VOGONS


Reply 141 of 252, by carlostex

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Your efforts are very appreciated. Every try might make a difference!

Loved the recordings. I do like how the Covox Sound Master sounds. And the DAC/DMA is definitely makes the card more interesting. Too bad it was not widely supported.

Reply 143 of 252, by Great Hierophant

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Formulator wrote:

I always wondered what Simcity DOS sounded like with it.

It only supports digitized sounds, so it will sound just like it does on a Tandy 1000 with a DAC.

The music from Ultima 6 and PoP sound very close to the Tandy music, which should be expected because the music chips in each use the same basic square-wave + noise PSG technology. It does not appear that any of the Sound Master's advanced AY-3-8910 or AY8930 musical features are being used.

http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.com/ - Nerdly Pleasures - My Retro Gaming, Computing & Tech Blog

Reply 145 of 252, by moturimi1

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vetz wrote:

Do anyone have a complete list of supported games, or a link to one?

The best homepage to gather information on Covox Sound Master (thanks to Great Hierophant):
http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.de/2014/09/th … nd-devices.html (list of supported titles)
http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.de/2012_04_01_archive.html (list of supported titles)

Reply 146 of 252, by Beegle

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These pictures and audio captures are very nice. Thank you moturimi1.
I'm happy to finally hear what the original CSM sounds like.

The more sound cards, the better.
AdLib documentary : Official Thread
Youtube Channel : The Sound Card Database

Reply 147 of 252, by awgamer

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moturimi1 wrote:
Here is a first comparison from music within Ultima 6: Covox Sound Master: http://www.filedropper.com/ultima62covox Ati Stereo […]
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Here is a first comparison from music within Ultima 6:
Covox Sound Master: http://www.filedropper.com/ultima62covox
Ati Stereo F/X CMS: http://www.filedropper.com/ultima62cmsati
Sound Blaster 2.0 CMS: http://www.filedropper.com/ultima62cmssb20
Ati Stereo F/X OPL2: http://www.filedropper.com/ultima62adlibati
Sound Blaster 2.0 OPL2: http://www.filedropper.com/ultima62adlibsb20
Aztech SG NXII OPL3: http://www.filedropper.com/ultima62adlibopl3sgnxii

I normalized the peak volume level.
Ati Stereo F/X add sort of stero sound effect.

cms has more polyphony than the sound master, noticeable around 20s where there are notes missing with the sm playback that are present with the cms.

Reply 148 of 252, by Great Hierophant

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moturimi1 wrote:
The best homepage to gather information on Covox Sound Master (thanks to Great Hierophant): http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.de/2 […]
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vetz wrote:

Do anyone have a complete list of supported games, or a link to one?

The best homepage to gather information on Covox Sound Master (thanks to Great Hierophant):
http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.de/2014/09/th … nd-devices.html (list of supported titles)
http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.de/2012_04_01_archive.html (list of supported titles)

Thanks to your photos I realized that the resources I had for the CSM were incorrect.
Thanks to the new photos, working out the settings is possible. For JP2, there are settings :

DMA3 : 1 & 3
DMA1 : 2 & 4
IRQ7 : 5
IRQ3 : 6

I heard digitized sound effects in Prince of Persia. The default settings for the card appear to be IRQ7/DMA1. Do they work with the alternate settings?

http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.com/ - Nerdly Pleasures - My Retro Gaming, Computing & Tech Blog

Reply 149 of 252, by moturimi1

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Great Hierophant wrote:
Thanks to your photos I realized that the resources I had for the CSM were incorrect. Thanks to the new photos, working out th […]
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moturimi1 wrote:
The best homepage to gather information on Covox Sound Master (thanks to Great Hierophant): http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.de/2 […]
Show full quote
vetz wrote:

Do anyone have a complete list of supported games, or a link to one?

The best homepage to gather information on Covox Sound Master (thanks to Great Hierophant):
http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.de/2014/09/th … nd-devices.html (list of supported titles)
http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.de/2012_04_01_archive.html (list of supported titles)

Thanks to your photos I realized that the resources I had for the CSM were incorrect.
Thanks to the new photos, working out the settings is possible. For JP2, there are settings :

DMA3 : 1 & 3
DMA1 : 2 & 4
IRQ7 : 5
IRQ3 : 6

I heard digitized sound effects in Prince of Persia. The default settings for the card appear to be IRQ7/DMA1. Do they work with the alternate settings?

Sorry for not answering your message.
I haven't tried other jumper setting yet. I can do that in the future, if it is of interest.
Hopefully Shock will be able to make a Replica of the Sound Master. But I think not before he has finished the GUS project.
I can easily hand it over to him, as we both live in Berlin, Germany.

