The Yamaha based cards have very good sound and very good compatibility. Only a handful of games, like Duke Nukem II and Major Stryker, have trouble. The Live card will only work with games compatible with EMM386.

Right but unless I'm wrong, and I very well could be, my Yamaha can only do FM synthesis? So for something like Duke or Xwing, general midi and the more realistic sounds are going to be more desirable?

Your Yamaha card is an ISA based card and should have a full functioning MPU-401 MIDI port and, similarly, a Wave Blaster header.
You can then either connect a MIDI daughter board (like the Dreamblaster) or, an external MIDI module (like a Roland SC-55 or one of its compatible modules), which will then provide you with the General MIDI sounds that you desire.
Some threads on Vogons about your sound card:
Atrend ATC-6631 with YMF715B-S chipset
Yamaha Sound Card (ATC-6631) Questions

The standard (DOS based) sample set of the Sound Blaster Live! is not of the best quality.
Under DOS, the Live! did run OK with later DOS games, but I prefer playing my DOS games with an ISA based sound card. PCI sound cards don't really operate that well under DOS.

However, many later DOS games (particularly protected mode games) can be played from within Windows 9x (via a DOS command prompt).
The Sound Blaster Live's Windows driver also has a Sound Blaster 16 emulation driver that should enable you to play your DOS games via a DOS command prompt - I did not experiment much with this myself, but I applied the same principle with my AWE64 and this seemed to work fine.
When playing games from within Windows, you're also not restricted to the DOS based sample set of the Sound Blaster Live! but, you can then load custom soundfonts which vastly improves your General MIDI listening experience.

Thanks a lot that's good to know.

So I basically have two choices really, get the dreamblaster or play within Win98? Out of the two, what would you suggest? I don't play many older DOS games. The oldest probably being DOOM.

I'm not sure I'd know what to do with regards to soundfonts, haha.

sketchus wrote:

Thanks a lot that's good to know.

So I basically have two choices really, get the dreamblaster or play within Win98? Out of the two, what would you suggest? I don't play many older DOS games. The oldest probably being DOOM.

I'm not sure I'd know what to do with regards to soundfonts, haha.

That is entirely up to you - you will have to spend some money on a Dreamblaster but, then you will have a nice DOS based system that should work with practically any General MIDI game (bar any speed related issues, should your current hardware be a bit too fast for some of the early General MIDI titles).
If you are currently running a Windows 98 setup, then you can also create a multiple boot configuration so that, when you want to play your DOS games, you can boot up directly into "real" DOS (not a DOS command prompt) - refer How to create a boot (start up) menu under Windows 9x/ME
Just take note that by booting up straight into DOS 7.0/7.1, you are then running in a "pure" DOS environment, which then brings me back to my previous comment of me preferring to run my DOS games with an ISA based sound card.

If you prefer going the Windows route, then you might run into compatibility problems with some DOS games (since DOS games were designed to run under DOS and not Windows).
Best would to experiment with the games that you wish to play and see how it works out.
Regarding Soundfonts - there is plenty of reading material on this subject and also plenty of online "repositories" where you can download custom made soundfonts.
With the Sound Blaster Live! range, you're basically just limited to how much system RAM you have, but the standard soundfonts that are shipped with the Live! range are not too bad.

Thanks again for the detailed answer. I am indeed running a WIN98 based system. For now, I've just using a PIF file to reboot into DOS with CD Rom support, your guide should really help because booting to 98 first is a little bit of a pain.

I have always preferred running in real DOS, so I'll probably go with the Dreamblaster, but the soundfonts are definitely something I'm going to educate myself on.

Can I just confirm with you too, that I'm right in thinking that General Midi (for the most part) is going to be more desirable over Sound Blaster? I know it's part preference, but to me GM sounds much...fuller? Thank you.

For the most part, yes. General MIDI sampled playback is more desirable than OPL3 FM synthesis.

However, you must just bear in mind that there are "good" and there are "bad" General MIDI compatible modules out there - this is mostly due to the quality of the samples that they have implemented, as well as the size of those sample sets.
Around the mid 90's many companies also started to introduce Wave Blaster compatible MIDI daughter boards (or sound cards with on-board MIDI support) but, with very poor quality MIDI samples and/or reverb/chorus effects.

Back in the early 90's, most game developers used the Roland Sound Canvas SC-55 to "compose" their soundtracks on - so, naturally, if you want to hear what the game developer intended you to hear, then one would have to obtain a Roland Sound Canvas SC-55 (or a compatible module, like the SC-7) - more reading material: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roland_Sound_Canvas.
However, these can be quite expensive these days to acquire.
However, there are other "good" General MIDI modules out there that might sound slightly different in terms of the sample sets (for example, the trumpet or electric guitar might sound a bit different) but, this doesn't mean that the listening experience will be poor.

There are some Youtube videos that you can watch where the Doom E1M1 soundtrack is compared between different modules and MIDI daughter boards.

Thank you so much for all the help. I've gone from completely lost to at least having a sense of direction of what I want.

I decided in the end to order a Dreamblaster. Looks like a lovely and simple solution and I should be able to get everything working easily enough (famous last words)

My eventual goal is to collect a few different boards, but as you said original board these days seems somewhat expensive, and I'm more that happy with the price of the Dreamblaster.

The difference in sound between these different modules is quite astonishing really. You can really see how people have such different memories of what they heard back in the day.

There's another, cheaper option. Throw the Live card in a P4/Athlon or better running Windows 98 SE or XP and install Falcosoft Media Player. You get a fast Windows machine for games that don't like your main Windows box, and you can use two gameport MIDI adapters and a coupler to give your DOS machine GM.

Ooh, I actually have a P4 lying around. Might look into it, at least for a little fun side project.

Thanks.

Why is your P4 lying all around ? 😕 My P4 was never lying, it always had been honest to me.

In my experience, they've always been plenty lazy.

Whew! 😀 That's good news, way better as if they (P4s) were liars.

Haha my P4 never had an honest upbringing 😀