You shouldn't need XP. I'm fairly certain that every game up through the DX8 era will run on 98SE. DX9 games started to require XP.

BTW, some of the AWE32 cards do have real OPL3 hardware. CT2760 has it, for example.

Lots of AWE info http://queststudios.com/smf/index.php?topic=2175.0

swaaye wrote:

You shouldn't need XP. I'm fairly certain that every game up through the DX8 era will run on 98SE. DX9 games started to require XP.

BTW, some of the AWE32 cards do have real OPL3 hardware. CT2760 has it, for example.

Lots of AWE info http://queststudios.com/smf/index.php?topic=2175.0

My main machine runs on XP. Any game I can run there without compromise, I will run there. It is simply a matter of convenience.

I am aware that my CT2760 has a yamaha opl chip. So does my CT 3980 iirc.

I'd like to hear opinions on:

Pro Audio Spectrum 16 (or Studio 16)
Turtle Beach cards
Orchid cards
OPL4-based cards

I'd really like to know if anyone has used an Orchid NuSound PNP 32. As far as I know it is another CS4232 + OPL3 combo.

swaaye wrote:

I'd like to hear opinions on: […]
Show full quote

I'd like to hear opinions on:

Pro Audio Spectrum 16 (or Studio 16)
Turtle Beach cards
Orchid cards
OPL4-based cards

I have a Pro AudioSpectrum 16 and Pro AudioSpectrum 16 Basic.

What is there to say?

They sound great. Everything sounds separated and clear like on the other great sounding ISA cards such as the GUS and Soundscape.

And like those cards it is the SB compatibility that makes the card only useful in later games that support it.

Unfortunately there is no perfect sound card. Nearly everyone here has tried to find such a thing but had to settle on a combination of 2 or more cards to have the best of all worlds. There were too many competing standards back then and too much proprietary hardware that all had certain advantages over the competition that you will never find a perfect all in one solution, especially if you are looking for ISA cards.

I'll stick with Creative Labs and Roland products thank you very much 😁

However I do pick the card I am using depending on the age of the game for that authentic experience.

E.g. if a game came out before the Sound Blaster 16 was on the market, I will play it on a Sound Blaster 1.5 or 2.0. Same with Roland midi modules.

OPL chip is just one ingredient. E.g. Sound Blaster didn't have low and high pass filters, wheras Sound Blaster Pro and later do. Also Sound Blaster didn't have a mixer wheras Sound Blaster Pro and later do... So the rabbit hole goes quite deep once you start doing some research 😜

I do have a Sound Blaster Pro 2, however it seems there aren't any games that supported the Sound Blaster Pro but not the Sound Blaster 16. I guess Stereo digital sound effects was just to CPU intense back in the day. So I see the Sound Blaster Pro 2 as a "stuck in the middle" card, wheras the Sound Blaster and Soundblaster 16 have plenty of games that where designed when that card was on the market. The Sound Blaster Pro was on the market only for 1 year before the SB 16 came out.

The SB16 digital soudn effects part was reused in the AWE32 and AWE64. On top of that music was handled by midi anyway.

And once digital sound effects took off, they all supported SB16 anyway.

I remember buying my first Sound Blaster card. I went to the store to buy a SB Pro, as nothing was really taking advantage of the SB 16 yet and what they sold was the Pro 2. Most stores didn't differentiate between it and the Pro. It basically replaced it as far as they were concerned.

It was only later, here, that I learned about the difference.

I ran a SBPro 2 alone for a couple of years and then ran it alongside a Ensoniq Soundscape for more years. The Ensoniq card has awesome 16-bit digital audio quality but not all games support it obviously, although by '95 it really was as well-supported as a SB card. The SBPro 2 combined with that beast covered all the bases.

I really don't like the SB16 and its sequels because they aren't a whole let better than the older cards. I can't stand the analog signal quality they put out. The later SB16s also don't have a real OPL chip anymore. Who cares if they can do 16-bit 44.1 kHz stereo when it sounds so muffled, has a lot of noise and has the occasional pop/click. Roland DBs don't work right on them usually, and if they do they have to go the same crap analog circuitry. There are cards that will do 16-bit 44.1kHz vastly better, like the Ensoniq cards. Games that use full digital audio for even music (incl tracker music) sound clearly better. It's eye/ear opening. 😁

I've read that either SB16 has a 12-bit DAC or that the resulting quality is "effectively 12-bit". These cards were overpriced junk that got way too much praise and popularity.

swaaye wrote:

Who cares if they can do 16-bit 44.1 kHz stereo when it sounds so muffled, has a lot of noise and has the occasional pop/click.

Exactly!

I wonder why the other guys didn't advertise with that, pointing at Creative.

Well in regards to Noise the older Sound Blaster sure take home the award 😀

I don't see how a missing OPL is such a big deal, as music is MT-32 or General Midi anyway. The SB16 midi interface isn't MPU-401 intelligent mode compliant, so you need a Roland MPU401 card anyway.

For games that have music through MT-32 or General Midi + speech through Sound Blaster I use AWE64 Gold + Roland MPU401. For the really old games that have no MT-32 / General Midi support (they are usually very old) I use the older Sound Blasters or Game Blaster if they support it.

Regarding digital speech sounding better on other cards, well I guess it's time for someone to make some recordings / videos and show us the difference. I'd love to hear more!

Clicking and poping however doesn't sound right at all. What creative card clicks and pops and swapping for which card solved the issue? And what game?

Hi Guys,

could someone please confirm SC1610/11 against wavetable add-on sound (hearable / not hearable).
I'm asking prior buying, because on another ES688F card I couldn't force WT to be working, despite using different initialisers, ESSVOL, SoftMPU, etc.

Hi, you oversaw the year, I believe? 🙂
That was 12 years ago.. Most people like Phil/Maulwurf don't even visit anymore.

Not sure I did, the subject still seems suitable for the question I raised and another people may reply 😀

Please post new topics instead of necrobumping really old threads.