If your intention is to just have voices/sound effects, together with your SC-55, then you don't require two sound cards for that.

The AWE64 Value should suffice, since you can then connect the SC-55 to the external MIDI/Game port and still use the same card for voices and sound effects.

If, however, you also want real OPL3 FM synthesis, then I can understand why you would want another sound card.

I always thought to use OPL3 FM Synthesis all you needed to do was use the "SET MIDI=SYNTH:1" setting with one sound card installed, or am I not getting this right?

GabrielKnight123 wrote:

I always thought to use OPL3 FM Synthesis all you needed to do was use the "SET MIDI=SYNTH:1" setting with one sound card installed, or am I not getting this right?

jesolo is referring to the fact that SoundBlasters have different chips for FM synth. AWE64 has CQM (worse) while some SB16s and Vibras have dedicated Yamaha OPL3 chips or CT-1747 chips with integrated true OPL3 (better). At the same time AWE64 doesn't have bugs with external MIDI (such as SC-55) while a lot of SB16s/Vibras have them. So if you have a true OPL3 in your SB, you can use it for FM synthesis and AWE64 for MIDI. In that case, SC-55 audio output goes into AWE64 line-in port, AWE64's output then goes into SB16's line-in, and SB16 mixes MIDI with digital sounds and outputs it all to the speakers.

Thanks Jheronimus I will not use the CQM synth on the AWE64 and I will look for a card I have somewhere here with OPL3, I have a stereo mixer so could I connect it like this:

from the MPU-401/joystick port on the AWE64 using a joystick to Midi cable to the SC55's Midi "IN" and then the SC55's RCA output to channel 1's input on the stereo mixer.
from the line out of the SB16 to the channel 2's input of the stereo mixer
from the stereo mixers main output to the stereo speakers.

Or do I have to have the SC55's output going into the AWE64's line-in port?

I forgot to ask how does a dos game know which sound card to use for music and or sound effects? Would the set blaster environment variables be used for both cards at the same time?

Jheronimus you said "AWE64 has CQM (worse) while some SB16s and Vibras have dedicated Yamaha OPL3 chips or CT-1747 chips with integrated true OPL3 (better). At the same time AWE64 doesn't have bugs with external MIDI (such as SC-55) while a lot of SB16s/Vibras have them. So if you have a true OPL3 in your SB, you can use it for FM synthesis and AWE64 for MIDI.

I thought FM Synthesis was for midi!? If I use the AWE64 with its CQM for Midi wont that sound worse than OPL3?
What is the best card setup alongside an AWE64 that will be used for Midi with an SC55?
How do I setup two cards to work with each other?

GabrielKnight123 wrote:

Jheronimus you said "AWE64 has CQM (worse) while some SB16s and Vibras have dedicated Yamaha OPL3 chips or CT-1747 chips with in […]
Show full quote

Jheronimus you said "AWE64 has CQM (worse) while some SB16s and Vibras have dedicated Yamaha OPL3 chips or CT-1747 chips with integrated true OPL3 (better). At the same time AWE64 doesn't have bugs with external MIDI (such as SC-55) while a lot of SB16s/Vibras have them. So if you have a true OPL3 in your SB, you can use it for FM synthesis and AWE64 for MIDI.

I thought FM Synthesis was for midi!? If I use the AWE64 with its CQM for Midi wont that sound worse than OPL3?
What is the best card setup alongside an AWE64 that will be used for Midi with an SC55?
How do I setup two cards to work with each other?

No, FM synthesis and General MIDI sampled playback is not the same and also does not utilise the same (hexadecimal) address - they are similar in the sense that they are both (mostly) used for music playback in games but, while the OPL3 FM chip is synthesized, General MIDI based modules and/or sound cards actually uses samples of real world instruments to generate the music playback (the implementation thereof varies in quality between different manufacturers). You can read up a bit more on the Internet between General MIDI (which is actually just a standard) and the Yamaha YMF-262 (OPL3) FM synthesis chip.

Some sound card manufacturers did not put an OPL3 FM synthesis chip on their sound cards and then either used their own synthesizer chip (like the ESS range) or, used the on-board "wave table" samples to "emulate" the FM synthesis chip (very poorly).
Other manufacturers, like Creative Labs, later on introduced a technology called "Creative Quadratic Modulation" (or CQM) to emulate the Yamaha OPL3 FM synthesis chip but, this was independent of the on-board MIDI samples on the sound card.

