What features do you need? I just use the YMF719 in my machine for digital, OPL3 and MIDI. I had to make a ribbon cable to connect an XR385 daughterboard but it works flawlessly.

Kinda need a easy solution that doesn't require to much work but also something doesn't require me to hunt down expensive modules :s
Tell me more about the ymf719 and how it gets things done.

There's info here The Yamaha OPL YMF718-S chipset.

But basically, much better sound quality than any contemporary Creative card, real OPL3, MIDI without hanging notes, no memory-resident drivers, haven't found a game that it doesn't work with yet.

Thanks for the info. Just need to understand how to configure everything in software now.

The YMF is definitely best in the list. ESS cards are okay too, has funky sounding FM but it's not OPL3.

Get your drivers here: http://www.yamaha.co.jp/english/product/lsi/download/
Configuration is dead easy: run the SETUPSA.EXE program to configure it, then add SETUPSA /S to your autoexec. I think I posted the best (least noise) volume settings here somewhere but I can't find it right now.. IIRC the WSS volume had to be turned down a bit.
In Windows 2000 and XP you don't even need any drivers installed, they're included with the OS.

The Yamaha card may technically be better in some ways, but the ESS card might be worth a try first. FM sound is pretty subjective, and I personally like the ES1688 sound. It's different from a real OPL3, sure, but different isn't necessarily bad. Another nice thing about the ES1688 is that it's non-PnP... no messing with config programs or anything, just set the jumpers and go. Plus, most of those ESS cards are full-height, so they can fit a daughterboard without having to hack together an adapter.

Actually, ESFM is very similar to OPL3. I've done some comparative recordings and forum member Ace has too. There are some recordings of ESFM on the page in my signature. I'm sure these cards vary but my ES1869 has nice quality and the DB header works great with Roland. A mixer TSR is available for fine tuning.

Also, years ago some guys here found a nice SB16-compatible card with the Cmedia CMI8330 that they liked.
Sound Blaster 16 Clones

BTW, it is really unfortunate how information flows down the drain on a forum as time passes.

swaaye wrote:

Actually, ESFM is very similar to OPL3. I've done some comparative recordings and forum member Ace has too. There are some re […]
Show full quote

Actually, ESFM is very similar to OPL3. I've done some comparative recordings and forum member Ace has too. There are some recordings of ESFM on the page in my signature. I'm sure these cards vary but my ES1869 has nice quality and the DB header works great with Roland. A mixer TSR is available for fine tuning.

Also, years ago some guys here found a nice SB16-compatible card with the Cmedia CMI8330 that they liked.
Sound Blaster 16 Clones

BTW, it is really unfortunate how information flows down the drain on a forum as time passes.

Makes my head spin when reading through all these threads when trying to figure what is going to work. 😵

Makes my head spin when reading through all these threads when trying to figure what is going to work.

Don't get too caught up in it. Just play around with cards that seem interesting... you'll run across some that suck, some that sound good, some that sound good but are a pain in the ass to set up (or don't work with your favorite game), and all sorts of other things.

Just about any ISA sound card will work for the majority games. Quite a few will work quite well for the majority games. What you have to keep in mind is that a lot of the discussion of sound cards here is about people trying to get the best performance in as many games as possible... that's where things start to get tricky. Especially when the 'best performance' is quite subjective (same as anything else involving sound quality).

Oh man I got caught up in this frustrating quest for the right sound card(s), it was fun for a while but got old after trying 5 or six different combos. There's ALWAYS a down side to every card. The CMI8330 3D media thing mentioned above nearly did it for me but the joy stick port had to be unplugged to fit a full sized DB. You could always do the 'make your own cable' thing that DonutKing mentioned but then you have to mount the DB somewhere else. Bollocks to that I say!

In the end I went with a SB Pro 2.0 + a Roland SCC-1, but of course the SCC-1 wasn't cheap.

Unless you need a DB Header, SB Pro2 is the dog's bollocks.

Another vote for the Sound Blaster Pro 2 😀 For me my retro PC just HAS TO HAVE a Creative Sound Blaster. No matter what. My first sound card was a Sound Blaster 1.5 and Creative has such a huge meaning for my personal nostalgia experience!

Mau1wurf1977 wrote:

Another vote for the Sound Blaster Pro 2 😀 For me my retro PC just HAS TO HAVE a Creative Sound Blaster. No matter what. My first sound card was a Sound Blaster 1.5 and Creative has such a huge meaning for my personal nostalgia experience!

LoL, thinking about testing a Creative branded dvd drive for my win 9x rig.