VOGONS


First post, by Predator99

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Today I received my Compaq Ultrasound 32 Pro / STB Soundrage 32 Pro (Interwave) from a dealer in used condition. It was packaged very well and there was no damage on the box.

I paid a lot of money for it, most probably more than its worth. 80$ for the card, 60$ shipping around the world and 25€ custom fee. Alltogether around 170€ 🙁

Plugged into my PC...and nothing. My other Interwave cards (MED3201 & GUS Pnp) are already regongnized by the BIOS (tested this today again)...but with the new STB clone nothing happens.

The card does also not respond to iwinit.exe or the iweeprom tools.

There is no obvious damage on the card.

I already removed the jumper and the SIMM and tried another ISA slot.

Does anybode have an idea? Sending it back is no option as I assume I have to pay again 60$ for the shipment to get back 80$ for the card 🙁 🙁 🙁

MED3201 Bios message

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STB front

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STB back

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Reply 3 of 10, by shock__

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Yup ... seems completely dead indeed.

Do you have a scope? I've had a GUS clone with a dead 74F373 (latch for ram/rom adressing) which seemed completely dead at first as well, but worked after I replaced that chip - yours look like they ran a bit hot at one point (can be normal tho). Depending on the defect it can also block access to the EEPROM with the PNP config causing the card to fail to initialize.

If you don't think you can do that repair yourself, I might give it a shot. I'm located in Germany.

Current Project: new GUS PnP compatible soundcard

[Z?]

Reply 5 of 10, by peklop

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Imho this Compaq/STB card still listed as Sound Rage 32 Pro is not a Sound Rage 32 Pro.
SR32 Pro has same PCB as classic SR32 with 512kB memory onboard and no SIMM slot.

Reply 6 of 10, by moturimi1

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Strange your Boards detects the PnP Resources of the GUS!
I have a STB Soundrage 32. I also was not able to initialise the card until I updated the BIOS of the GUS.
Check it out here: EC251 InterWave Audio Card

Reply 7 of 10, by Predator99

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Yes Peklop, according to Wiki you are right!

No, the first Screenshot of the PnP detection is with the MED3201 installed. The STB shows nothing at this stage. I flashed the ROM from Gravis on the MED3201 long time ago to be able to use the Gravis drivers. However, its of limited use as the MED3201 has no RAM.

Reply 9 of 10, by ExTneicsol

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This sound card work with the right compaq driver. I've made a post here somewhere about it. Just for information, this card was dont work on some old pnp motherboard ... (not detected, but if you reboot ... it is)

I will check if I still have my tweaked driver that make it work with the GUS environment. If you need it PM me.

Reply 10 of 10, by cyclone3d

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I'm starting a comprehensive guide for this card.

With the stock ROM, it will only work with the Compaq driver set. I think mainly due to the added fader/mixer chip.

I was able to get it working once with one of the other ROMs, but it stopped working.

I was having issues with Dxdiag causing a bsod with the direct sound driver.. and finally today tracked down an updated driver softpaq that fixes the issue.

Here is my post about the card.. adding more info and pics.

STB Ultrasound 32 Pro (Compaq Interwave sound card) - The comprehensive guide

Yamaha modified setupds and drivers
Yamaha XG repository
YMF7x4 Guide
Aopen AW744L II SB-LINK