.

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Reply 2 of 83, by ElBrunzy

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wave blaster header ? wouldnt that make the emu8000 chip a bit redundant? Anyway you pinpointed right at it, when you only use the card with AMP.EXE by Lada Kopecky, you want hardware mixing and clean output.

Reply 3 of 83, by Jolaes76

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Redundant? No. Even the Waveblaster had two revisions, and this daughterboard header can host many different sounding synth boards.

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Reply 4 of 83, by Kamerat

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Anonymous Coward wrote:

As far as I know (from reading VOGONS), the main difference between the SB32 and AWE32 were the lack of onboard soundfont RAM (512k), Wave Blaster header, CSP/ASP chip and real OPL3 on the SB32. The SB32 is vibra based, and is supposed to have cleaner quality output.

There are probably several models of both AWE32 and SB32, so it's difficult to make an exact comparison.
I think what it comes down to is that both do SB16, EMU8k and have SIMM slots for soundfonts, and that's all most people cared about.

I have a SB32 CT3600 with the CT1749 chip that should have integrated OPL3, but it's short of the other things you mention.

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Reply 5 of 83, by ElBrunzy

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Jolaes76 : might be my understanding of the waveblaster daughterboard was wrong then. I always think the waveblaster was an emu8000 with some memory for the soundblaster 16, pretty much like an gus ace to a sb16.

kamerat: who cares really about opl3 when you have emu8000... I actually do when I try to setup adlib in video game 😁 ... never work ...

Reply 6 of 83, by gdjacobs

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It is an E-MU in both versions, with an EMU8000 in the Waveblaster II. Unlike the Goldfinch card or the GUS ACE, the Waveblaster and Waveblaster II are in no way programmable with new samples.

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Reply 7 of 83, by ElBrunzy

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thanks you very so much gdjacobs. So, why would someone having a sbpnp32 or sbawe32 would want a waveblaster ? The connector must be available for some reasons..

Reply 8 of 83, by ElBrunzy

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haha this bring to mind that famous "hack" when you can get super reverb if you have a gus and a gus ace and mix the output, or something like it ...

Reply 9 of 83, by alexanrs

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The Waveblaster is a daughterboard that is accessed through the MPU-401 interface, whereas in the AWEs it is accessed through a proprietary interface. That way you can have GM in games that do not support AWEs natively without having to rely on the AWE's emulation.

Reply 10 of 83, by gdjacobs

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The Waveblaster interface also connects with daughterboards from professional instrument companies like Yamaha, Roland, and Korg.

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Reply 11 of 83, by ElBrunzy

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alexanrs yeah you are right, but does it worth it ? must be a desing problem or a pinout limitation if they didnt make the emu8k available thru midi port on sb32, what do you think ?

gdjacobs: was it possible natively or via an adaptor ?

Reply 12 of 83, by gdjacobs

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Waveblaster was a standard header. Lots of companies built daughterboards for it.
http://members.home.nl/c.kersten/

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Reply 13 of 83, by chrisNova777

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great topic, i also have a CT3600 and was wondering the same Trying to look this stuff up just the other night..

ElBrunzy wrote:

must be a design problem or a pinout limitation if they didnt make the emu8k available thru midi port on sb32, what do you think ?

im pretty sure i have played the emu8k synthesizer from a midi interface using cubase 1.0 on windows 3.11 earlier this year...
i think its not accessible unless u have the proper install cd tho? maybe thats why u thought that? my card is sitting here on the desk not installed atm but u are making em want to plug it in and test this out now..

gdjacobs wrote:

Waveblaster was a standard header. Lots of companies built daughterboards for it.
http://members.home.nl/c.kersten/

cool link.. interesting info.
i think its safe to assume that the name "waveBlaster" was just creatives marketing department's idea to name the connection to which the wavetable boards attach

correct me if im wrong but my understanding of the wavetable daughterboards is that you could easily think of them the same as purchasing any "Sample Library" of pre-made + pre-mapped configuration of sounds
the same as for a sampler : a samplecd or for an instrument: a preset card.
swapping the card instantly "reloads" you with a different color pallette to work with. allowing the companies to work on refining the soundset to provide a higher quality and of course capitalizing off setlling all the different cards! 🤣
really the wavetable soundsets are no different from the GS standard soundset https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roland_GS is just a standardized sound set / preset instrument mappings
isnt there somewavetable cards that claim to be "GS" or "GM" ?

i think that GM https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_MIDI came a tiny bit before GS and it was the original attempt at a redefinition of the original standard spec
set out by the MIDI 1.0 specification http://oktopus.hu/uploaded/Tudastar/MIDI%201. … ecification.pdf
this document isn the original 1.0 but rather an revision this page here shows that the original spec was devised in 1982!!
the mt-32 being from 1987 of course came in the middle of all that AFTER this original midi 1.0 spec + BEFORE the General MIDI spec
and providing the popular LA type synthesis of the 80s to the video game world.

