Aztech Sound Galaxy cards

[The Serpent Rider]

Compared to a decent SB16 model, I don't hear any improvement. My card also have a tendency to switch between quiet/noisy state during idling and playing.

[James-F]

Did some tests with mentioned Aztech Sound Galaxy Multimedia 16 ABO. Can't call this card quiet at all, at least with low-impedance headphones.

I have the Multimedia 16 ABI (AZT-2316), this is one of the best SBPro2 clones around, has a very clean sounding coded, even better than the original SBPro2.
It has original OPL3, bug free MPU-401, Wavetable, and excellent drivers, definitely a good choice for a retro PC,,, but it lacks a lowpass filter over the PCM sounds, but so does the Audician 32 Plus.
BUT, it has an issue in my system (P200 MMX) that some games freeze, like Prince of Persia and Supaplex, these games use singlce-cycle DMA.

Its self noise is very quiet, but you have to set the mixer properly and use a correct line load (10k).

Code: Select all

volset.exe /x:16 /v:16 /f:16 /m:0 /c:0 /l:0 /m:0 /r:l

No ISA card that I know of has headphone output, the output impedance is build for line inputs (10k load) or Speaker (8ohm load but not headphones).
I don't know where the 'trend' came from to plugging headphones into the line-out or speaker-out of a vintage ISA card, but it is definitely wrong and will sound wrong.
The right way is to use a headphone amplifier or mixer with dedicated headphone output.

Anyway, I've had a chance to test the AZT-2316 based card again, and it sounds good even without a lowpass filter.
But as I stated earlier, it has some issues with single-cycle DMA mode, on my machine at least.

@Moderator
Please move this thread to the Marvin->Sound board.

[Stiletto]

Moved.

[gdjacobs]

Did some tests with mentioned Aztech Sound Galaxy Multimedia 16 ABO. Can't call this card quiet at all, at least with low-impedance headphones.

I have the Multimedia 16 ABI (AZT-2316), this is one of the best SBPro2 clones around, has a very clean sounding coded, even better than the original SBPro2.
It has original OPL3, bug free MPU-401, Wavetable, and excellent drivers, definitely a good choice for a retro PC,,, but it lacks a lowpass filter over the PCM sounds, but so does the Audician 32 Plus.
BUT, it has an issue in my system (P200 MMX) that some games freeze, like Prince of Persia and Supaplex, these games use singlce-cycle DMA.

Its self noise is very quiet, but you have to set the mixer properly and use a correct line load (10k).

Code: Select all

volset.exe /x:16 /v:16 /f:16 /m:0 /c:0 /l:0 /m:0 /r:l

No ISA card that I know of has headphone output, the output impedance is build for line inputs (10k load) or Speaker (8ohm load but not headphones).
I don't know where the 'trend' came from to plugging headphones into the line-out or speaker-out of a vintage ISA card, but it is definitely wrong and will sound wrong.
The right way is to use a headphone amplifier or mixer with dedicated headphone output.

Anyway, I've had a chance to test the AZT-2316 based card again, and it sounds good even without a lowpass filter.
But as I stated earlier, it has some issues with single-cycle DMA mode, on my machine at least.

@Moderator
Please move this thread to the Marvin->Sound board.

You're right, but I think it's worth explaining more. The line out amp will source plenty of current to drive a set of headphones, but 600 ohm headphones require larger voltage swings to work properly. A normal line out or speaker out will sound very quiet at normal volume settings on the mixer which might tempt users to overdrive the output into clipping, severely distorting the sound. Headphones closer to 8 ohms will, of course, not suffer so heavily or perhaps at all.

[James-F]

I wouldn't call the on-board IC amplifier on an old ISA card a hi-fi device, but it might drive headphones properly.
On the newer AZT2316 based Aztech card I see a TDA1517P which should give a 5W 0.5% THD into 4ohm, half the power for 8 ohm etc..
For a typical 16ohm headphone max power will be around 1W , that is plenty to drive the headphone into distortion and your ears to bleed.
Most portable headphones rated around 100db SPL per 1mW so the on-board amplifier should be plenty.

But, I will not trust the amplifier IC to put out frequency response or self noise characteristics similar to the line-out with a proper 10k load.
One thing is definitely sure, 16ohm headphone should not be plugged into the line-out jack because its output op-amps provide no current and will distort the waveform and/or frequency response and who knows what else pretty much immediately.

I can run a test with 8 ohm load power resistor and tap that through a 1K resistor into my test equipment to see how the amplifier behaves, but meh...

[gdjacobs]

I wouldn't call the on-board IC amplifier on an old ISA card a hi-fi device, but it might drive headphones properly.
On the newer AZT2316 based Aztech card I see a TDA1517P which should give a 5W 0.5% THD into 4ohm, half the power for 8 ohm etc..
For a typical 16ohm headphone max power will be around 1W , that is plenty to drive the headphone into distortion and your ears to bleed.
Most portable headphones rated around 100db SPL per 1mW so the on-board amplifier should be plenty.

