Couple of notes on this. First, Creative's SB16 emulation on SBLive/Audigy cards isn't perfect. There are compatibility issues with certain DOS games, and playing them under Windows can make things worse. For example, Quake and WarCraft 2 exhibit stuttering/distortion of digital audio under such conditions. Running them in pure DOS can sometimes help with this. However, you can't load soundfonts in pure DOS, and are stuck with ECW sets for General MIDI. This doesn't sound so great, so there's a tradeoff.

That said, I haven't extensively tested different driver versions with regards to digital audio issues. I don't think it would make much difference on Audigy cards, since they need newer drivers by default. But using older drivers on SBLive cards could possibly have some impact. There's a downside to that as well, since older SBLive drivers sometimes exhibit slowdown and stuttering when playing FM synth music. So your mileage may vary.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2024-04-18, 13:42:

I don't think it would make much difference on Audigy cards, since they need newer drivers by default. But using older drivers on SBLive cards could possibly have some impact. There's a downside to that as well, since older SBLive drivers sometimes exhibit slowdown and stuttering when playing FM synth music. So your mileage may vary.

Interesting - thank you - and for all your work supporting these cards!

I have an SBLive! in another older system and tried booting that to Win98 and playing the same games. None of the DOS game stuttering issues there.

From what you've said it sounds like it might be worth trying with the drivers from the original Audigy 1 disc, rather than the Audigy2 disc? Or I wonder if it would be worth trying swapping the SBLive! into the main system?

justin1985 wrote on 2024-04-18, 23:00:

Interesting - thank you - and for all your work supporting these cards!

Cheers! 😀

From what you've said it sounds like it might be worth trying with the drivers from the original Audigy 1 disc, rather than the Audigy2 disc? Or I wonder if it would be worth trying swapping the SBLive! into the main system?

I was referring to the DOS component of the drivers. The newest version of that shipped with Audigy 1 cards. Creative never released official DOS drivers for Audigy 2 or ZS cards, but it's possible to adapt Audigy 1 drivers to work on those as well.

As for downgrading the Audigy 1 Windows drivers, that probably wouldn't make much difference, but it doesn't hurt to try. Using a SBLive with older DOS drivers would likely be more effective.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2024-04-19, 03:31:

As for downgrading the Audigy 1 Windows drivers, that probably wouldn't make much difference, but it doesn't hurt to try. Using a SBLive with older DOS drivers would likely be more effective.

Several hours later ... it seemed like swapping to the SB4760 Live! card, with the drivers from the original install disc image for that version, was the only way to get all of the DOS games I want to play nicely under Win98. This seems like a good balance for me for this PC - targeting late DOS and Win98 games, but not particularly bothered about 3D audio etc. I guess save the Audigy for XP, or even sell it on again ...

justin1985 wrote on 2024-04-19, 23:24:

Several hours later ... it seemed like swapping to the SB4760 Live! card, with the drivers from the original install disc image for that version, was the only way to get all of the DOS games I want to play nicely under Win98. This seems like a good balance for me for this PC - targeting late DOS and Win98 games, but not particularly bothered about 3D audio etc. I guess save the Audigy for XP, or even sell it on again ...

Good to hear you got it working! Note that with stock SBLive drivers (VxD) you can't use soundfonts for General MIDI music in DOS games. The card will always default to ECW sets, which don't sound as good. That and the aforementioned FM synth slowdown are the only issues I can think of. Also, if you're using surround sound speakers, Audigy cards are a bit more convenient, since you can easily disable auto-expanding stereo sources to all speakers.

Otherwise, the SBLive is an excellent card, and you're not losing much compared to the Audigy. SBLive has fewer DirectSound3D hardware channels (32 vs. 64 on the Audigy). It also doesn't support EAX 3.0 and CMSS. But that won't make much difference under Win9x if you stick to playing games released before 2002.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2024-04-20, 06:22:

justin1985 wrote on 2024-04-19, 23:24:

Several hours later ... it seemed like swapping to the SB4760 Live! card, with the drivers from the original install disc image for that version, was the only way to get all of the DOS games I want to play nicely under Win98. This seems like a good balance for me for this PC - targeting late DOS and Win98 games, but not particularly bothered about 3D audio etc. I guess save the Audigy for XP, or even sell it on again ...

Good to hear you got it working! Note that with stock SBLive drivers (VxD) you can't use soundfonts for General MIDI music in DOS games. The card will always default to ECW sets, which don't sound as good. That and the aforementioned FM synth slowdown are the only issues I can think of. Also, if you're using surround sound speakers, Audigy cards are a bit more convenient, since you can easily disable auto-expanding stereo sources to all speakers.

Thanks again for sharing all of this wisdom! I thought I'd noticed a change in general MIDI sound when switching from the Audigy-adapted drivers to the original CT4760 ones.

Do you specifically mean the stock SBLive VxD drivers from the original CT4760 disk, or SB Live VXD drivers (rather than adapted Audigy) in general? I noticed on the Vogons Driver Library there are several 4.06.xxx and 4.12.xxx driver versions available, as well as the CT4760 image I used ... Or perhaps that is irrelevant to this question?

If the Live! is always limited to ECW for General MIDI in DOS under Windows (unless you use the Audigy drivers), is it possible to force it to use the larger sample set, like I remember seeing as advice for the AudioPCI?

justin1985 wrote on 2024-04-20, 10:20:

If the Live! is always limited to ECW for General MIDI in DOS under Windows (unless you use the Audigy drivers), is it possible to force it to use the larger sample set, like I remember seeing as advice for the AudioPCI?

The SBLive always uses ECW sets for DOS gaming with its stock VxD drivers (any version). You can force it to use a larger ECW file by overwriting C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\DEFAULT.ECW with the 8MB set, or something like that. Can't remember the exact location of that file.

The only way to use soundfonts for DOS game music with a SBLive is to either switch to its stock WDM drivers (which have compatibility issues of their own) or to use the Audigy drivers.

Trying different driver versions could help, and it's worth checking for compatibility settings in the game