Someone please compare with the ROTT soundtrack, most awesome music ever. =]

TrueMorph wrote:

Hi,

I'm looking for Ultima 6 Opening recorded with the real CMS/GameBlaster. Is there any chance that someone could make one for me in its free time? 😀

Thanks.

I may be able to help you, as I have a real CMS card, although it will be a matter of finding the time.... if someone else wants to have a go at this first be my guest 😀

Someone please compare with the ROTT soundtrack, most awesome music ever. =]

I agree 😀 Although I thikn Tyrian is also a contender for that title...

I've recorded nearly all of ROTT soundtrack using an SC-55 and an XR385 (DB50XG clone card). Here are the links:
SC-55: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/9151127/ROTT/SC55/sc55.html

XR385 (attached to CT2800): http://dl.dropbox.com/u/9151127/ROTT/XR385/xr385.html

IMHO the XR385 is much better sounding for this game.

I was planning on also doing Adlib/FM synth, on versions 1.2 and 1.3 of ROTT (as it sounds quite different in 1.3), Gravis Ultrasound, and AWE32. However finding the time to do so is the hard part 😒 I'd like to do the same for Tyrian one day too.

Thanks man it would be great 😀

I had in mind SB 1.5 or 2.0 with CMS chips too. 😜

Hey, this is possibly a little bit off track from what you guys are doing in this thread but I thought it was the best place to put it. I thought you'd all enjoy it since we're all sound card nuts. 😜

I've been working on a project of my own-- recording MIDI music playback from various devices. There's no focus on old hardware, or DOS stuff, or whatever-- just any sort of MIDI playback, whether it be hardware or software based (the basic rule being: if it sounds different, record it!) I have a set of 9 MIDIs that I picked mostly because I like them and partially because they'll show off different parts of the MIDI spectrum.

I'm using Youtube to put this stuff up, and while it's not the most elegant solution, it at least allows me to stream it easily without running into bandwidth limits. If set on 480p it sounds as clear as the raw video file on my computer. The playlist is located at http://www.youtube.com/user/MrKsoft#grid/user … C0EF3C24F934DEF
(Hopefully I can upload the actual audio files at some point, but I have nowhere to put them where they won't get taken down for using huge amounts of bandwidth)

Only thing is that I don't have all that much to work with, especially on the hardware side. So I was wondering if anyone here would like to contribute to the project! I'm looking for pretty much anything that can play a MIDI. Just grab the MIDI set I put together from here, make recordings (I would prefer a lossless format for archival purposes, though I know they're kinda hard to upload), and send them to me with a picture (or stock photo) of the hardware. Thanks much and enjoy!

I love what you've done there!
I too love different sounding MIDI equipment! I must congratulate you on the inclusion of the Beach theme from Plok, that's one hell of a track!

Sweet, thanks for the ROTT soundtrack from SC-55, one of my favorite sounding midi devices.

No problem 😀

I've also recently recorded the music using my Gravis Ultrasound Classic. Here's the link:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/9151127/ROTT/gravis/gus.html

I like this one the best 😀 I remember reading somewhere that Lee Jackson composed the soundtrack for ROTT using a GUS.
Here's the index of all 3 cards that i've done so far: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/9151127/ROTT/rott.html

DonutKing wrote:

No problem :) […]
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No problem 😀

I've also recently recorded the music using my Gravis Ultrasound Classic. Here's the link:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/9151127/ROTT/gravis/gus.html

I like this one the best 😀 I remember reading somewhere that Lee Jackson composed the soundtrack for ROTT using a GUS.
Here's the index of all 3 cards that i've done so far: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/9151127/ROTT/rott.html

Thanks for those recordings, ive always listened to my rott midis using the sound canvas. It sounds pretty good with the gus!

I gotta say however donutking, you should try to normalize the level of your recordings so max amplitude = 0db . It is pretty weak here, i gotta pump everything to the max and it sounds a bit noisy and distorted.

General rules for good recordings in my experience should be :
-Dont pump the source to the max yet stay close, by that i mean i.e music volume in a game, midi sound level in windows etc.. ( i usualy go around 85-95%)
-Set input gain in the recording interface/sound card to as high as you can without ever peaking, you want the max amplitude to be a little bit below peaking.
-Then Normalize the recorded track so offset is centered and max amplitude= 0db. * Hint, if you dont see the waveform getting bigger in the recording program after you use normalize, it means you set the input gain too high. If it gets a lot bigger then the input gain was too low.
When you do normalize and the waveform gets just a bit bigger, you know you did it right 😉

Edit, Btw, forgot to ask what recording program you use. I also downloaded the XR385 version and its siginificantly louder and cleaner than the gus. Use the steps i listed and you should get pretty constant quality/volume all the time 😉

