feipoa wrote on 2022-03-10, 02:09:

I've decided to add a Hollywood Plus EM8300 based DVD/MPEG2 decoder to my Cyrix 5x86-133/4x build, which dual boots between w9x […]
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I've decided to add a Hollywood Plus EM8300 based DVD/MPEG2 decoder to my Cyrix 5x86-133/4x build, which dual boots between w9x and NT4. Does anyone have the Hollywood Plus, REALMagic Sigma Designs (EM8300) drivers for NT4?

I should have the Creative branded DXR2 and DXR3 drivers, for which I believe the DXR3 is for the Hollywood Plus, but I was hoping for the Sigma Designs branded drivers and application disk.

I looking at the web archive, I see reference to a file names here, but cannot find them anywhere:

https://web.archive.org/web/19991127163637/ht … nload_hw+nt.htm
REALmagic Hollywood Plus
Windows NT
Release 1.8 bulid 120
Driver: Hwp1_8n1.zip <------------ ANYONE HAVE THIS?
Application: Hwp1_8n2.zip <------------ ANYONE HAVE THIS?

It also looks like there was a v2.41 release for NT4, but the file names don't even appear:

https://web.archive.org/web/20041208201432/ht … _plus_winnt.htm
REALmagic Hollywood Plus
Windows NT
Release 2.41
Driver: ? <------------ ANYONE HAVE THIS?
Application: ? <------------ ANYONE HAVE THIS?

I was able to find the v2.41 of the w9x drivers already:

https://web.archive.org/web/20041205054714/ht … _plus_win9x.htm
REALmagic Hollywood Plus
Windows 9x
Release 2.41
Driver: HP2_41w1.zip <---------------found
Application: HP2_41w2.zip <---------------found

And almost all of the w9x v1.8 driver pack:

https://web.archive.org/web/19991129021640/ht … nload_hw+9x.htm
REALmagic Hollywood Plus
Windows 9x
Release 1.8 bulid 120

Driver: HP1_81W1.ZIP <---------------found
Application: HP1_81W2.ZIP <------------ ANYONE HAVE THIS?

The problem with the wayback links for downloads was that Sigma Designs hosted all these files on an FTP and doesn't appear as if wayback will archive these ftp links. Either that, or the issue with FTP transfers being eliminated from modern browsers has reared its ugly head again.

Some useful links which talk about these cards:
http://www.digivision.it/docs/hollywoodplus.html
https://www.overclockers.com.au/article.php?id=367537&P=1

Checked any of these?

ftp://ftp.dyu.edu.tw/pub/Hardware/stuff/multi … agic/Hollywood/

ftp://ftp.oldskool.org/pub/drivers/unsorted/RealMagic/

ftp://ftp.oldskool.org/pub/drivers/Sigma%20De … magic%20Family/

I have the following files for NT4:

Collected for my project here: Sigma Designs RealMagic complete productlist, supported games and drivers

Haven't gotten around to post everything on Vogonsdrivers as of yet unfortunately.

PC Hoarder Patrol, thank you. I was able to find two more from those FTP links, the NT4 v2.41 drivers and application disk.

Vetz, it looks like you have some of the other versions for NT4. Would you be willing to send this compilation to me ? Maybe PM a zip file or use Google Drive? Many thanks. I no longer need the HP2_41n1.zip and HP2_41n2.zip since I found those from PC Hoarder Patrol.

Vetz, for Win9x drivers, do you also have HP1_81W2.ZIP ?

Here are the Win9x files:

I'll upload it to Vogonsdrivers after work.

Yup, the stuff I'm looking for is in there too. I guess if you're going to upload all, could you provide zips for nt4, w2k, and w9x? I might also install W2K on my Cyrix 5x86-133/4x after upgrading the HDD from 36 GB SCSI to 300 GB SCSI.

Vetz, if you were able to upload the drivers to vogons drivers, could you share the direct link? Many thanks. I was unable to locate your driver history package.

feipoa wrote on 2022-03-12, 09:52:

Vetz, if you were able to upload the drivers to vogons drivers, could you share the direct link? Many thanks. I was unable to locate your driver history package.

I'll just quickly quote vetz for you so he'll get notified about this response.

vetz wrote on 2022-03-10, 13:03:

Couldn't find my password for Vogonsdrivers, so while I search old PM's, here is a link with the compilation file:

https://www.mediafire.com/file/u8zrk24sblcsth … EM8300.zip/file

Thanks. I too forgot my vogons drivers password.

