I'm using the same combination of cards. In some games the result wasn't that good (not quite compatible to MT-32, as you say). Recently I tried something a friend of mine suggested. I used scummvm and selected the sb external midi as output device. The result was better than great. I've tried 3-4 sierra games and the two monkey islands, and it sounds as good as the roland. The only problem was that running scummvm under windows 95 on a pentium 233mmx, was a little slow, even for those old dos games. So then I set up a celeron 500 system, and it's ok now. However scummvm also scaled the graphics. I didn't try not to use that option on the mmx pentium. Maybe it's playable without it. I'm going to try that as soon as I can.

In one of my systems, I'm having the CT1740 with the NEC XR385 daughterboard. It sits besides my AWE32.

I'm using the CT1740+XR385 as my primary GENERAL MIDI device. Sierra games choose the MIDI port 330 by default for all GM/MT-32/CM-32L choices, and can't be changed without using the port changing utility, which is available at QuestStudios download site.

I'm currently having the QFG1VGA in my hard disk, with General MIDI selected. The XR sounds just as it should be - GREAT! 😀

Lucky that the default mode for the DB60XG (and hence XR385) is GM mode. XG enabled apps send a sysex to enable the XG extensions.

http://www.vgmusic.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=13502

If I play FF7 PC with my XR385, I have to send the GM RESET sysex before I play something else, or it sounds odd.

You can use MidiOX to send custom sysex messages.

(And I'm sure these sysex strings have been posted on VOGONS before, but damned if I could find em!)

Lots of useful utilities here : http://www.queststudios.com/roland/

Click utilities from there. (Can't link to the page directly.)

I'm currently having the QFG1VGA in my hard disk, with General MIDI selected. The XR sounds just as it should be - GREAT!

OK, so at least it's supposed to work. Problem is, my XR385 is on port 330 already. That's what I set up Hexen to use, and it works fine. I looked over the utilities you linked and didn't find anything applicable. Any suggestions?

Lucky that the default mode for the DB60XG (and hence XR385) is GM mode. XG enabled apps send a sysex to enable the XG extensions.

So if I cold boot my PC, it should be in GM mode, which should work with QFG1VGA, right? I will give it a try anyway when I get a chance. No chance tonight though. 😁

I think if the XR 385 is already at port330, the Sierra MIDI port changer utility will not be helpful. (It's for when the MIDI port is not at 330h.)

But the MIDI-EX utility listed there with the RESET.SYX (also avail. there) can help to reset the daughterboard's MIDI. But this is just a simple utility to reset the MIDI without cold booting the PC.

Yeah, no luck resetting or changing ports. I thought I'd share what it sounds like with you guys. Here's the first minute of QFG1VGA with FM synthesis, and with the XR385.

God only knows what it's doing there.

I'm pretty sure there are issues between the earlier SCI "VGA" games, UART mode MPU-401s, and fast CPUs.

Try one of the "MTBLAST" type sound drivers from here, along with the game speed/timing patches from here.

In my experience, the MTBLAST driver for SQ1VGA also worked on SQ4 and will probably work in QFG1VGA, despite the site saying it won't.

Post the contents of your RESOURCE.CFG.