In terms of sound cards, FM synthesis uses the standard address (Adlib port) of 388h, while all (General MIDI based) games will utilise the MPU-401 MIDI interface (that is integrated into most sound cards from that era) to send the MIDI signals to the respective sound module (whether that be on-board or external). The default address is 330h but, this can be changed - some games might have trouble with this.

Setting up two sound cards so that only one uses Adlib (FM synthesis) might be tricky - some sound cards will allow you to disable basically every "component" in their setup program, while others might not.
This will then end up with a possible conflict if the game tries to pass the signal through to the FM synthesizer chip.

Ultimately, if you do want to set up two sound cards in your system, you will have to configure each sound card so that neither of their addresses/ports conflicts with the other one.
You must ensure that your standard Sound Blaster port (default is 220h), IRQ (default is 5 or 7 for older models) and DMA channels (default is 1 & 5) do not conflict with each other.
Once you've configured each card with different settings, then you would just specify the settings in your SET BLASTER statement to point to the card that you do want to use (later games actually allows you to specify in the game's setup menu what settings you wish to use so, the SET BLASTER statement would then be irrelevant).

The Adlib port can normally not be changed, which comes back to my previous point where you might experience a conflict.
One possible way around this is to have is a Non Plug 'n Play and a Plug 'n Play sound card in your system (the AWE64 is a Plug 'n Play sound card).
You can then set up a boot (start up) menu configuration to basically use the one sound card for FM synthesis & voices/sound effects (and therefore not "enable" the other sound card) and the other sound card (the AWE64) for General MIDI & voices/sound effects and then only point to that sound card's settings in your Autoexec.bat file.

However, this is a very technical and complicated process and you need to have a clear understanding of resources & any associated conflicts under DOS, etc. etc.

If I were you, I would pick a sound card that suits your basic needs, does not have the MIDI hanging note bug, and hook up your SC-55 to that sound card.
You could look at alternatives (like the Audician 32 Plus or, one of the Aztech Sound Galaxy range of sound cards) - they have the "real" OPL3 FM synthesis chip but, are only Sound Blaster Pro compatible under DOS (however, for most DOS games, this will be sufficient). Under Windows, most of them are full 16-bit sound cards.

GabrielKnight123 wrote:

I forgot to ask how does a dos game know which sound card to use for music and or sound effects? Would the set blaster environment variables be used for both cards at the same time?

Yes and no - some games will "read" the SET BLASTER statement, other games allows you to specify the sound card settings in the game's setup menu.

GabrielKnight123 wrote:

Thanks Jheronimus I will not use the CQM synth on the AWE64 and I will look for a card I have somewhere here with OPL3, I have a […]
Show full quote

Thanks Jheronimus I will not use the CQM synth on the AWE64 and I will look for a card I have somewhere here with OPL3, I have a stereo mixer so could I connect it like this:

from the MPU-401/joystick port on the AWE64 using a joystick to Midi cable to the SC55's Midi "IN" and then the SC55's RCA output to channel 1's input on the stereo mixer.
from the line out of the SB16 to the channel 2's input of the stereo mixer
from the stereo mixers main output to the stereo speakers.

Or do I have to have the SC55's output going into the AWE64's line-in port?

Either method will work - if you route the SC-55's output to the AWE64's Line-In port, just make sure the Line-In volume setting is not muted. Otherwise, you will hear nothing.

jesolo wrote:

GabrielKnight123 wrote:

In terms of sound cards, FM synthesis uses the standard address (Adlib port) of 388h, while all (General MIDI based) games will utilise the MPU-401 MIDI interface (that is integrated into most sound cards from that era) to send the MIDI signals to the respective sound module (whether that be on-board or external). The default address is 330h but, this can be changed - some games might have trouble with this.

Setting up two sound cards so that only one uses Adlib (FM synthesis) might be tricky - some sound cards will allow you to disable basically every "component" in their setup program, while others might not.
This will then end up with a possible conflict if the game tries to pass the signal through to the FM synthesizer chip.

Adlib is new to me and are you saying that music can be played through an SC55 with the Adlib port 388?

No, Adlib (i.e., your FM synthesis chip) utilises port 388h.
MIDI sounds (from a gaming perspective) are played back via the MPU-401 MIDI interface (which has the standard port of 330h but, this can be configured on most sound cards).

You need to send MIDI commands to a sound module (like the SC-55) in order for it to "understand" which instruments to play back, at what rate, tempo, pitch, etc.

FM synthesis and General MIDI are not the same.

Thanks very much for the details Jesolo I will try out 2 cards like in your example and I will look for more about Adlib for the future in case I get adventurous to try something new and at the same time old.