Geriatric Danmaku wrote on 2026-09-05, 21:34:

Not yet getting Gameport support in Windows 95. It could be a Windows 95 corruption issue. After following alot of general advice, and not making enough progress...

The auto detection will probably not work, try manually adding a standard gameport using the add hardware wizard (usually filed under Microsoft in the driver list)

MONEY! We got this! It was all about setting the Windows gameport to port 201h. No Windows reinstall needed.

Now looking at the Windows games which work with current Sound Blaster emulation. Not all of them are working. But some of them are. More to come.

NeoG_ wrote on 2026-09-05, 22:40:

Geriatric Danmaku wrote on 2026-09-05, 21:34:

Not yet getting Gameport support in Windows 95. It could be a Windows 95 corruption issue. After following alot of general advice, and not making enough progress...

The auto detection will probably not work, try manually adding a standard gameport using the add hardware wizard (usually filed under Microsoft in the driver list)

Geriatric Danmaku wrote on 2026-09-05, 14:54:

What are some good games to try out CMS Sound?

Silpheed, Space Quest 3, King's Quest 4

There is a very good retroclone of pacman that has CMS sound..

Budokan: The Martial Spirit

Geriatric Danmaku wrote on 2026-09-07, 05:58:

Now looking at the Windows games which work with current Sound Blaster emulation. Not all of them are working. But some of them are. More to come.

Since you inherited an existing SB16 configuration onto the PicoGUS, there is one specific thing that needs to be changed - The PicoGUS is an 8-bit card and is not capable of using high DMAs. Your existing SB16 was more than likely configured to use a separate low and high DMA as is normal for SB16 except for specific scenarios.

The hardware resources would need to be adjusted so that the low and high DMA are the same. Some DOS games won't let you use these settings and only give you the option for the High DMA being 5, 6 or 7 (for example Duke 3D), those need to be dealt with on a case by case basis by manually editing the game's config file.

No worries on this one NeoG... Found that discussion a few months ago, and made the adjustment.

It may have been too much to ask for all Windows 95 games to work with SB Emulation. Here's my results so far:
Balls of Steel and similar pinball: YES
Get Medival: YES
NASCAR Racing 1999: NO
Starcraft: NO
Diablo: NO

There was some talk a few months ago about covering Windows with.... Windows Sound System emulation. That sounds pretty awesome. What's the latest news there?

PicoGUS SB output is SUPER CLEAN. It's going to be hard to go back to the supplemental noise of the real SB 16.

PicoGUS Joystick emulation is not working while the real GUS is installed.

Has anybody tried out a real era soundcard WITH PicoGUS installed, and had the Joystick emulation work? Which card?

NeoG_ wrote on Yesterday, 02:17:

Geriatric Danmaku wrote on 2026-09-07, 05:58:

Now looking at the Windows games which work with current Sound Blaster emulation. Not all of them are working. But some of them are. More to come.

Since you inherited an existing SB16 configuration onto the PicoGUS, there is one specific thing that needs to be changed - The PicoGUS is an 8-bit card and is not capable of using high DMAs. Your existing SB16 was more than likely configured to use a separate low and high DMA as is normal for SB16 except for specific scenarios.

The hardware resources would need to be adjusted so that the low and high DMA are the same. Some DOS games won't let you use these settings and only give you the option for the High DMA being 5, 6 or 7 (for example Duke 3D), those need to be dealt with on a case by case basis by manually editing the game's config file.

Geriatric Danmaku wrote on Today, 01:21:

NASCAR Racing 1999: NO
Starcraft: NO
Diablo: NO

I'm surprised by these because they are windows games and windows should abstract the sound device for pretty much all software, I assume they were all working with the original SB16 card?

Geriatric Danmaku wrote on Today, 01:21:

PicoGUS Joystick emulation is not working while the real GUS is installed.

Has anybody tried out a real era soundcard WITH PicoGUS installed, and had the Joystick emulation work? Which card?

I have an SB16 and PicoGUS (I want the hardware OPL still, PicoGUS OPL3 is probably 95% there. Plus I use the 15pin joystick port). I have to remove the JYEN jumper on the SB16 card for the PicoGUS joystick emulation to work. See if your GUS card has a similar jumper. Otherwise the GUS and the PicoGUS will conflict on port 201.

NeoG_ wrote on Today, 01:41:

Geriatric Danmaku wrote on Today, 01:21:

NASCAR Racing 1999: NO
Starcraft: NO
Diablo: NO

I'm surprised by these because they are windows games and windows should abstract the sound device for pretty much all software, I assume they were all working with the original SB16 card?

IIRC Windows drivers for Creative SB are not 100% compatible with third party implementations. It's entirely possible for something different from official Creative SB implementation to break certain driver functionalities.

I think standard wave output of lower sample rates and bit widths should be very likely to work regardless of HW implementation, but there's a high chance that FM and/or MIDI will not work requiring hardware-specific initialization routines that official Creative SB drivers cannot handle.