Real Sound Canvas synths are much, much better than that little 3.5MB DLS bank. Roland's Virtual Sound Canvas emulator is even a vast improvement over Microsoft's software synth. Check out these recordings of The Elder Scrolls: Arena that I made from my Roland SC-88 (Sound Canvas) and DOSBox's Adlib emulation: Re: HELP! Mount CD-ROM of Gabriel Knight 1

Not very helpful to people nowadays but this is interesting:

http://blogs.technet.com/megand/default.aspx

"PCI Express Updated" Article

Ah, I KNEW that MS thing had to be a cheap peice of crap compared to real hardware. You really had me worried for a moment there.

I've heard FM synthesis before. Unfortunately. I have no desire to hear it again emulated or otherwise (and why do I want to emulate? I have real OPL hardware. Any game using FM synthesis would drive me crazy.) The soundcanvas recordings I'll listen to though. EDIT: That's the opening theme? I dont' even recognize it. And I'm not joking that it sounds that radically different or something, my synthesis sounds rather a lot like that, though with these 32MB of soundfonts loaded up, a bit better to me at least. I just plain don't recognize that tune... Mind you, I'm playing the CD version, perhaps it's something in the disk version?

BTW, look for an author named Rozzman Gregor. Seems like he made a lot of the music in Daggerfall. If you look for cached copies of his old site you can still download a lot of MIDIs, many of which you will definitely recognize. The new site has very little and last I checked the links were broken unfortunately.

EDIT: Glad to know that PCI-Express may be more friendly towards such things. Guess we won't be seeing proper legacy emulation anymore, even if it might be more easily done using that though. No one seems to care these days. I swear, it's just such a pain getting a modern soundcard to do even SB Pro (eg 8-bit *shivers*) emulation these days. )-:

gulikoza wrote:

<snip> because of certain x86 properties, virtualization is still hard. Some other architectures (IBM zSeries for example) are much more virtualization friendly. Even more, such systems are capable of running hundreds of virtual machines with very little overhead (in IBM zVM for example, each system "service" gets it's own virtual machine, each user logs into it's own vmachine...).

IBM mainframes have been virtualization-friendly all the way back from 1964 when the IBM 360 server and its operating system VM/360 was introduced.

My memory is a bit hazy, but I believe that one of the great motivators behind this was CICS, a very popular on-line data retrival application for OS/360 - the first OS for the IBM 360. Unfortunately, it was written in assembler and did nasty, low-level stuff direct on the hardware (all in the name of performance and features), had a limit on how many terminals/users it could support, etc, etc.

So some bright guy at IBM came up with this idea of rewriting OS/360 into something that supported virtualization, and the result was VM/360. With VM/360 you could load and run any number of virtual OS/360 instances, each with its own copy of CICS. Problem solved.

Or something like that....

HunterZ wrote:

That would be weird, as it's how things started out (dumb terminals connected to a mainframe). I think people like us will make a lot of noise to keep that from catching on. I don't want all my private stuff on a Microsoft server somewhere...

In many corporate setups, this is the dream goal for IT-support.

A lot of office PC's are setup with very restrictive policies, with the user not even being able to create shortcuts on their desktops, let alone install new programs.

As a programmer/sysadm I am currently exempt from having my PC locked down like that, but I routinely access the corporate Time Registration and the Incident Management System using a thin MetaFrame client. Works really well.

Hmm, maybe the business world and consumer world may seperate yet again. It bugged the crap out of me when MS announced they were dumping the home os in favor of a business os (out with 9x, in with NT.) Win2K was nothing but pain for me and even wouldn't use my 100% ms compatible mouse at the time. And don't bring up WinME, they made that on purpose to make a few more bucks and sabatoge the 9x line so they could continue with their claims of the greatness of NT (at least, on those systems where the drivers for simple things like soundcards didn't routinely cause the person's pc to BSOD... Surprise, they made XP default to hiding the BSOD from the user... At least they improved hardware support thank god.)

It's pretty ironic to think that the x86 series was originally intended for business purposes, but, it ended up being a home computer even used for gaming.