Reply 150 of 252, by Great Hierophant

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moturimi1 wrote:
Sorry for not answering your message. I haven't tried other jumper setting yet. I can do that in the future, if it is of interes […]
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Great Hierophant wrote:
Thanks to your photos I realized that the resources I had for the CSM were incorrect. Thanks to the new photos, working out th […]
Show full quote

Thanks to your photos I realized that the resources I had for the CSM were incorrect.
Thanks to the new photos, working out the settings is possible. For JP2, there are settings :

DMA3 : 1 & 3
DMA1 : 2 & 4
IRQ7 : 5
IRQ3 : 6

I heard digitized sound effects in Prince of Persia. The default settings for the card appear to be IRQ7/DMA1. Do they work with the alternate settings?

Sorry for not answering your message.
I haven't tried other jumper setting yet. I can do that in the future, if it is of interest.
Hopefully Shock will be able to make a Replica of the Sound Master. But I think not before he has finished the GUS project.
I can easily hand it over to him, as we both live in Berlin, Germany.

It is of interest, even if I had forgotten the original request.

This is encouraging news, although I hope that his health will not be broken on the GUS PNP clone project. One PAL chip should not be any great obstacle to him if he can replicate a far more advanced board.

http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.com/ - Nerdly Pleasures - My Retro Gaming, Computing & Tech Blog

Reply 151 of 252, by carlostex

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Keropi has been able to crack a PAL on a Music Quest MPU card by sending it to the proper people so its doable.

If Shock_ can help that's awesome. Fagear already did a very good job and most of the board has alredy been traced.

Reply 152 of 252, by shock__

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Great Hierophant wrote:

This is encouraging news, although I hope that his health will not be broken on the GUS PNP clone project. One PAL chip should not be any great obstacle to him if he can replicate a far more advanced board.

No worries there 😀 Health is going strong, even when the project is going at a slow pace once again.
The PAL chip very likely can be replaced easily, since we should be able to derive it's function once a full schematic has been drawn. That way we could replace it with standard logic since PAL chips have a "shelf life" of 20-50 years (also eliminating the need for an additional programmer). Another thing I considered would be replacing the R2R ladder on the left (above the 74LS74 - using 8 resistors with different values, which is sufficient but also the lowest quality approach) with a dedicated DAC circuit, allowing superior quality.
But yeah, ARGUS comes first.

Current Project: new GUS PnP compatible soundcard

[Z?]

Reply 153 of 252, by Yvan256

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I haven't forgot about this project, but a lot of stuff has been happening since I last posted here.

Here's something interesting, if it could further help this project:
http://www.ebay.ca/itm/272490757158

Reply 154 of 252, by Fagear

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moturimi1 wrote:

I am still willing to contribute (I own the card). I hope it is possible to reverse engineer the card without having to desolder anything. And if we have to, well that would also be ok for me.
If you have any suggestions to keep the project moving forward go ahead...

At the moment I have all the equipment and skills to reverse all the traces on the board in a span of one day. But I don't have a card.

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What I can tell from the experience of re-routing Tandy PSG, CMS, SSI-2001, OPL2?
This card uses usual set of A0...A9, AEN address lines, usual set of D0...D7 data lines as all of those do. It does not use IO_RDY.
The card uses one +5 rail (of two) and +12 rail (for analog output circuits).
It takes 14.318 MHz clock and listens to RESET signal.
Also it allows writes AND reads from it, probably just for joystick ports.
It also can use IRQs 3 and/or 7.
Somewhat difficult part is that it also can use DMA 1 and/or 3.
GAL chip is involved in address decoding - that is not a problem for me now if I'll know what ports this card can use. I can reconstruct decoder on 74 series based on that information. But also GAL brobably handles DMA...

New BIG soundcard: FMonster.
Covox Sound Master replica
Innovation SSI-2001 replica & DuoSID.
My audio/video collection.

Reply 155 of 252, by carlostex

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Nice equipment Fagear!

I also invested in a vacuum desoldering pump. I got a Hakko FR-300 gun. A bit expensive, but a top notch product. It has helped me saving a some hardware that would be otherwise be thrown in a bin. From what i can understand the Covox Sound Master is a 2 layer PCB design, so one can use less heat in the gun, which is always good. I guess since you have most of the board already layed out you also wouldn't need a lot of desoldering.

Well if moturimi1 doesn't mind to send you his card your way, i guess we would have a finished replica by the end of the year. Which would be nice, it's been almost 4 years now since i created this thread.

Then a 4 way sound card with SID, AY, CMS, Tandy would be possible.

Reply 156 of 252, by Fagear

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carlostex wrote:

Nice equipment Fagear!

Thanks! 😀

carlostex wrote:

Well if moturimi1 doesn't mind to send you his card your way, i guess we would have a finished replica by the end of the year.

