I'm in for one of each. I have a 2 Value cards, but still in search of a Gold.

Has anyone actually stepped up saying they'd try to re-create these things? We certainly have enough interested buyers here.

Well we have the pbc/cad files or what ever you call them. So anyone that's know who to go to could make/sell them.

If I get some time after finishing my piii box I'll see about finding someone to make them. I may know someone that can make the Pcb.
The hard part is keeping it cost effective. The pbc would be cheap. 10$ max if you know the right people. It's every thing else that gets you, like the sim slots and IC's.

I would be willing to say most would be willing to spend up to 50$ for one. So one would have to get them made for around 30-40$

It would easily be over $50+ if one shows up on ebay.
There is one in combination with a CT4390 selling for $450.....

Imho $450 would be absolutely ridiculous even if the Gold was accompanied by a true CT1950, let alone any 3rd party adapters including SIMMConn.

Yes. I hope someone can re-create it so people can't charge such ridiculous price on ebay.

hi any news on the Simmconn AWE64 Adapter
any re-releases on this item
would like to buy 2
thanks

spanner_man3 wrote:

hi any news on the Simmconn AWE64 Adapter any re-releases on this item would like to buy 2 thanks […]
Show full quote

hi any news on the Simmconn AWE64 Adapter
any re-releases on this item
would like to buy 2
thanks

Nope no news.. no one's stepped up to the plate to commit to this yet. And I don't have the knowledge to do it myself.

Well given he says commercial use is prohibited - I don't think anybody really wants to make and assemble 50 of these for no reward

if someone wants to translate the design to oshpark, I'd say that is the best we can hope for

I would like to take a swing at this project but most pcb manufacturers require at least 20 boards to be printed. Locating the required chips is an issue as well. Not to mention simm sockets. I'm not sure what the developer means by "commercial use" but my guess is his plans are not intended to be used to make hundreds of these to attempt to make a profit. I don't think anyone would invest much money in this project and build 20+ of these for no profit. I will look into this a bit more when I get home from work, I only have an awe64 value card so if I make an attempt at this project that's all I'll be able to focus on. I need to research all the required components and get a board maker to get a quote on the minimum lot.

It would be cheaper if the components could be ordered separately and obliging the end-user to solder it together, wouldn't it?

Jorpho wrote:

It would be cheaper if the components could be ordered separately and obliging the end-user to solder it together, wouldn't it?

Possibly, but if that were the case then not everyone has decent solder skills at that level.. and then most of us wouldn't ever be able to use one.

lilkuz2005 wrote:

Locating the required chips is an issue as well.

I had a look at the PALCE16V8H7JC/5 a while ago and it was discontinued and the current suggested part that supersedes it (about 4 supersessions deep) was a different sized chip and would need a board redesign

some places claimed to have stock of the original chip but none that i had dealt with in the past or that looked like they really wanted 20 orders of 1 unit of the chip from different people.

though someone may have a good solution to that or perhaps google was not being my friend that day.

I had a bit of a crack at getting the supplied Gerber files to load in current software, but it seems the Files are so old that many of them don't make any sense
in the software. Someone would have to really know what they're doing to sort this out.
I'm fairly certain All the electronic parts can be found on Aliexpress.

i got looking at the awe64 value ct4520. i looked up some of the chips on the card and found the SIEMENS HYB514256BJ-70, and the NPNX NN514265J-60, are both 256 K × 4-Bit Dynamic RAM, that would make up the 512kb available to load sound-fonts. the chips are not in the same orientation, one is a SOJ-20pin package, the other is a SOJ-40pin package, but i was thinking that technology has advanced a great deal over the past 20 years, could i find a larger 4-bit dynamic ram chip and replace the 2 chips on the card ?
its my understanding that the SIMMconn as well as the creative proprietary memory upgrade module will not retain the information that is flashed to it after a power cycle, its treated just like system memory. but the onboard memory will retain the information because its the same type of memory used by motherboards CMOS.
has anyone made an attempt to do this mod / upgrade? im looking around and i have found much larger capacity chips that are in the same orientation as the factory chips, but im not sure if the card can see and use the higher amounts ? if this could work it could potentially make the ct4520 a better card then the awe64 gold with its 4mb of onboard memory.

lilkuz2005 wrote:

i got looking at the awe64 value ct4520. i looked up some of the chips on the card and found the SIEMENS HYB514256BJ-70, and the NPNX NN514265J-60, are both 256 K × 4-Bit Dynamic RAM, that would make up the 512kb available to load sound-fonts. the chips are not in the same orientation, one is a SOJ-20pin package, the other is a SOJ-40pin package, but i was thinking that technology has advanced a great deal over the past 20 years, could i find a larger 4-bit dynamic ram chip and replace the 2 chips on the card ?
its my understanding that the SIMMconn as well as the creative proprietary memory upgrade module will not retain the information that is flashed to it after a power cycle, its treated just like system memory. but the onboard memory will retain the information because its the same type of memory used by motherboards CMOS.
has anyone made an attempt to do this mod / upgrade? im looking around and i have found much larger capacity chips that are in the same orientation as the factory chips, but im not sure if the card can see and use the higher amounts ? if this could work it could potentially make the ct4520 a better card then the awe64 gold with its 4mb of onboard memory.

I have an awe64 value with the original SIMMconn, even installing a 32MB SIMM in it, the card only "Sees" 28 MB of additional add-on memory via the SIMMconn device. And any sound fonts loaded into the SIMMconn additional ram, acts just like RAM. It's "lost" on power cycle and we have to re-load it via software (Creative's software will do this automatically on start up if we tell it to) to load the sound font in again.

I'm not entirely sure how to go about this but maybe if you could get it done via 1 x 32MB chip today.. then it would probably reduce construction costs a good bit and simplify the entire thing, I would imagine.

kithylin wrote:

I have an awe64 value with the original SIMMconn, even installing a 32MB SIMM in it, the card only "Sees" 28 MB of additional add-on memory via the SIMMconn device. And any sound fonts loaded into the SIMMconn additional ram, acts just like RAM. It's "lost" on power cycle and we have to re-load it via software (Creative's software will do this automatically on start up if we tell it to) to load the sound font in again.

I'm not entirely sure how to go about this but maybe if you could get it done via 1 x 32MB chip today.. then it would probably reduce construction costs a good bit and simplify the entire thing, I would imagine.

im not sure if the EMU8000 is designed to look for both RAM chips when its reading and writing, i guess the only way to test this would be to just rework a new chip and see if the card will still function with just one chip, this idea really has me interested in giving it a shot, i can get the ct4520's not the ct4525 "nerfed models" for around $12 shipped here, so im thinking about buying another to test on, worst case i would just have to solder the old chips back

kithylin wrote:

I have an awe64 value with the original SIMMconn, even installing a 32MB SIMM in it, the card only "Sees" 28 MB of additional add-on memory via the SIMMconn device.

I dimly recall that the AWE32 acts the same way.

I'm interested as well. Someone should start a kickstarter!

dexvx wrote:

I'm interested as well. Someone should start a kickstarter!

The problem is that while there are interested parties.. some folks here said they're looking in to it and it may not be technically possible to re-create today. At least so far.