Nazo wrote:

I've heard FM synthesis before.

Unfortunately. I have no desire to hear it again emulated or otherwise (and why do I want to emulate? I have real OPL hardware. Any game using FM synthesis would drive me crazy.)

Actually, FM synthesis is the term used to describe the method by which realy OPL chips produce sound. The MT-32 uses LA synthesis; the Sound Canvas and most modern software and hardware synthesizers use wavetable synthesis.

The soundcanvas recordings I'll listen to though. EDIT: That's the opening theme? I dont' even recognize it. And I'm not joking that it sounds that radically different or something, my synthesis sounds rather a lot like that, though with these 32MB of soundfonts loaded up, a bit better to me at least. I just plain don't recognize that tune... Mind you, I'm playing the CD version, perhaps it's something in the disk version?

It's probably bad that I called it "opening theme" - what I meant was the theme it plays when you hit "Start New Game" and it starts giving you the back-story. One of the more memorable pieces of music in the game, in my opinion.

It can sound better on soundfont synths using large GM banks, especially if you find one with a good Choir Aahs instrument sound.

BTW, look for an author named Rozzman Gregor. Seems like he made a lot of the music in Daggerfall.

Thanks! I consider myself an appreciator of video game music and am always interested in learning more about the people behind the music in my favorite games. My favorite song from Daggerfall is the snow theme (title is something like gsnow_b).

Nazo wrote:

I had actually not known of the command line option to do that. It's still worlds easier to just copy over the only files actually needed and a single taylored configuration file in the game's directory and set up a batch file that runs the game directly through it (I know I could have it run through the autoexec section, but, this has the benefit of autoexit on completion for a more seamless feel and it doesn't have to rely on the game being in a particular directory.)

Nazo - no offence - and I haven't read through the whole thread yet either - but to me it seems clear that there are huge opportunites for you to learn exciting new stuff about virtualization, emulation and the incredible flexibility of DOSBox.

I do essential the same as HunterZ - keeping each game in its own directory. Alongside the game files, I have a slimmed down dosbox.conf containing only settings used to override the defaults (which usually means 10-15 lines to set CPU cycles, Sound Blaster IRQ, Core selection, and Capture directory - and finally an AutoExec section to mount the C-drive (mount C "."") and start the game.

Now all I have to do is to set up a shortcut to DOSBox with the game-specfic directory as the working directory.

HunterZ wrote:

Nazo wrote:

I've heard FM synthesis before.

Unfortunately. I have no desire to hear it again emulated or otherwise (and why do I want to emulate? I have real OPL hardware. Any game using FM synthesis would drive me crazy.)

Actually, FM synthesis is the term used to describe the method by which realy OPL chips produce sound. The MT-32 uses LA synthesis; the Sound Canvas and most modern software and hardware synthesizers use wavetable synthesis.

Er, I knew about the FM part. That's why I said I knew what it sounded like. The fact is, I never even noticed the difference between my original Adlib way way back when and the OPL3 on the soundcards I had later. I mean, I'm sure it's there, I just didn't hear it back then (and I'm sure as heck not going back to find out thanks.) The fact is, FM synthesis is a good idea that maybe given modern technology with more research and more complicated algorithms would produce great real sounding results now, but, from the moment wavetable style synthesis came out, it became obvious that it just isn't worth it. As far as I'm concerned, FM synthesis can dissapear with the PC speaker, and I don't care that some games actually did amazing things with it (heck, PC speaker can play digital audio in a few rare games, in one actual MOD type music -- and there were of course actual mod players that could use it -- but, I'd describe the sound as being probably 11KHz max on a powerful CPU and definitely no more than 8-bitdepth, possibly less if there is such a thing.)

It's probably bad that I called it "opening theme" - what I meant was the theme it plays when you hit "Start New Game" and it starts giving you the back-story. One of the more memorable pieces of music in the game, in my opinion.

Well, in my version I get a back story via movie with (if I recall, my disc is buried somewhere and it's actually been a few months since I played last now) patrick stewart's voice (man does he ever get rich off of voiceovers on games or what?)

