Parts ordered 😀

Can't await to build it!

Any success/failure stories of completed prototypes so far?
cyclone3d/640k!enough/QBiN did your prototypes arrive yet?

Haven't started building yet - I have the components except the 20K/2.2K/2.2uf ones - I ordered them today.
I believe I'll start soldering one board tomorrow but programming the ROM will take some time as I have no SOP44 adapter.

I git mine last week. I haven't had time to do anything with it yet though due to work and other pressing matters.

I'm going to try to get the parts ordered this week or next week.

my caps should arrive every day now and i can finish it this week. still need a better sub-d connector then. I'm currently working at a slot-blade which I'm gonna 3d-print.

shock__ wrote:

cyclone3d/640k!enough/QBiN did your prototypes arrive yet?

No sign of it yet. Canada Post has been rather irregular in recent years; sometimes parcels arrive surprisingly quickly, and other times they take months. I've been waiting over a month for a shipment of ROM module prototype boards, too.

Do i see correctly that jp5 is 2 separate bridges (pin1+2 and pin3+4) or is it 1 bridge over the 4pins (1+2+3+4) ?

Should i only solder jp0,1,2,3 when i use ram ? I'm planning on only using a simm. What size can i take? 1MB or 4MB?

Actual pic of completed board:
http://abload.de/image.php?img=img_20180122_181934ogrx3.jpg

shock__ wrote:

Any success/failure stories of completed prototypes so far?
cyclone3d/640k!enough/QBiN did your prototypes arrive yet?

I am still waiting for some parts: ROM, solder paste, some caps.
And I will try to solder the SMD parts with solder paste and a heat gun. Hope this works flawlessly.

JP4 & JP5 are set correct.
It's 2 seperate bridges for 29F800 or 1 bridge going over 3 pads for the IW78C21M1

For the SIMM I'd recommend going with the full 16MB ... but -since you're a beta tester- you're free to test all you've got 😀

Expanding on my previous comment, I decided to order a smaller set of cheaper boards last week, since the original order has been delayed so long. Those have arrived via express shipping. I don't have enough parts to build many at the moment, but I did assemble one GUS ROM module.

The revision 2 prototype does appear to work. The first unit I have assembled has a 2 MiB instrument set, based on the 4 MiB Eye & I set, but this time μ-law encoded. I haven't tested extensively yet, but so far I haven't been treated to a light show, magic smoke or any peculiar behaviour. My impression so far is that sound quality falls somewhere between full 16-bit quality and linear 8-bit. I can upload a few samples if there is interest.

I didn't re-order the module for the ARGUS to keep the cost down, but that isn't a problem yet, since I don't have that board, either. I guess that testing will have to wait a while longer.

so...I was testing the card using a 16M Ram.

wrote eeprom (output just says nothing if correct? Or is that map output the "good" output??

took drivers from
https://gona.mactar.hu/GRAVIS/#PnP
PNPV22B.ZIP

and installed. added like 3 times the "iwinit.exe" to my config files...I think it fails 1 time out of these 3, it's weird !?

Run the config tool, sets up. but in game sound setups, it's not detected. what am i missing? or can someone send me some other drivers ?

duke 3d says that i should use irq7 or less (i did, still didn't work), doom2 configs, but no sound at all

What's the output on "iwinit -v9"?
Output for pnpmap is normal.

will test tomorrow, already nearly in bed 😉
can you confirm that these are "good" drivers ?

If the card initializes, they should be good.

As shock__ requested, the full output of iwinit -v9 would be helpful.

This may be obvious, but it may be worth mentioning just the same: the flash ROM should be programmed with an instrument bank before being soldered onto the board. It is currently not possible to write an instrument bank to the chip directly in place (in-circuit). That would be a very good reason for MIDI playback to fail in some instances, unless patches were loaded into RAM by the software. The card can be used without a ROM bank in place, but some software that wasn't specifically designed to handle that case may not work correctly. Using the included PLAY.EXE to test MIDI and MOD playback is probably a simpler approach. Test third-party games only once that is working.

Also: Duke3D requesting an IRQ of 7 or lower is normal and bound to the sound system used by that game. Also (if anything else is alright) Duke3D would fail if it can't find an InterWave ROM (contents don't have to be the original ones).

started populating a card - no surprises so far! 😀

Soldering looks amazing - keep it up.

Thanks! 😁
tbh it's not amazing - but it's not bad either , maybe if I had better tools it would be even prettier... maybe some day I'll find out 🤣

640K!enough wrote:

No sign of it yet. Canada Post has been rather irregular in recent years; sometimes parcels arrive surprisingly quickly, and other times they take months. I've been waiting over a month for a shipment of ROM module prototype boards, too.

I got mine pretty rapidly, weird as we are in the same area.
Anyhow, did you already purchased all the required components ? I'd like to use your list and vendors so I can start to build mine.