VOGONS

DMA buffer error on SB16

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First post, by dune

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I have an old DOS program (not a game) that I am trying to get audio working under DOSBox 0.72. I can verify that audio does work on an old P100 with ISA SB16 sound card.

The program starts up OK, however, on first attempt to play any sound it reports the following message:

Driver : Error retrieving size of embedded DMA buffer.

Error - xmshd = 0

I have tried different emulation modes sb1 and sb2. I have not tried the sbpro modes since I know this application will only work with an ISA SB16.

I believe this might be related to the fact that the SB driver isn't really loaded because there is no config.sys in DOSbox. I'm not sure what other options I could try but any help would be greatly appreciated.

*** Moderator: This needs to be moved to the DOSbox forum, sorry. ***

Last edited by dune on 2008-09-29, 17:55. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 1 of 5, by wd

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This is more likely related to XMS rather than soundblaster, xmshd might
be xmshandle (and zero is bad), so you could check the himem calls.

Reply 2 of 5, by dune

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I fired up DOSBox Debugger but am only seeing MSCDEX activity when the errors occurs (FYI, the program also tries to play an audio CD).

Bear with me as I haven't dug into DOSBox this far before. What process should be used to monitor himem calls?

Reply 3 of 5, by MiniMax

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Dunno if this guide will help:

Guide to the DOSBox debugger

DOSBox 60 seconds guide | How to ask questions
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Reply 4 of 5, by wd

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First of all be sure that xms is enabled in your dosbox config file,
to verify it type xms right before starting the app (you should get a
"true" response).
himem calls are int2f/ax=4f00 and ax=4f10, depends on how far
you want to debug this.

Did you check the app's manual for the error message you get? Any
configuration tool for that program?

Reply 5 of 5, by dune

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xms is true in the config and returns true inside DOSBox

I would really like to get it working but not sure how far I'll need to go to fix it (if it's even possible to fix). I should be able to get some debug information but will need help deciphering its meaning.

As for documentation, there isn't much outside the setup guide. This software controls an old laser tag system over RS232 and as stated before it does work on a real Pentium-1 system with ISA sound card, the trick is just getting it to work on DOSBox so I'm not bound by aging hardware.

I'm learning how to use this debugger to get the information needed and will post my findings here.

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