Thanks! I consider myself an appreciator of video game music and am always interested in learning more about the people behind the music in my favorite games. My favorite song from Daggerfall is the snow theme (title is something like gsnow_b).

I have all but the story theme as nearly as I know. Actually, there's a tool out there that's supposed to extract and convert the music called "Daggerfall Jukebox" If you find that story theme, let me know, it sounds pretty nice.

And I love the snow theme as well. I believe it's among the ones you'll find on Gregor's old site if you can find a good cache of it. (I set wget to just download the whole bloody site at the time, so I even have it around here somewhere still maybe.)

MiniMax, I never said I didn't have a thing or two to learn. If I did, you'll have to quote me on it because I have no memory of saying such a crazy thing. But, how do you learn if you don't say something? And, I also do the same thing with DOSBox essentially, but, the command line paramater for an external configuration wasn't know to me (it may be relatively new in fact perhaps?) However, I don't like things that require me to use fixed paths. I like a more universal solution. Right now I have a single RAR archive on my desktop which I just extract into a game folder with all the minimal files needed for dosbox to run. Extracted it takes, roughly 1MB or so of my 130GB harddrive. Gee. Darn. I just do a minor bit of tweaking to this and that in the configuration, make a simple batch file that says "dosbox /exit game.exe" and presto. No fixed paths or anything like that, so I can just archive up the game and make a backup like that.

The fact is, the parameter for multiple configurations really does me no good. The extra 1MB or so uncompressed is a small cost to never have to configure paths. Plus it means I have a version of DOSBox guaranteed to work with that particular game down the road if anything major ever changes. If anything major changes for the good, I simply overwrite with the new one.

MiniMax: Actually, while I may preach that cool method, I've always been too lazy to implement it. I just have a 'mount c d:\oldgames' and 'c:' command in my main dosbox.conf and then I 'cd' into the appropriate game directory from inside DOSBox. This usually means that I have to keep dosbox.conf open in notepad and re-launch DOSBox with new settings a couple of times until I get it right for the particular game I'm trying to play at the moment.

Nazo:
FM/OPL: As far as I know, the only significant difference between the OPL2 on the Adlib (and non-Pro/non-SB16 SoundBlasters) and the OPL3 is that the latter can do stereo.

PC Speaker: When used as a DAC (digital-to-analog converter - in other words, for MOD music and digital samples), it's actually a 1-bit device: on and off and that's all you get. With a 286, I don't think I was even able to reach 8KHz in the MOD players I used. 8KHz 1bit - terrible compared to even 11KHz 8bit that the original Sound Blaster could easily do.

Arena: Interesting. I'll have to run my CD version's intro again, as I only just got it working after seeing a workaround from Qbix last week. I made the recordings from the floppy version that Bethesda released for free.

Daggerfall: I actually made my own tool about 6+ years ago to extract the HMI files from the BSA archive (which I also had to reverse-engineer the format of), then I had to use a MIDI loopback driver to capture the MIDI output of an HMI player, as there were no free converters available at the time. As you can see, I was rather determined 😀 I still have them laying around somewhere on my hard drive (they used to be on my Geocities site but it went down a few years ago because I forgot the password)

Wait, Arena.. Bah, I'm getting mixed up here. No, I was referring to Daggerfall. THAT's why I didn't recognize that particular theme..... I've only played Arena for a few minutes because Daggerfall just felt so much better. Plus, it's a little hard to get started into such a game when they dump you right into an annoying dungeon like that. I hate that in Daggerfall too.

Got any MIDIs of Arena lying about?

Ah. No, I don't think I do, but of course you can download the game for free from somewhere on Bethesda's site and then run it in DOSBox.

Also, I seem to remember the narrator in the intro of Daggerfall having a northeastern U.S. accent that reminded me more of someone like Norm Abrams (http://www.newyankee.com/index.shtml - don't ask) than Patrick Stewart.

Already have a copy that I've played for a bit in DOSBox. Thing is, I enjoy having seperate MIDIs, which is why I asked.

And, like I said, it has been a while, and I didn't pay much attention to the intro. The whole thing is a little silly. I probably got it mixed up with Lands of Lore in this case since they both open with the king explaining your purpose and all that stuff.