kamerat: who cares really about opl3 when you have emu8000..

well thats comparing sounds from 1988 to sounds from 1994.. 6 year difference
really the interpreted quality of playback would depend more so on whether or not u are listening to the musical composition (midi file) on the original platform that it was designed/composed on
so that you are hearing an accurate representation of what the original composer intedended for that game or midi file.. i think that is always going to be the deciding factor of "perceived quality"

this page is a great visualization: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_MIDI_standards
shows that GS was basically Rolands edited + customized version of GM.. which was made by the midi manufacturers group/comittee http://www.midi.org/aboutus/aboutmma.php

but im not saying im an expert im sure alot of people lurking on this site are alot more well educated.. 😁

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Reply 14 of 83, by alexanrs

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Its not just a pinout limitation. The EMU8K in the AWEs is used in a way that is much more flexible than the Waveblaster (loading SoundFonts in the boards RAM), but needs some data in the system's RAM, which is why AWEUTIL becomes a conventional memory hog when you enable the MPU-401 emulation. On the Waveblaster all the necessary data is on ROM. Anyway, I'd rather use my Yamaha DB50XG or a Roland daughterboard than the Waveblaster.

chrisNova777 - Not being wired to the MPU-401 interface does not mean it is not GM compliant. This is only an issue for DOS apps (which access hardware directly), but Windows apps are indifferent to that as long as the correct drivers are installed.
Also, GM is supposed to be vendor-agnostic (and every post-GM synth should be GM compliant), and GS are Roland's proprietary extension to the standard.

Reply 15 of 83, by gdjacobs

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chrisNova777 - GS is Roland's proprietary extension of GM while XG is Yamaha's proprietary extension. Modules didn't only offer different sets of samples, but often different sets of effects as well. In effect, the Roland SCB-55 is like the guts of an SC-55 mounted to your sound card, while the Yamaha DB50XG is like an MU80 module.

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Reply 16 of 83, by chrisNova777

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re the original posters original question : can we break it down simple easy to read point form bulleted list??
im wondering now re: the FM.. i know SB32 has FM of some sort but im not 100% sure without looking it up
SB32PNP - has no OPL3? but it has FM is it OPL2 then? i cant see any yamaha chips on my card ..
but i remember it saying something about FM.. when i had it installed
SBAWE32 - has OPL3?

i actually have the "Goldfinch" SBAwe32UPG" card here next to me aswell..
im still not 100% clear on which card has what..
without checking facts im suspecting that neither of these cards have a real yamaha chip.. and i will prob have to go shopping again if i want some yamaha synth goodness 😁 🤣
i could always resort to useing FM7 + FM8 - i wonder if anyone has tried using those for Game playback. has that topic been discussed here?

looking at my CT3600 isee theres missing connection pin headers for "AUX2" + "AUX1" but seems to have 2 different connections for "CD IN"`of course anyone could ascertain that from looking at a pic on google images but im just making conversation 😁 🤣

gdjacobs wrote:

chrisNova777 - GS is Roland's proprietary extension of GM while XG is Yamaha's proprietary extension. Modules didn't only offer different sets of samples, but often different sets of effects as well. In effect, the Roland SCB-55 is like the guts of an SC-55 mounted to your sound card, while the Yamaha DB50XG is like an MU80 module.

so that makes me wonder what the benefit of using the wavetable daughterboard at all vs having a real MU80?? other then it benefitting the company in that they can charge u the same price for the full blown module to sell u just the sounds to tack on to your existing hardware.. but why would someone have wanted to get a daughterboard instead of a real mu80 module.. ?

Last edited by chrisNova777 on 2016-01-22, 02:30. Edited 3 times in total.

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Reply 17 of 83, by alexanrs

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/\ No external cables, direct control over the volume through the sound card's mixer. Also it is a more compact solution (everything is inside the PCs case....
But as far as sound quality goes, the external module is usually better unless your sound card has a very low noise level. Also, when I got my DB50XG, it was cheaper than a MU80 and available "locally" (I was in the USA on a trip) with cheap shipping.

Reply 18 of 83, by chrisNova777

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another point is that the mu units can be connected to macs as well as pcs via the serial host cable (8 pin DIN)

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Reply 19 of 83, by DjLc

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CT3600= CT-2502 SDQ = CQM (Creative Quadrature Modulaton aka opl3 emulation).

OPL2 = YM3812
OPL3 =YMF262/YMF289x/YMF71x/CT1747
OPL4 = YMF278
CQM = CT2502/CT1978

Goldfinch card was used to be an upgrade for SB16.

@ElBrunzy

If you want to know the difference between your cards, tell us wich chips are on it.