Masejoer wrote on 2022-06-28, 05:33:

So I've just been getting my MT-32 and SoundCanvas units going after sitting on them for some time. Slowly getting my retro PCs […]
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So I've just been getting my MT-32 and SoundCanvas units going after sitting on them for some time. Slowly getting my retro PCs built now. MPU music works fine on my DOS install using a PnP Vibra16. What I don't understand is how I can play midi files through the Roland devices from within Windows, using this soundcard. On youtube I've heard plenty of GUI/WIndows-game midi-files being played back through Roland devices, but I haven't a clue how those were done. Is this something that I need to use a different midi card/interface for?

All I have in the MIDI tab of multimedia properties is "Creative Stereo Music Synthesizer," and I haven't found any other information online all day about getting midi music going through a SoundCanvas from within WIndows 95 or 98. Lots of people referencing DOS mode, which is not what I'm looking for.

Perhaps there's some other driver I'm missing. I'm not seeing any MPU-type device in the SBW9XUP driver package. Trying to install the Microsoft "MPU401 compatible" driver just gives me a device-error in the device manager at address 330.

I imagine many here know exactly what I'm missing, so instead of continuing to bang my head against the wall, I'm seeking help from all of you with m0re experience.

There should be a MIDI port device in Device Manager that corresponds to the external MIDI (MPU-401 compatible) port on your sound card . Are there any devices with question marks, exclamation marks or a red X in Device Manager ?

Masejoer wrote on 2022-06-28, 05:33:

MPU music works fine on my DOS install using a PnP Vibra16.

So you're using a Vibra? 😰 Which model exactly? Do you use the Creative's Plug&Play tools CTCM/CTCU on DOS?
If not, maybe the PnP BIOS of your PC does assign the basic stuff as long as DOS is running. Maybe that's why the Windows drivers don't work properly, not sure. The Vibras are not traditional SB16s, even less than the AWEs.
Maybe that's why the SBW9XUP doesn't properly work. It maybe doesn't contain the Plug&Play tools necessary to set-up PnP cards.
It's just a driver update for Windows 9x.
If a real SB16 was installed, it wouldn't be needed, anyway. Normal SB16 drivers are included since Windows 95.

darry wrote on 2022-06-28, 06:25:

There should be a MIDI port device in Device Manager that corresponds to the external MIDI (MPU-401 compatible) port on your sound card . Are there any devices with question marks, exclamation marks or a red X in Device Manager ?

No, there is not. I manually added the "Creative gameport joystick" in this screenshot.

^That's fine, but the Game Port is a totally different device, technically.
The MPU-401 merely uses two unused pins on the DE-15 connector.
MPU-401 is at port 300h/330h, the game port at port 201h.

Jo22 wrote on 2022-06-28, 07:15:

^That's fine, but the Game Port is a totally different device, technically.
The MPU-401 merely uses two unused pins on the DE-15 connector.
MPU-401 is at port 300h/330h, the game port at port 201h.

Yes, I do understand this. Just stating that I only had one audio device, until I added the gameport manually - that item wasn't automatically installed. There is no MPU-401 option in the creative driver pack if I try to manually install new hardware, and manually adding the microsoft mpu-401 compatible driver just gives me an exclamation mark.

The Windows sound and separate dos drivers both work fine in this OS installation, and MPU works fine in dos mode, but I simply don't have any MPU output options in Windows. Not sure what to do next to resolve this. It seems I need to manually install a new hardware device, with a driver that I'm not sure where to obtain.

If I manually add the (microsoft) mpu-401 device, I receive this screenshot after reboot. Standard "device is not present/not working properly." I see no other mpu-401 drivers anywhere to try loading.

I have no idea what's going on - after playing with a couple dos games for a bit, now the windows "Microsoft mpu-401 compatible" drivers I added above are working fine. Yellow exclamation mark went away, midi music is playing through sc-88 fine.

I've been messing with this off an on for some 12 hours now, and I haven't done anything different than I did in the early afternoon. I remember always having weird driver issues back in the 90's, generally because I didn't understand/ignorant on hardware resources, but now with 25 years of experience behind me, this one stands out as a bit more bizarre. I even have an image of the hard drive I made earlier when I added the mpu-401 device manually, which I may restore to another CF card to try to identify what could have possibly been different.

Somehow, this is now working fine.

Jo22 wrote on 2022-06-28, 07:04:

So you're using a Vibra? 😰 Which model exactly? Do you use the Creative's Plug&Play tools CTCM/CTCU on DOS? If not, maybe the Pn […]
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Masejoer wrote on 2022-06-28, 05:33:

MPU music works fine on my DOS install using a PnP Vibra16.

So you're using a Vibra? 😰 Which model exactly? Do you use the Creative's Plug&Play tools CTCM/CTCU on DOS?
If not, maybe the PnP BIOS of your PC does assign the basic stuff as long as DOS is running. Maybe that's why the Windows drivers don't work properly, not sure. The Vibras are not traditional SB16s, even less than the AWEs.
Maybe that's why the SBW9XUP doesn't properly work. It maybe doesn't contain the Plug&Play tools necessary to set-up PnP cards.
It's just a driver update for Windows 9x.
If a real SB16 was installed, it wouldn't be needed, anyway. Normal SB16 drivers are included since Windows 95.

I apologize - I didn't see this other response last night. I didn't even realize it was two different people responding in this thread. I was getting quite tired after the battle with the sound card all day!

I have the PnP CT2800 in there. I only used this specific card as a PnP debugging card to see if my YMF card issues (breaking IDE2 and floppy ports) were due to PnP, or the card itself. Turns out the PnP Vibra card worked fine in the system, and I haven't bothered changing it as it seemed to perform fine.

Oddly enough, MPU-401 was broken again today. The only change was shutting down the PC last night, powering it up again today. Back to yellow exclamation mark. I have narrowed down my "temporary" fix to rebooting to MSDOS mode, running diagnose.exe to re-configure the card, saving with F10, then rebooting. The MPU functionality comes back in Windows.

It appears that my sb16\diagnose.exe in autoexec needed to be moved down a bit. Running that later keeps the MPU working on system power off and back on. Following the steps in the 95dosapp driver's readme file made SET BLASTER in autoexec be located in the wrong spot, possibly because SET BLASTER could have existed earlier via the Windows 95 native drivers.