I have both an Audigy 2 ZS (SB0350) and a SBLive 5.1 (SB0100).

I mainly use the Audigy 2 ZS under Win98, but from my (limited) experience with the SBLive, its VxD DOS drivers are less compatible than those of the Audigy. On the other hand, using WDM drivers for the SBLive does improve DOS compatibility, but they only have SBPro emulation instead of SB16.

If you choose to go with the Audigy 2 ZS, be warned, the process of setting up DOS compatibility on that card is fairly complex, requiring some registry editing and manual device installation. Even in the best case scenario, when everything is set up properly, some (mostly older) games will simply not work with this setup. Late era DOS games (1995 and onward) usually work fine, but there are some exceptions.

thanks. I'll keep that in mind.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2020-05-11, 17:51:

SBLive does improve DOS compatibility, but they only have SBPro emulation instead of SB16.

You sure? I'm pretty sure the "non live" cards like the PCI64 and 128 emulated SBPro and Live bumped this upto SB16.
It's been many years now though and definitely wasn't a 5.1 so could be mistaken, anyway

Windows is where you'll notice the most difference.
First off Audigy series supports EAX4 vs EAX3 of the Live! series, not that many games went beyond EAX3
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_games_with_EAX_support

Other main difference is newer cards always have better snr rating then the card it's replacing, again if you actually hear the difference is down to the listener.

In DOS your in effect using the same driver just re-written to work with the new card. You won't gain anything accept the better snr.
Official DOS support ends with the Audigy1, Audigy 2 is using slightly modified Audigy 1 drivers

Personally I prefer the Audigy series driver as they are not as bloated as the ones for the Live but if I had a Live lying around I'd use that rather then go spend money.

chinny22 wrote on 2020-05-13, 15:20:

You sure? I'm pretty sure the "non live" cards like the PCI64 and 128 emulated SBPro and Live bumped this upto SB16.

Depends on whether the card was made by Ensoniq or Creative. Creative drivers give you SB16 emulation while Ensoniq's only do SBPro emulation. My SB128 is made by Creative, so Ensoniq drivers don't even work on it.

As for the SBLive, you don't get SB16 emulation with WDM drivers, only SBPro. You need VxD drivers for SB16 emulation.

ah so Live with vxd gives you SB16 but same card using wdm gives SBPro, never knew that!
Good to know, (although not sure what I'll do with my new found knowledge)

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2020-05-13, 15:29:

chinny22 wrote on 2020-05-13, 15:20:

You sure? I'm pretty sure the "non live" cards like the PCI64 and 128 emulated SBPro and Live bumped this upto SB16.

As for the SBLive, you don't get SB16 emulation with WDM drivers, only SBPro. You need VxD drivers for SB16 emulation.

Just to be clear, that is in DOS , when running under Windows . Under pure DOS, you get SB16 emulation either way .

chinny22 wrote on 2020-05-13, 15:49:

ah so Live with vxd gives you SB16 but same card using wdm gives SBPro, never knew that!
Good to know, (although not sure what I'll do with my new found knowledge)

In my (limited) experience, SBPro emulation under WDM drivers will work fine for some games which fail to run using SB16 emulation under VxD drivers.

Admittedly, I haven't done a whole lot of testing, but I distinctly remember a couple of games failing with a "stack overflow" error under VxD while working perfectly fine under WDM.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2020-05-13, 15:29:

Creative drivers give you SB16 emulation while Ensoniq's only do SBPro emulation.

Earlier versions of the AudioPCI also emulated Soundscape.

darry wrote on 2020-05-13, 16:30:

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2020-05-13, 15:29:

chinny22 wrote on 2020-05-13, 15:20:

You sure? I'm pretty sure the "non live" cards like the PCI64 and 128 emulated SBPro and Live bumped this upto SB16.

As for the SBLive, you don't get SB16 emulation with WDM drivers, only SBPro. You need VxD drivers for SB16 emulation.

Just to be clear, that is in DOS , when running under Windows . Under pure DOS, you get SB16 emulation either way .

If possible, I have a few questions about that pure DOS mode SB16 emulation.

Does the SB16 emulation work with both real mode and protected mode games?

I'm asking this, because I recently stumbled upon the file `update_pc_miles_sounddrv5.rar` that Vogons user mefistotelis shared in this thread post, quite a few years ago. He mentioned those were real mode drivers, but that was probably a mistake or mixup, since these are in fact protected mode drivers. They seem to be a later (v5?) revision of the protected mode AIL3 (Miles) drivers that we used in a lot of protected mode games that used the DOS/4GW DOS extender.

What caught my eye is that the `MSSDRVR.LST` file in that version of the driver pack mentions that the `sb16.dig` (for digital audio) and `mpu401.mdi` (for MIDI music) also "support" the Sound Blaster Live!.

I'm wondering if they added native SBLive! support to those two drivers. I doubt it, however, since it's such a different card that it would have justified separate driver files, methinks. So the most likely explanation is that they merely improved the SB16 and MPU-401 drivers to be more compatible with the DOS-mode SB16 emulation. Has anybody tried these drivers with their SB Live! and/or Audigy cards yet? With or without the DOS-mode SB16 emulation TSR? That would also imply that the SB16 emulation of the SB Live! and Audigy somehow works with protected mode as well. Usually, that's not possible without some kind of hardware-assisted emulation mechanism, right?

Or perhaps it only works with certain specific chipsets? Does it work in more recent chipsets (particularly PCI Express architectures with legacy PCI bridges) as well? Probably not, right?

digger wrote on 2020-05-13, 19:35:

If possible, I have a few questions about that pure DOS mode SB16 emulation. […]
Show full quote

darry wrote on 2020-05-13, 16:30:

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2020-05-13, 15:29:

As for the SBLive, you don't get SB16 emulation with WDM drivers, only SBPro. You need VxD drivers for SB16 emulation.

Just to be clear, that is in DOS , when running under Windows . Under pure DOS, you get SB16 emulation either way .

If possible, I have a few questions about that pure DOS mode SB16 emulation.

Does the SB16 emulation work with both real mode and protected mode games?

I'm asking this, because I recently stumbled upon the file `update_pc_miles_sounddrv5.rar` that Vogons user mefistotelis shared in this thread post, quite a few years ago. He mentioned those were real mode drivers, but that was probably a mistake or mixup, since these are in fact protected mode drivers. They seem to be a later (v5?) revision of the protected mode AIL3 (Miles) drivers that we used in a lot of protected mode games that used the DOS/4GW DOS extender.

What caught my eye is that the `MSSDRVR.LST` file in that version of the driver pack mentions that the `sb16.dig` (for digital audio) and `mpu401.mdi` (for MIDI music) also "support" the Sound Blaster Live!.

I'm wondering if they added native SBLive! support to those two drivers. I doubt it, however, since it's such a different card that it would have justified separate driver files, methinks. So the most likely explanation is that they merely improved the SB16 and MPU-401 drivers to be more compatible with the DOS-mode SB16 emulation. Has anybody tried these drivers with their SB Live! and/or Audigy cards yet? With or without the DOS-mode SB16 emulation TSR? That would also imply that the SB16 emulation of the SB Live! and Audigy somehow works with protected mode as well. Usually, that's not possible without some kind of hardware-assisted emulation mechanism, right?

Or perhaps it only works with certain specific chipsets? Does it work in more recent chipsets (particularly PCI Express architectures with legacy PCI bridges) as well? Probably not, right?

according to Re: Sb live drivers pure dos. , the drivers work with Doom, which runs in protected mode .