Wether it gets easier or more efficent, it's a HUGE security nightmare.

Think about it - no one system can see everything, so how can you expect to catch all the viruses? Duh!

Of course that's not going to stop people from using it - virtualization saves time, effort, how many computers you need---in short, a lot of -cold hard cash-.

The issue isn't new, tho. -How- many times before has it been that saving time and worry comes at the expense of having security somewhat like a screen door inside a submarine? I don't even wanna know.

Wow, lol, you dug up not only an old forgotten thread, but, one which we MIGHT have driven just a TAD bit off topic... *whistles innocently* Oh well, may as well go with the flow, at least it's back closer to the original topic in the most important way.

BTW, security issues do exist, but, still something that can be checked for, simply a little harder to do. For example, boot into a linux rescue disc and run ClamAV. In fact, I am distributing discs intended for just such a purpose and even plan to someday get around to rigging one up to actually automatically update clamav on startup, mount local filesystems and automatically scan things for the user requiring no input (currently I have to tell them what to type, though it's still not very much so quite easy for them.) By running completely independant of the host OS, no virtualization processes will be used.

That said, I should add that virtualization isn't exactly the holy grail of virus design either. You see, you can't just put a virus in a virtualized setup and let it go expecting that to be good enough. By existing within a virtualization just for it, it will be unable to do much damage without still interacting with things that antivirus software can catch. I have read of one worrying trick though. Someone pointed out that if they could get it into a rootkit -- essentially running the actual kernel and os itself within a virtualization -- then a virus could exist on the "outside" process and would indeed be very hard to catch (the "inside" process wouldn't even know that less than 100% of the CPU was available even if I'm not mistaken.) That would be troublesome since it would be hard to tell anything is wrong unless the virus goes out of control (and the best virus will not since the moment it goes out of control it risks exposure.) That's where my bootdisk idea comes in.

If you're curious, you might want to try some of the so called "live rescue discs" out there. My personal favorite right now being Finnix but another that was my favorite before it stagnated (it has now come back to life and is fresh with lots of updates) would be the System Rescue CD which is equally good compared to Finnix probably (depending on what you want to use it for.) I believe in both cases they should recognize any onboard or external network interfaces, use DHCP (assuming your modem supports it of course) and provide internet access (don't worry, iptables -- the linux kernel firewall -- is built in.) I think you should be able to just type freshclam and get updates right off, then mount /mnt/hda1 or whatever your harddrive and partition may be and start scanning. (ClamAV, by default, should just report any suspicious files without taking any action, leaving you to do what you wish with such files unless my memory is failing me -- sorry, it has been a while since I found even a false positive on a virus.)

Of course, if you have an unusual connection type -- such as a built-in DSL card (not network, but, an actual DSL card where the software must dial in for you and everything rather than an external modem handling that for you) -- or if you have a dialup modem, you will have to still configure things. A proper cable or dsl modem should come with a DHCP server built-in, though maybe some will be disabled by default. Any router worth it's weight in salt definitely will. Also, wireless cards are, admitedly, not getting very good support in linux right now, so I wouldn't depend on one of them to work on such a rescue disc (but then, considering how unreliable they can be sometimes, you should always have the OPTION of a fallback to an ethernet card for an emergency.)

Ok. Point taken. Sorry for being off-topic, but it just made me shake my head and say, "people! -think- for a minute here..."

Dark-Star wrote:

Ok. Point taken. Sorry for being off-topic, but it just made me shake my head and say, "people! -think- for a minute here..."

Doesn't matter. The original topic was addressed and answered long ago. And virtualization DOES present security issues people should be aware of, but, it's nothing to panic about either since for every problem there is at least one solution. It does make it a bit harder since such a virus will be harder to catch, but, if you routinely do scans with something independant of the OS affected (eg the bootdisk idea) then you should be able to catch such a thing before you unwittingly become a zombie for some massive attack or some other such unpleasant thing.

Anyway, on the up side, virtualization is actually a pretty neat technology with some nice potential behind it.