More or less. With a nasty TSR that eats available RAM. And the OPL3 emulation isn't great.

With a Pentium MMX you usually have ISA slots. An ISA sound card -basically almost ANY ISA sound card - will generally work better in DOS.

Exactly which card is best depends on which games you want to play, and there are a lot of different opinions - but basically you want a real OPL3 or 1:1 copy ("LS-212") and hardware Sound Blaster Pro 2 (or 16) support as a minimum.

Note that this SBLive is an excellent Windows 98SE or later sound card. Just not good for DOS.

harris286 wrote on 2022-07-30, 19:30:

0 = cow poop and 10 = Excellent

score: 3, for the reasons detailled by dionb.

SBLives are better matches with very PCI systems of later generations when commercial DOS games were truly dead (K6-2/P3/etc)

At least it looks nice 😀

As said an ISA sound card is better for DOS, but in my opinion the Sound Blaster Live! is actually pretty good in DOS. I found it to be more compatible than I thought it would be considering its reputation around here. The TSR requires EMS memory so it's not compatible with any game that conflicts with EMS, but it's fairly compatible outside of that scenario. It's FM music isn't that good, but it supports General MIDI music in DOS which is usually preferable anyway.

I would suggest just trying it and seeing how you like it before getting an ISA card.

I had this old ISA card.
He thought the Sound Blaster LIVE was better.
How does it sound? Is it as good as the Sound Blaster?

thank you all for helping

If your primary requirement is sound quality (in compatible games), the SB Live is clearly the better card. If you are interested in EAX or DirectSound accelleration of 3D sound, if you are interested in high-quality MIDI music, the SB Live is your only option.

If your primary requirement is compatibility with older DOS games, the ultra-cheap bottom-of-the-barrel OPTi based card is likely better. The OPTi card does not provide SB16 compatibility, just SB Pro (and "Windows Sound System", a 16-bit sound standard supported by everyone except Creative Labs). So for the handful of games that support 16-bit sound on SB16, but do not support WSS, the SB Live might be superior. Be aware that the OPTi card will not work unless you run an initialization program in AUTOEXEC.BAT. That program doesn't occupy any memory permanently, it just makes the card ready for operation in the required mode at the addresses, interrupt and DMA channel you choose and exits.

That OPTi 931-based card looks like a really low-end card. It will work better in DOS, but will not sound better (except with OPL3 FM synthesis - although not much better).

Once again, it depends on what you want to be playing exactly. How about telling us which DOS games you are most interested in?

harris286 wrote on 2022-07-31, 09:30:

I had this old ISA card. He thought the Sound Blaster LIVE was better. How does it sound? Is it as good as the Sound Blaster? […]
Show full quote

I had this old ISA card.
He thought the Sound Blaster LIVE was better.
How does it sound? Is it as good as the Sound Blaster?

thank you all for helping

Get a SB16 Card with Real OPL3 Chip on it.
Its worth the 40€ really.

Peter.Mengel wrote on 2022-07-31, 21:04:

[...]

Get a SB16 Card with Real OPL3 Chip on it.
Its worth the 40€ really.

It really depends on the games. All SB16 are buggy, but how buggy varies and whether you will hit any given bug depends on the game.

Same about the upsides of the SB16: if the game doesn't use 16b audio (or supports WSS 16b as well) or FM synth, you won't hear any difference with that card he already has.

Telling someone to shell out EUR 40 for something that may not benefit them at all is rather premature at best.

dionb wrote on 2022-07-31, 23:06:

It really depends on the games. All SB16 are buggy, but how buggy varies and whether you will hit any given bug depends on the g […]
Show full quote

Peter.Mengel wrote on 2022-07-31, 21:04:

[...]

Get a SB16 Card with Real OPL3 Chip on it.
Its worth the 40€ really.

It really depends on the games. All SB16 are buggy, but how buggy varies and whether you will hit any given bug depends on the game.

Same about the upsides of the SB16: if the game doesn't use 16b audio (or supports WSS 16b as well) or FM synth, you won't hear any difference with that card he already has.

Telling someone to shell out EUR 40 for something that may not benefit them at all is rather premature at best.

