DaCiRO wrote:

Has anyone heard of a ISA to PCI adapter.

Yes, they exist.

DaCiRO wrote:

Would be ideal to plug in my old ISA sound card into a regular PCI slot of a Pentium 4 MoBo (PCI is not PCI express).

that won't work. DMA and IRQ need chipset level support that can't be provided by an add on like what you are looking for. Chipset level support for the required ISA features has been long ago discontinued on everything.

DaCiRO wrote:

I have an AGP to PCI adapter that works great with my video card and wondering if anyone has heard of these ISA to PCI adapters.... is even possible to architecture such a thing?

completely different. AGP is "only" a heavily modified PCI slot to begin with.

The closest you are going to get is a USB to ISA adapter. And even then, you have to use a special version of DOSBOX or mod your own newer version of DOSBOX with the special code from the company that makes the adapters.

http://arstech.com/install/ecom-prodshow/usb2isar.html
http://arstech.com/install/ecom-prodshow/usb2isax3.html

The other option is to get an industrial PICMG system that has a SBC with an ITE8888 PCI to ISA bridge if you are going with a Pentium 4 setup. There are also slower SBC cards that have chipsets that support ISA natively but then you might as well just use a regular motherboard unless you want a huge number of ISA slots.

Also have a look here:
Could this be the ultimate fastest system with pure dos sound support?

Koltoroc wrote:

DMA and IRQ need chipset level support that can't be provided by an add on like what you are looking for. Chipset level support for the required ISA features has been long ago discontinued on everything.

I think Pentium 4 mobos still exist with the required chipset level support for ISA-like DMA and IRQ; however, if you have this, you might as well plug a PCI card with a driver that can utilize such support.

dr_st wrote:

Koltoroc wrote:

DMA and IRQ need chipset level support that can't be provided by an add on like what you are looking for. Chipset level support for the required ISA features has been long ago discontinued on everything.

I think Pentium 4 mobos still exist with the required chipset level support for ISA-like DMA and IRQ; however, if you have this, you might as well plug a PCI card with a driver that can utilize such support.

I never managed to get my SB Live DOS drivers working on my P4(865G chipset), however i'm not sure if it is because of the SB Live OEM trap.

its possible to bridge isa to pci, but you don't get full combatiblity and maybe need custom drivers..

.legaCy wrote:

I never managed to get my SB Live DOS drivers working on my P4(865G chipset), however i'm not sure if it is because of the SB Live OEM trap.

Certainly not all P4 mobos and not all PCI cards support this kind of thing. But some do. The point is that - if a board supports it, then a PCI card would work just as well as any ISA card in a theoretical ISA-PCI adapter. And if it does not, the adapter would not work either.

Costronic make PCI to ISA adapters. I ordered the cheapest i could get with an ITE IT8888 bridge chip, but i didnt notice in the description that the ISA slot were not soldered on, so i must find one and do it myself. I could choose a sample test item between theese models (picked no. 1):
1. SH72Pv2 
2. SH72Pv2 + S (Stand ISA slot)
3. SH72Pv2 + L (Left side ISA slot)
4. SH72Pv2 + R (Right side ISA slot)

For fully ISA compatibility i think you still need a chipset no later than ICH5.
https://www.costronic.com.tw/Ev72p.htm

i did manage to get a pentium4 with isa motherboard fully working with a soundblaster card. but it was an industrial motherboard and not a consumer one. I had to disable so many things in the bios but i ended up having it working

its good just because you can put a pentium 4 3.0ghz , but then you are limited because their agp slot is 8x and you cant use very old videocards. thats why i preffer something with universal agp slot and isa

Interesting!,... I guess it is not as simple as plug and play and off you go,... Do you know if it requires any programming or flashing?

Scraphoarder wrote:

Costronic make PCI to ISA adapters. I ordered the cheapest i could get with an ITE IT8888 bridge chip, but i didnt notice in the […]
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Costronic make PCI to ISA adapters. I ordered the cheapest i could get with an ITE IT8888 bridge chip, but i didnt notice in the description that the ISA slot were not soldered on, so i must find one and do it myself. I could choose a sample test item between theese models (picked no. 1):
1. SH72Pv2 
2. SH72Pv2 + S (Stand ISA slot)
3. SH72Pv2 + L (Left side ISA slot)
4. SH72Pv2 + R (Right side ISA slot)

For fully ISA compatibility i think you still need a chipset no later than ICH5.
https://www.costronic.com.tw/Ev72p.htm

DaCiRO wrote:

Interesting!,... I guess it is not as simple as plug and play and off you go,... Do you know if it requires any programming or flashing?

I really dont know as i have yet to try it. I ordered one just in case they stop making them anymore and dont think the demand is very high theese days. Costronic dont have support and send no drivers with it. Here is a quote from them:
"Regarding the adapters, they are sold as hardware-only. Any supporting firmware, software, or drivers would be the responsibility of the end user. Please do not order the adapters if you do not have this expertise (they are non-returnable).
The boards should be detected by the OS, but there are so many variables, we can’t predict whether or not they will work.
Costronic has two versions. The main difference is the brand of bridge chip."

Those adapters are not cheap, but if a group buy could be done i think you could get the price down to approx $100-120 per board.
Maybe this could be done as a project like all the soundcard clones being made lately? The layout seems rather simple with few chips on it where the bridge chip is the largest.

Did anyone tried one of these cheap Chinese PCI/PCI-E to ISA cards? They cost about 40$ PCI (CH365 chip) and 50-60$ PCI-E version (CH367 chip)

These chips are made by WCH (Nanjing Qinheng Microelectronics )...

I have one of the PCI versions on the way.

The info sheet for that chip of course doesn't say anything about DMA, so that pretty much means that it will not work with most sound cards.

Adlib and clones will probably work fine though.

I'm not finding the pci-e ones. Link?

cyclone3d, search for the chip, CH367, you'll have more luck finding it.

edit: looking at the info for the ch367 (pcie)... they only mention an 8 bit address bus. Good luck getting any card running on that without modifications.
the CH365 (pci version) is indicated as having 16bit address bus, so that would be good.
the CH368 (pcie) also has 16bit address bus, though no card seems to exist with an ISA connector.

These chips will only provide IO and memory accesses but not IRQs or DMAs, something else will have to do that in addition. As is, you'll only get Adlib and MPU401 action out of them, and other devices that don't rely on IRQs or DMAs to operate.

Is it necro-ing a thread if the last reply was a few months ago? Either way, was thinking of picking a pci to isa adapter up and wondering what could be used with them? Would a video card work?