I have begun working on this again. I am using driver version 2.41 in Windows NT 4.0 with the RealMagic supplied DVD Station (player). However, I have run into this irritating issue: the RealMagic DVD Station keeps complaining, "This Disc cannot be played in this Region." I'm not sure why this is happening because the DVD driver is set to Region 1 (USA/Canada) and my DVD's are all for Region 1. Is this some kind of bug in the software and is there some way around it?

I tried the Videologic DVD Player, however I get and MCI error. I tried PowerDVD 3.0, but it won't open the DVD's.

I read in this post, Re: How to get Realmagic EM8300 Mpeg decoder to work? , that there may be some kind of "Realmagic Hollywood2 plus region hack". Might this be a fix?

Using Windows 95, I also installed v2.41 and ran into the same issue. However, after much dicking around in Win95, the DVD player stopped giving me this error and plays the DVD's fine. I tried to replicate my goofing around in NT4, but no luck. Ideas?

I'd prefer to get this working in NT4 over w9x because some of my previous results, Re: DVD hardware decoder cards , indicated that NT4 should yield less CPU usage. Win9x currently is at 100% usage just to read a 4:3 DVD. At 16:9, there was some skipping.

I tried the RealMagic Hollywood2 Plus region hack - didn't help the situation

I tried the Zone Selector for RealMagic Hollywood2 plus drivers from 1.8.3 to 2.2 - didn't help, even when I used version 1.8.3 and 2.2b drivers.

I've determined that the RealMagic DVD Station will spit out this Region error when there is a SCSI error. Looking in the event viewer, I see Event ID 11 from aic78u2, "The driver detected a controller error on \Device\ScsiPort1." No other information is given.

I tried all the RealMagic Hollywood2 plus drivers I could find (thanks vetz):

1.0
1.7
1.8
1.8.1
1.8.2
1.8.3
2.2beta
2.41

Driver versions 1.0 to 1.8.3 return, "Cannot find the specified file. Make sure the path and filename are correct", while versions 2.2b and 2.41 return, "This Disc cannot be played in this Region."

I tried the VideoLogic v4 DVD player, but it returns "Cannot find the specified file..."

What is interesting is that all driver versions are able to play a *.vob file if I select it manually, but cannot seem to play the DVD as a whole.

I am currently using an NEC IDE DVD drive connected to an ACARD 7722 IDE-to-SCSI adapter. I tried two different ACARD 7722 adapters revisions with two different BIOS versions, but the results were the same. Thinking that the issue may be the ACARD bridge adapter (even though DVD playback works fine in Win95c), I decided to try out a native SCSI DVD-ROM drive. The RealMagic DVD Station immediately starts to play the DVD as a whole, however the computer always hangs at about the 4 second mark. Hmmmm....

I put the NEC IDE DVD-ROM w/ACARD back into the system and try to install the Creative branded drivers/player, but I receive an error, stating something like the device ID is wrong, so it won't load. Darn it. OK, so now I remove the REALMAGIC branded card and install the Creative brand of the same card, which is called a DXR3. I immediately notice the lously pass-through quality on the LCD, even though I'm using the same pass-through cable. However, and as luck would have it, the Creative brand of the driver+DVD player work just fine in NT4 on this system. The Creative player is a genuine piece of junk, but is functional. This leads me to believe that RealMagic didn't do much troubleshooting with SCSI DVD-ROM drives.

The problem is that I don't want to leave the Creative-branded DXR3 installed because of the lousy pass-through signal quality. My RealMagic Hollywood2 Plus w/SGRAM has much better pass through quality. Is there any way to trick the Creative software to thinking my RealMagic branded Hollywood 2 Plus card is a creative card, thus allowing me to use the NT4 Creative DXR3 drivers and their DVD player software?

Hey @feipoa, I believe you have Sigma Designs VGA input cable in your posession. Could you create a pinout diagram of it?

I've been able to find it myself 😀

Are the cables getting hard to find? I only have one cable myself.

While I have found the factory pass-through cable is pretty decent for 2D desktop use, not so much for glide 3D mode at 1280x1024. When I run GLQuake with a Voodoo3, the drop in quality is obvious. For this reason, I leave the pass through cable disconnected, and only connect it if I am wanting to test DVD playback.

If searched directly for "sigma cable", it's $40 on ebay and another $40 for shipping to Europe.

My card came without a cable for a bargain price.