Well i own like 20 SB16 Cards and the worst problems i had was the hanging note bug sometimes but it gets "bug fixed" by itself if the song restarts or the song changes. And Premature? Sorry...ok for what reason did you came up with this? Just to show that iam totally wrong? Sure, Maybe! I just said what i personally think. And you added the "youre a child" to blame me for my opinion? OK!....

In the End i never had any problems with sb16 cards at all with the original OPL3 Chip on them. And SB Pro and SB Pro 2 Cards i own have Problems to...Noisy, weird filtering. Is there even one SB Card without any problems?

And the Point 40€, well yeah its a expensiv Hobby, Retro Gaming at all. So if you want cheap you might get it fixed cheaper, a Option are aztech sound cards, Cheap, Good OPL3 "Emulation", so good i cant tell if its not a Rebranded Yamaha Chip. No Problems with Hanging Notes and stuff like that.

The most Cheap way is using Dosbox, Dosbox-X, 86Box and Emulate the Hardware...
If not u have to get used to this prices better earlier then later...or always have good dump-yard luck.

And its a P1 200mhz MMX...its to fast for 1987-1991 Gaming...where SB16 could get problems more likely. But most games after release date 1992 will work without bigger problems.
From my own Experience. It doesnt have to match yours.

Ive started with a SB PCI128, and it was great for me at first i was like WOW like back then xD.....now some thousand euros later i wont go back to it.

@Harris
BTW!...forgot to add this! Listen by yourself what you would like at call close to original and good enough for you.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXFYWJ7dbz0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24ScDNeQoZ8

My experience with the SBLive was that it was ok for DOS games. Better than nothing. Had issues with a lot of more popular games. I remember whatever mechanism it uses to emulate FM synth really slowed down Descent for me. And Tyrian 2000 had an SBLive compatible version that for whatever reason I could never, ever, get to work. I had to use a Win9X source port of Privateer's engine to play that, since it refused to ever work, no way no how, with an SBLive. But Doom worked well enough I guess.

I replaced it with an AWE64 Gold, and the AWE capabilities were fantastic in games that supported them. But it's FM synthesis was grating, especially in E1M1 of Doom. And it's DOS midi support was very lacking, relying on a rather temperamental IMHO TSR. But everything will work.

I then got a Sound Blaster 16 CT2800. Technically a Vibra I think? Has a genuine OPL3, and no bugs I've ever noticed, but I've not used it's MIDI capabilities. Generally been super happy with it for games that shine best on an OPL3.

If I were to only get a single sound card for DOS gaming, I'd probably go with the CT2800. The AWE64 sounds better in games that support it's capabilities, but worse in games that don't IMHO. The SBLive would be a dos card of last resort.

Is this PC just for dos games or will you be playing some Win9x games as well?

If you are dual booting I'd try the Live! it's one of the best cards for Win9x and others have said ok at dos so would give it a go, it may well serve you well.

If it a pure dos rig I'd try the Opti card at least as a starter card. Truth is no 1 single isa card is best at everything, at least this will give you something while you work out what's important for you, ie OPL, SB16 compatibility, etc

Peter.Mengel wrote on 2022-08-01, 00:05:

[...]

Well i own like 20 SB16 Cards and the worst problems i had was the hanging note bug sometimes but it gets "bug fixed" by itself if the song restarts or the song changes. And Premature? Sorry...ok for what reason did you came up with this? Just to show that iam totally wrong? Sure, Maybe! I just said what i personally think. And you added the "youre a child" to blame me for my opinion? OK!....

That's the hanging note bug type 2 you're describing, legitimate notes hanging. Many SB16 cards also have the type 1, with illegitimate hanging notes, usually irritating high-pitched ones. There are a few SB16 cards with neither - but all SB16 cards suffer from slowdowns when MIDI and high quality PCM audio are being played. Think Build engine games (Duke Nukem3D) and notoriously, Tie Fighter. Various models also suffer from single-cycle DMA clicking, or in case of Vibra, hissing or clipping.

Now, you may not be bothered by these bugs, but they are there. They are not present on the card OP already has. It's premature to advise someone to spend money before you even know if he is missing anything with the hardware he already has, particularly when you recommend introducing bugs not present in current hardware. Any price is too high if it doesn't need to be spent. Simple as that.