The Solo-1 has excellent DOS compatibility (depending on motherboard chipset support) and great sounding hardware FM (OPL2 and OPL3) the same as the earlier ISA based ESS Audiodrive cards.

megatron-uk wrote on 2025-03-14, 20:35:

The Solo-1 has excellent DOS compatibility (depending on motherboard chipset support) and great sounding hardware FM (OPL2 and OPL3) the same as the earlier ISA based ESS Audiodrive cards.

Thanks! Does the sound card compatibility really depend on the motherboard as well? I thought the compatibility was determined only by the sound card's chip. Secondly, would the variants of Solo-1 (e.g. Labway's A331-L70) have more or less the same quality/compatibility, to your knowledge? e.g. this one https://theretroweb.com/expansioncards/s/labw … tion-solo-1-l70

With PCI cards it does indeed depend on the motherboard as well.

They all have to emulate or mimic to a certain degree the way a real Soundblaster on an ISA bus works, with DMA etc .

Some cards work better than other (Yamaha YMF-7x4 and the ESS Solo-1 being two good examples), but final game compatibility does depend on the motherboard. You may hear the terms PCI/PCI, TDMA and DDMA, they are the different methods PCI based sound cards attempt to work as if they were an actual Soundblaster on the ISA bus talking to DMA (digital audio).

I can't speak about different variations of the cards - my experience with the Solo-1 is on laptops, where it is already on the motherboard itself.

xtreger wrote on 2025-03-14, 20:47:

megatron-uk wrote on 2025-03-14, 20:35:

The Solo-1 has excellent DOS compatibility (depending on motherboard chipset support) and great sounding hardware FM (OPL2 and OPL3) the same as the earlier ISA based ESS Audiodrive cards.

Thanks! Does the sound card compatibility really depend on the motherboard as well? I thought the compatibility was determined only by the sound card's chip. Secondly, would the variants of Solo-1 (e.g. Labway's A331-L70) have more or less the same quality/compatibility, to your knowledge? e.g. this one https://theretroweb.com/expansioncards/s/labw … tion-solo-1-l70

There's one card (not chip) specific variation that can matter, again dependent on your motherboard. See the six-pin block just left of the Solo chipset? That's a PC/PCI (aka SBLINK) connector. If your motherboard also supports PC/PCI, using that connector you don't need to run a TSR driver. Without it you do. IMHO overrated: almost all boards that have PC/PCI also have ISA slots so you could just use an ISA card instead. So only relevant if your board has it.

Another variation is whether you have a wavetable header or not. The commonest Solo card in my experience, the Terratec Solo-1, is odd in that you either get a wavetable header or PC/PCI, but never both. I've added the wavetable header to a card without it and it works perfectly, so very puzzled why they weren't released like that.

But tell us which motherboard you have (or failing that which system this is going into if an OEM system, or in any case the motherboard chipset) and we can see what the options are.

dionb wrote on 2025-03-14, 23:17:

The commonest Solo card in my experience, the Terratec Solo-1, is odd in that you either get a wavetable header or PC/PCI, but never both. I've added the wavetable header to a card without it and it works perfectly, so very puzzled why they weren't released like that.

Maybe in the EU but in USA I rarely see them unless they are coming from EU and still dont see them often. Of the five Solo-1s I have two of them have both PC/PCI and wavetable header and no Terratec.

I have not had a problem with dos on the motherboards I have used but have not tested that many and not tested all my Solo-1 cards. I only have one Ensoniq PCI 3000 ES1370 and havent tested it in dos.

dionb wrote on 2025-03-14, 23:17:

There's one card (not chip) specific variation that can matter, again dependent on your motherboard. See the six-pin block just […]
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xtreger wrote on 2025-03-14, 20:47:

megatron-uk wrote on 2025-03-14, 20:35:

The Solo-1 has excellent DOS compatibility (depending on motherboard chipset support) and great sounding hardware FM (OPL2 and OPL3) the same as the earlier ISA based ESS Audiodrive cards.

Thanks! Does the sound card compatibility really depend on the motherboard as well? I thought the compatibility was determined only by the sound card's chip. Secondly, would the variants of Solo-1 (e.g. Labway's A331-L70) have more or less the same quality/compatibility, to your knowledge? e.g. this one https://theretroweb.com/expansioncards/s/labw … tion-solo-1-l70

There's one card (not chip) specific variation that can matter, again dependent on your motherboard. See the six-pin block just left of the Solo chipset? That's a PC/PCI (aka SBLINK) connector. If your motherboard also supports PC/PCI, using that connector you don't need to run a TSR driver. Without it you do. IMHO overrated: almost all boards that have PC/PCI also have ISA slots so you could just use an ISA card instead. So only relevant if your board has it.

Another variation is whether you have a wavetable header or not. The commonest Solo card in my experience, the Terratec Solo-1, is odd in that you either get a wavetable header or PC/PCI, but never both. I've added the wavetable header to a card without it and it works perfectly, so very puzzled why they weren't released like that.

But tell us which motherboard you have (or failing that which system this is going into if an OEM system, or in any case the motherboard chipset) and we can see what the options are.

I have a couple of motherboards - one is GA-G41MT-ES2L and the other is GA-G31M-ES2C. I don't think either of them has PC/PCI connector. Not sure about the DMA related stuffs

xtreger wrote on 2025-03-15, 04:53:

[...]

I have a couple of motherboards - one is GA-G41MT-ES2L and the other is GA-G31M-ES2C. I don't think either of them has PC/PCI connector. Not sure about the DMA related stuffs

G31 and G41 chipset? No they definitely don't as PC/PCI needs to connect to a - usually integrated - ISA bridge, which they don't have. Bigger as they are normally paired with ICH7 or later southbridge, they have nothing even resembling DMA anymore to interface with.

See this thread: PCI sound cards and Chipsets from various manufacturers...

Since ICH6 support for PC-PCI has dropped and it's not possible to provide ISA slots with DMA using PCI-ISA bridges anymore. Thi […]
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Since ICH6 support for PC-PCI has dropped and it's not possible to provide ISA slots with DMA using PCI-ISA bridges anymore. This also impacted PCI audio cards that now only FM synth works on those cards. No SFX audio works except Aureal sound cards.

[...]

2. ESS Solo-1
[...]
On other newer chipsets (ICH6 and onwards, nForce, etc.) only FM synth works.

If you want to get DOS to work natively on a system this new, you're going to have to jump through hoops - not just related to sound cards, but also due to speed-sensitive games. Unless that's your thing, use DOSbox (a Core2 system is more than fast enough for that) or get older hardware.