pan069 wrote on 2023-04-04, 21:06:

I myself made the journey from the internal, to the rear end bracket to the front loading CF adaptor. I have a few of them in some machines. Too bad they don't come in beige but I guess it's nothing that a can of spray paint can't fix. The front panel on these things is even textured like to good 'ol days... 😀

Heh, I had briefly considered a rear bracket type CF adapter. However, this rig sits on the floor, under a desk, so that would still make switching cards feel like a chore. This is why I decided to shell out some extra cash for the front loading model. I'm not that young anymore, and I deserve some creature comforts. 😁

Oh, and in case anyone's wondering why I even need separate DOS and Win95 installs, the answer is simply nostalgia. My very first PC was similar to this one, and it came with DOS 6.22 + Win3.11 so those are a must have for me. Later on, I upgraded to Win95 in order to play newer games, so I associate this rig with that OS as well.

So I got this Yamaha YMF719E-S a while ago, and I've been testing it a bit over the last couple of months. I was initially hesitant to do the low-pass filter mod as per these instructions by James-F. My soldering skills are fairly basic, and I was worried about damaging the card in the process. Today, after a bit of practice, I finally made the attempt, and I'm pleased to say that it was successful!

This is my first time soldering SMD components, and the results are not pretty by any stretch of the imagination. But the mod was does work, which is the important thing. 😀 I've made a few recordings showcasing the low-pass filter in action, and also comparing it to the output of my AWE64 Gold:

King's Quest VI voice samples:

I have to say, I greatly prefer the YMF719 with the low-pass filter enabled for games from this time period. It just makes the voices smoother and more pleasant to the ear. The AWE64 Gold uses a different, dynamic filter (just like all SB16 cards) and it doesn't sound quite right to me in this instance. Obviously, the AWE64 will be superior in newer games which use higher quality sound samples, but for old "talkie" adventure games from the early 90s, I prefer the SBPro style low-pass filter.

All in all, I will probably replace the OPTi 82C930 in this system with the newly modded Yamaha YMF719. The OPTi card is very nice and has served me well, but a fully PnP card like the YMF719 is slightly better for my particular use case.

EDIT - uploaded samples in FLAC format instead of MP3.

Yeah, that's substantial improvement for sure. While I had passingly noticed people mention the low pass filter in the past I had no idea it had that large impact!

And while your soldering may not be on par with factory automation, it's still pretty darn good to my eye for tiny surface stuff. Though I don't think I've got right to say anything about soldering to begin with, person holding a soldering iron by the tip.jpg

Sombrero wrote on 2023-04-12, 14:20:

Yeah, that's substantial improvement for sure. While I had passingly noticed people mention the low pass filter in the past I had no idea it had that large impact!

It's one of those things where once you hear it, you can never unhear it. 😀 Fortunately, there are many cheap sound cards which have the low-pass filter enabled out of the box, no mods required. Most OPTi and ESS cards are like that, for example.

Though I don't think I've got right to say anything about soldering to begin with, person holding a soldering iron by the tip.jpg

Heh, I wasn't much better until around 5-6 years ago. The desire to make my EU/PAL Sega Mega Drive region-free is what first got me into soldering. But I didn't work on SMD components until very recently. Watching a bunch of videos from Necroware and vswitchzero gave me the push to start practicing that more seriously. I highly recommend their channels, and both of them are members of this forum too.

I've re-uploaded the previous YMF719 and AWE64 filter recordings in FLAC format instead of using MP3. The lossy compression of the MP3 files made it more difficult to hear some of the more subtle differences between the filters. Also, here are some more recordings from another classic of the adventure genre:

Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis voice samples:

I think the filtering differences are even easier to spot in these examples.

I'm currently in the process of replacing my standard CF cards with industrial grade ones.

I didn't really have any issues with the standard cards, but I recently got a good deal for their industrial counterparts, so I figured why not. As before, the smaller 2 GB card will be used for MS-DOS 6.22, while the larger 16 GB one will host Windows 95 OSR 2.1.

Finally got around to taking some pics of this system with the new components installed.

Very happy with the modded YMF719 card. It's a real treat to play older DOS games on it.