MaxWar wrote:

-Set input gain in the recording interface/sound card to as high as you can without ever peaking, you want the max amplitude to be a little bit below peaking.

that always seems to be the problematic part - combined with setting the source volume it's hard to predict whether or not something is gonna hit 0db... those Himalayan peaks just love to sneak up on you.

ages ago I borrowed a Roland drum-sound module from someone and literally spent days trying to record around half the samples (for tracker usage). Then I returned it, only to find that the louder samples from each instrument were clipped to hell and back. Never was able to get my hand on the thing again 😠

VileRancour wrote:

MaxWar wrote:

-Set input gain in the recording interface/sound card to as high as you can without ever peaking, you want the max amplitude to be a little bit below peaking.

that always seems to be the problematic part - combined with setting the source volume it's hard to predict whether or not something is gonna hit 0db... those Himalayan peaks just love to sneak up on you.

ages ago I borrowed a Roland drum-sound module from someone and literally spent days trying to record around half the samples (for tracker usage). Then I returned it, only to find that the louder samples from each instrument were clipped to hell and back. Never was able to get my hand on the thing again 😠

It can be tricky i agree. For the source volume, very often 100% would be ok but some sources seem to distort when pushed too high so i go around 90% as a general rule. Unless i know for sure its ok to go higher.

For input gain : it can be somewhat time consuming as basically you gotta test first, make sure level is set right, then record. To make it fast when you are recording a whole set of songs from the same game, i would start with the loudest song, take the time to set it then use same input gain for all the others. It is not that long to do really and its worth it as you gain audio definition by maximizing input gain.

I'm using Audacity, and I recently bought a Creative X-FI Titanium which has pretty terrible software, and I'm not sure where to set the line in level...
The SC55 and XR385 were just done using onboard Realtek sound.

EDIT: just ran this one through Audacity's normalize filter. Does it sound any better?

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/9151127/ROTT/adagio1.mp3

DonutKing wrote:

I'm using Audacity, and I recently bought a Creative X-FI Titanium which has pretty terrible software, and I'm not sure where to set the line in level...
The SC55 and XR385 were just done using onboard Realtek sound.

Audacity is fine. I do not know what os you use exactly but the place should be the "usual" windows level mixer. Unless i am wrong, Audacity should let you adjust the line in level from within. Personaly i use a E-mu 1212m recording interface and it comes with its own specialized mixer and it does not work from audacity. So in my case it does not apply.

But i think it should apply with onboard realtek or X-Fi. For the x-fi you should at least have in the control panel a specific level mixer that came with the X-fi drivers. Just make sure it is clear that you are setting line in level and not line out level.

As far as I can tell the win 7 x64 mixer only has master volume control, and the x-fi software is terrible. Can find effects sliders for things like reverb and chorus but no line in volume control... maybe I'm looking in the wrong place.

It is a bit more complicated. Usually sound output from the old soundcards is analog and most of the single chip solutions nowadays feature some kind of automatic input gain detection of their analog inputs. In most drivers there is no option to disable this 'feature'. This basically means that each time if you power on a device on the end of the analog audio cable a input gain value is determined. As this is not very exact it differs slightly each time.
This means that even if you save your settings for a specific combination of audio source and input volume level this might be different the next time.
Another thing I noticed in Windows7 x64 is, if I power up a external audio output device the analog input is set way too loud and input is strongly distorted, even if the input mixer volume slider is set to 0. If I retouch the slider but leave it at 0 in the end the distortion is gone. I have to do this every time I activate a new audio source. I guess the all new audio subsystem in windows is good for 7.1+ output, but incapable of fulfilling basic features like simple analog input signal handling.

Normalizing the recorded wave is fine but rescaling the sample values to the full range does not mean that the loudness gets normalized. This is because obviously the loudness of some music does not correlate directly to a mathematical normalization. Thus it is good to apply a Replaygain analysis afterwards. Replaygain uses a specific algorithm to detect the loudness of a wave and tags this correction value to the file (f.e. as MP3 tag). The raw wave (or mp3) data is not altered. If you use a Replaygain aware player the correction is applied. There is for example a plugin in foobar that adds replaygain tags.

The other difficulty is that the GUS's line out is MUCH louder than other cards I've tried. It's almost as loud as an SB16's speaker out. I reduced the volume when I recorded it but I may have overdone it.

Anyway, I've run all the files through MP3GAIN and normalised them all, and reuploaded them. Please try downloading them again and see if they are improved.

Run the X-Fi in audio creation mode for a nice mixer. Should look like this. link I have a X-Fi too but not at home right now.