I'm all for it! If moturimi1 will agree to do this, I'll take his board and try to reverse engineer it without disassembling (shining high power light through, looking at shallow angles, buzzing traces out with multimeter). But if that will not be enough I'll partially disassemble the card, examine and put it together again with little to none evidence that it was disassembled (but only if it will be needed and moturimi1 will allow me to do that).

carlostex wrote:

Then a 4 way sound card with SID, AY, CMS, Tandy would be possible.

I'm afraid that there's no space left for such a big chip as AY. 😢 Probably. 😕

New BIG soundcard: FMonster.
Covox Sound Master replica
Innovation SSI-2001 replica & DuoSID.
My audio/video collection.

Reply 157 of 252, by carlostex

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Fagear wrote:

I'm afraid that there's no space left for such a big chip as AY. 😢 Probably. 😕

My suggesting in this case would be getting rid of OPL modules and just keep the rare synths. A 4 in 1 card would help save a lot of ISA slots. Maybe in the future you can design such a card after the FMonster?

Reply 158 of 252, by Fagear

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carlostex wrote:

My suggesting in this case would be getting rid of OPL modules and just keep the rare synths. A 4 in 1 card would help save a lot of ISA slots. Maybe in the future you can design such a card after the FMonster?

I think I could get rid of OPL2 module which is the longest one and can be replaced with only OPL3 one. Or make another daughterboard. There are some variants.
But first, we have to make a copy of a schematics and figure out functions of GAL chip.

New BIG soundcard: FMonster.
Covox Sound Master replica
Innovation SSI-2001 replica & DuoSID.
My audio/video collection.

Reply 159 of 252, by Fagear

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I've made some progress.
moturimi1 sent me a picture of the card with GAL chip removed, so now I've completed all the traces under GAL:

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A little bit of research.
Pins 1...9 and 11 of the GAL are input only. What we have there... 😕

Pin 1 can be connected to /DACK1 or /DACK3 (DMA Acknowledge 1 or 3) via a jumper. So, GAL chip manages DMA operations.
Pins 2 and 3 get /IOW and /IOR signals respectively straight from the ISA bus. So GAL chip manages read/write options.
Pin 4 gets signal from jumper block right under the AY, and another side of that is connected to address decoder outputs 74HC138 (inputs of which are still not clear). That jumper block is selecting base address of the card I presume, so GAL gets general "card accessed" signal.
Pin 5 gets TC signal from the ISA bus. That is "Terminal count" and corresponds to DMA timer.
Pin 6 is connected somewhere... Trace can not be detected yet. 😢
Pins 7, 8, 9 and 11 are connected to A4, A2, A1 and A0 of the ISA bus. So, GAL also manages some part of LSB address decoding, probably separating access to AY and joystick ports.

Now the second part, pins 12...19, these can be programmed as inputs or as outputs.

Pins 12 and 13 are connected to inputs /CLR and CLK of the 74HC74 nearby, so those pins are definitely outputs.
Pin 14 is connected to A3 of the ISA bus, completing A0...A4 address decoding, so pin 14 is an input.
Pins 15...17 are connected somewhere... Traces can not be detected yet. 😢
But! There are traces from pins 15 and 16 that almost certainly go to inputs BDIR and BC1 of the AY chip, controlling its behavior (read/write/latch address). So those signals are like "AY /CS" and "AY /WR". And pins 15 and 16 probably are outputs for that matter.

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Pin 18 is connected to /OE input of one of the 74HC365s. So this pin is an output and probably is something like "Joystick CS".
Pin 19 is connected to LE input of the 74HC373. This pin is an output too.
I think that 74HC373 latches joystick states, because it is connected to D0...D7 of the ISA bus AND AY8930 is also connected to those with its DA0...DA7 directly, so 373 is doing nothing for AY. Also I've assumed some traces (very thin on the picture) under 74HC365 and 74HC373 for AY-ISA data connections, because part of those are clearly connected, so most probably all those 8 lines are connected:

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TL;DR
GAL gets signal about card's base address being accessed.
GAL manages LSB ISA address decoding, separating access between joystick ports and AY chip.
GAL manages read/write requests routing and controlling end-devices accordingly.
GAL manages DMA operations, but I'm not sure if DMA is used for access AY or joysticks or both.

Also I've recognized that AY's IOA pins are connected to two resistor-diode networks (IOA0...IOA3 to first, IOA4...IOA7 to second) of 10k - 20k - 39(~40)k - 82(~80)k outputs from which are smoothed out via capacitors and routed to LM13600 OPAMP. Curiously enough those signals are connected to "AMP BIAS" inputs. Is port A of the AY chip is used for 4-bit stereo volume control? Because doing rudimentary 4-bit DAC that way is... something. 😐

Total overview:

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New BIG soundcard: FMonster.
Covox Sound Master replica
Innovation SSI-2001 replica & DuoSID.
My audio/video collection.