But, I will not trust the amplifier IC to put out frequency response or self noise characteristics similar to the line-out with a proper 10k load.
One thing is definitely sure, 16ohm headphone should not be plugged into the line-out jack because its output op-amps provide no current and will distort the waveform and/or frequency response and who knows what else pretty much immediately.

I can run a test with 8 ohm load power resistor and tap that through a 1K resistor into my test equipment to see how the amplifier behaves, but meh...

Totally agree there. A line level output will be completely unsuitable for driving unamplified headphones. Also, kind of annoying that the PDF for the amp chip doesn't have a THD vs Power curve. I'm guessing that THD will improve a little bit more when operating further from saturation, but it's hard to know for sure without testing.

[andrewreader]

Hello,

Which Win 3.11 / Dos driver is it for the Packard Bell ISA Sound Card 030056 / Aztech one?

It is: -FCC-ID I38-MMSN837

I can't find a match. Please can someone help?

Thanks,

Andrew.

[James-F]

Apparently the high-pitched whine I was complaining about in the NX Pro was from the Inverter Air Conditioner PWM frequency (around 16kHz) on the power line.
Turning the air conditioner off stopped the high pitched noise...

So the NXPro is quite good SBPro2 clone but still has issues with faster systems than a 486 66mHz, and also the reversed stereo (only PCM) issue.

[gdjacobs]

Ooh, filters on your PSU?

[James-F]

It's an old AT psu I can't expect too much from it.
Yeah, I think I'll buy a few line filters on ebay and build some filter boxs.

[jesolo]

Hello,

Which Win 3.11 / Dos driver is it for the Packard Bell ISA Sound Card 030056 / Aztech one?

It is: -FCC-ID I38-MMSN837

I can't find a match. Please can someone help?

Thanks,

Andrew.

Post of a high quality picture of your card (front and back).
I might have a driver for it.

[andrewreader]

Thanks Jesolo.

Front:
http://www.andrewreader.com/Vogons/DSC05056.JPG

Back:
http://www.andrewreader.com/Vogons/DSC05055.JPG

[elianda]

Looks like a variant of
http://retronn.de/imports/hwgal/hw_azte ... o16ii.html
http://retronn.de/imports/hwgal/hw_aztech_azt1605.html

[gdjacobs]

It actually sounds like this is an AZT2316 based card, as per Jesolo in the following post.
https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?f= ... 20#p585056

You'll know with certainty if you're okay with peeling away the stickers on the chips.

If the controller is a '2316, you should be able to use drivers from any of the third gen cards. Try the ones here:
ftp://ftp.aztech.com/support/DOWNLOAD/sg/P16II/

You need P16IIB-1.ZIP and P16IIB-2.ZIP for the contents of the driver disks. OS specific drivers are in the 2316xxxxx.ZIP files.

[jesolo]

It actually sounds like this is an AZT2316 based card, as per Jesolo in the following post.
https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?f= ... 20#p585056

You'll know with certainty if you're okay with peeling away the stickers on the chips.

You should be able to use drivers from any of the third gen cards. Try the ones here:
ftp://ftp.aztech.com/support/DOWNLOAD/sg/P16II/

You need P16IIB-1.ZIP and P16IIB-2.ZIP for the contents of the driver disks. OS specific drivers are in the 2316xxxxx.ZIP files.

I tend to agree with gdjacobs that this is most likely a third generation sound card with one of the AZT-2316 chipsets.
This particular model is very similar to the 1st generation Sound Galaxy Basic Audio 16 (I38-MMSN813), which was a budget model, since it only has 3 audio jacks and not 4.

If the above drivers do not work with your card, then you can try out one of the drivers that I've attached (you can extract the files within the executable with a utility like 7-zip).

[andrewreader]

Thanks for your help.

I've tried the drivers and nothing..

On the drivers that Jesolo provided, there was no 'hardware not detected' message but no sound either.

I give up with that card.

I had a replacement ESS ES186F ISA Sound card, but when this is installed, the mouse driver won't find the mouse.

So I'll take a gamble with another ISA sound card on EBay.

This is for my 'new' 'old' Dell Dimension P90.

[jesolo]

Thanks for your help.

I've tried the drivers and nothing..

On the drivers that Jesolo provided, there was no 'hardware not detected' message but no sound either.

I give up with that card.

I had a replacement ESS ES186F ISA Sound card, but when this is installed, the mouse driver won't find the mouse.

So I'll take a gamble with another ISA sound card on EBay.

This is for my 'new' 'old' Dell Dimension P90.

I'm not all that familiar with the Dell Dimension P90, but if it has an onboard sound card just make sure it is disabled in the BIOS.
The mouse not working could be a possible resource conflict.

[gdjacobs]

I don't believe it has built in sound, at least mine didn't years back.

[andrewreader]

There is no built in sound. And no Bios options for any re-assigning of any irqs etc. It's very basic.

[jesolo]

There is no built in sound. And no Bios options for any re-assigning of any irqs etc. It's very basic.

Try changing the DMA and I settings off your sound card.
The default settings are DMA 1 and IRQ 5.