You can also go into the Windows 7 recording device settings and find level adjustments in there. looks like this

Watch the input level meter for red beause that's clipping and must be avoided. On the Audacity graph clipping will appear as squared off peaks. It's also best to minimize how much amplifying you do post process because it will also amplify background noise.

Also useful is this Audacity wiki Win7 guide.
http://wiki.audacityteam.org/index.php?title=Windows_7_OS

elianda wrote:

most of the single chip solutions nowadays feature some kind of automatic input gain detection of their analog inputs. In most drivers there is no option to disable this 'feature'. This basically means that each time if you power on a device on the end of the analog audio cable a input gain value is determined.

Yuck, this is horrid. Makes me happy i never used onboard audio to record anything... Ive always used sound cards or external interfaces. I would not recommend anyone to try to record with such a system. I will check on my win7 computer, it uses onboard realtek. It also dual boots to ubuntu, might be interesting to see if this "unfeature" can be disabled with linux.

elianda wrote:

Another thing I noticed in Windows7 x64 is, if I power up a external audio output device the analog input is set way too loud and input is strongly distorted, even if the input mixer volume slider is set to 0. If I retouch the slider but leave it at 0 in the end the distortion is gone. I have to do this every time I activate a new audio source. I guess the all new audio subsystem in windows is good for 7.1+ output, but incapable of fulfilling basic features like simple analog input signal handling.

Microsoft seem to really like downgrading audio/midi options nowaday. All my music/recording systems still run XP

elianda wrote:

Normalizing the recorded wave is fine but rescaling the sample values to the full range does not mean that the loudness gets normalized. This is because obviously the loudness of some music does not correlate directly to a mathematical normalization. Thus it is good to apply a Replaygain analysis afterwards. Replaygain uses a specific algorithm to detect the loudness of a wave and tags this correction value to the file (f.e. as MP3 tag). The raw wave (or mp3) data is not altered. If you use a Replaygain aware player the correction is applied. There is for example a plugin in foobar that adds replaygain tags.

This is interesting, does it also work with flac ? I might just try it. Normally I will not normalize loudness when recording midis or vg musics because it will change the dynamic range and i prefer to preserve the authenticity. Although there can be loudness differences between two normalized recordings i find its usually pretty even if all you record is vg midis. But if you go compare that to a modern music recording where the mastering job squished everything flat for maximum loudness, its obvious the normalized midi recording will sound a bit weak.

DonutKing wrote:

The other difficulty is that the GUS's line out is MUCH louder than other cards I've tried. It's almost as loud as an SB16's speaker out. I reduced the volume when I recorded it but I may have overdone it.

Anyway, I've run all the files through MP3GAIN and normalised them all, and reuploaded them. Please try downloading them again and see if they are improved.

It certainly sounds louder and more even with the other recordings, this is a good thing for comparative listening. However if you used your old weak mp3 and boosted them, you definitely lost a bunch of sound quality in the whole process. Weak signal recording = bad signal to noise ratio as swaaye explained, but furthermore, weak digital recording = less audio definition as it will not fully use the potential of your audio resolution(44khz 16bit usualy). When you normalize a digital recording, it will do something akin to resolution upscaling, you end up with less than if the audio was recorded with more gain.

I've only had this 'automatic gain' in Windows 7, never XP or Linux. The audiodg.exe process has something to do with it, i reckon

Today I picked up a Yamaha YMF719.

I'm quite happy with it. Once its set up properly (as described earlier in this thread) its sounds pretty decent with a good SNR, seems to have a real OPL3 in it and the waveblaster header works without hanging notes. I don't get any nasty crackles in games with tracker based music like Halloween Harry or Mystic Towers.

Every game I've tried works so far except for Duke Nukem 2 - the music is fine, digital sound works for the intro but when you start a level, it will only play 2 or 3 sound effects and then it will not play any more. I've no idea what's going on here, some sort of buffer filling up? It works fine with a sound blaster. Haven't found any other games that do this.

Unfortunately the card is too small to mount my XR385 daughterboard so I had to get creative, and make an extension cable with some ribbon cable and 26 pin IDC headers:

I found that to get the correct pinout I had to twist every pair of wires on one end. The cable works flawlessly though 😀

Overall, very happy with this card, I think I've finally found the 'all in one' card I was looking for (real OPL + wavetable header without hanging notes + decent SNR, no crackles) 😀

Here are some recordings of this card.

YMF719 Halloween Harry

YMF719 Monkey Island 2

YMF719 Tyrian : Tunnelling Trolls

TrueMorph wrote:

Hi,

I'm looking for Ultima 6 Opening recorded with the real CMS/GameBlaster. Is there any chance that someone could make one for me in its free time? 😀

Thanks.

Sorry it took so long, but here you go 😀

Ultima 6 Opening, Menu, Introduction - CMS Game Blaster

Sounds very good 😀