MaxWar wrote:Xwing also likes being difficult apparently
X-Wing isn't just difficult about the sound card, it's also EXTREMELY difficult about the speed of your computer. The floppy disk edition, especially, is a nightmare to get working correctly with any of the SoundBlaster sound options, in particular on SoundBlaster clones, but I even used to have problems getting the game to work using the SoundBlaster sound options on real SoundBlasters (AWE64 CT4500 and Pro 2.0 CT1600)! Lately, I even had problems with the game on the ESS Maestro-2 with the floppy disk edition of X-Wing as the game would only work with the SoundBlaster sound options under Windows 95 whereas in DOS, all I got was complete silence.
If you use the AdLib, Roland or General MIDI sound options with the floppy disk edition of X-Wing, you will generally get sound, but as soon as you use either the SoundBlaster, SoundBlaster Pro, Roland with SoundBlaster or General MIDI with SoundBlaster sound options, on certain cards, you'll get complete silence.
Then you have to worry about the speed of your computer's CPU. This isn't as much of a problem with the Collector's CD-ROM edition as with the floppy disk edition, but it's pretty bad on the floppy disk edition. Sound cards with true OPL2 and OPL3 especially are affected by this as the faster your CPU, the greater the risk the game outputs a jumbled mess of garbage notes out of the YM3812 or YMF262. There is a small in-between area where the game will start missing notes or outputting notes incorrectly, though (if I were to estimate this area, it would be between a Pentium MMX and possibly an AMD K6-II). The best CPU I've used for X-Wing is a Pentium 120MHz, both for the floppy disk edition and Collector's CD-ROM edition, as that too may output incorrect notes when using 4-Op FM music (using AdLib music on a fast computer will result in VERY slow music and gameplay that's just as slow - nasty).
leileilol wrote:X-Wing distorts like hell on a CS4232.
Distorted like this? That's what I got with the floppy disk edition using a CS4235 integrated on an IBM Personal Computer 300PL. Worst sound card I've ever used. I haven't had any distortion issues like this on a CX4236 or even a CS4232.
As for other games, I have had problems with Doom and Duke Nukem 3D on some PCI sound cards where the game would either fail to load or output absolutely no digital audio if I were to set that card to output sound effects. Plus, I've had MAJOR problems with using a Roland CM-300 on any SoundBlaster 16 or my SoundBlaster 32 PnP CT3600 on either game where the music was skipping notes, would just stay on the same note forever and would cause severe speed issues on both of those games (DSP version doesn't matter; I've had DSP version 4.16 on my SoundBlaster 16 WavEffects CT4170 do the same thing). Descent even caused issues on my OPTi 82C929A where it was absolutely impossible to get any Stereo sound out of the card.
Creator of The Many Sounds of:, a collection of various DOS games played using different sound cards.