Love it! Very nice and tidy PC with components that almost look like new - my favorite kind of build! 😁
One thing I'd recommend is a full PSU maintenance (including recap), or maybe replacing it altogether (any good modern PSU would be suitable, since this PC doesn't suck a lot of current from the 5V/3.3V rails).

bloodem wrote on 2023-09-12, 15:57:

Love it! Very nice and tidy PC with components that almost look like new - my favorite kind of build! 😁

Thanks! A few years back, I was very fortunate to get my AWE64 Gold and Voodoo1 locally, in mint condition, and for very little money. But nowadays, their prices have exploded even in my neck of the woods.

One thing I'd recommend is a full PSU maintenance (including recap), or maybe replacing it altogether (any good modern PSU would be suitable, since this PC doesn't suck a lot of current from the 5V/3.3V rails).

I got a couple of these LC Power PSUs from a local seller who refurbishes and tests them. I originally bought them because they still supply -5V and (seemingly) have a lot of amps on the 5V rail, which was desirable for my AthlonXP.

These PSUs have been working fine for me for the last couple of years, but I may replace this one at some point. Right now, I have no sound cards which need -5V, and I would greatly prefer the (nearly) silent operation of a modern PSU.

Made a few changes on the software side while reinstalling Win95. Previously, I was using DirectX 7.0a and the latest official Voodoo drivers v3.01.00. However, I noticed a few minor issues with that. First, the game Pandemonium! wouldn't recognize my Voodoo card during the installation process, so I had to manually copy over the relevant executable. Not a big deal, but still somewhat irksome. Second, the retail version of Unreal (without any patches applied) would crash on startup.

For that reason, I decided to try DirectX 5 and older Voodoo drivers this time around. I first installed the Voodoo drivers from this Diamond Monster 3D installation disc. After that, I applied the Glide 2.43 runtime update and then installed DirectX 5. Both of these are available on the Unreal CD, but I ultimately went for the slightly newer DirectX 5.2 which is archived here. I didn't install the full SDK, just the redistributable itself. And finally, here's the end result:

And what do you know, Pandemonium! now correctly detects the Voodoo card during installation, and unpatched Unreal works fine as well. Since I'm mostly playing early Win9x games on this system, I think I'll leave it like that.

I was playing around with the MT-32 emulation functionality of some of my sound cards/devices and made a few recordings. Of course, this is only useful for MT-32 games which don't use custom instruments, so I've chosen the Monkey Island intro for demonstration purposes.

• Sound Blaster AWE64 Gold (MT-32 mode)
• Sound Blaster PCI 128 (MT-32 mode)
• Sound Blaster Live! (MT-32 mode)
• Roland SC-155 (MT-32 mode)

Nowadays, there are much better ways of playing MT-32 games, but I thought it would still be interesting to see how these cards and devices from the 90s handled the task. I think the SBLive and the SB128 sound almost identical, probably because they use the same ECW sets in pure DOS. Of course, the Sound Canvas in MT-32 mode tops everything else.

I love how you built this system so versatile and so capable of running a wide range of games, both DOS and early Windows-games! Brilliant having two sound cards and in a way two video cards, all in one build!

hilram wrote on 2024-03-26, 15:18:

I love how you built this system so versatile and so capable of running a wide range of games, both DOS and early Windows-games! Brilliant having two sound cards and in a way two video cards, all in one build!

Thanks! 😀

I got inspired after watching this video by Phil which shows how a Pentium MMX works with SetMul, and explains how to use the various slowdown settings. It is indeed a very versatile platform.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2024-01-08, 17:23:

Made a few changes on the software side while reinstalling Win95. Previously, I was using DirectX 7.0a and the latest official Voodoo drivers v3.01.00. However, I noticed a few minor issues with that. (...)

but I ultimately went for the slightly newer DirectX 5.2 (...)

And what do you know, Pandemonium! now correctly detects the Voodoo card during installation, and unpatched Unreal works fine as well. Since I'm mostly playing early Win9x games on this system, I think I'll leave it like that.

Sensible choice. The first Vooodoo does not have built-in hardware-support for DX features beyond DX 3.0, and even the Voodoo 2 does not support features higher than 5.0.