Deksor wrote:

I wanted to try out the DOS mode of windows 9x, and so I wanted sound, so I installed the DOS driver. Under DOS, I run "setupds.exe" in order to configure it, but everytime I want to save, it says that it can't find the DMA 1 ... When I set IRQ on ISA or S-IRQ instead of "INTA#", it says the same thing, but with "IRQ 5" ... and I can't save the configuration, and so I don't have sound under pure DOS. I tried with EMM386.EXE launched and without it and it does the exact same thing.

This sound card works with DOS games under windows though (with the exact same settings which are address : 220, irq: 5 and dma : 1)

I presume you are using SB-Link?

A few things to try:

1) In your BIOS, reserve the IRQ and DMA you want to use for Sound Blaster settings (usually DMA 1, IRQ 5 or 7) and set them to 'Legacy' mode or something equivalent (i.e. not PnP). You can also change PnP OS to "No".

2) When using Setupds, disable *everything* when configuring and save settings.

3) Reboot, and initialise YMF using "Setupds /s", and this is with everything disabled.

4) Run Setupds again, and you should be able to change "S-IRQ" (if using SB-Link) and DMA mode to "PC/PCI". Test and save.

Alright, so I have a "PNP/PCI" tab in my bios where I can set "resources controlled by" to auto or manual. Obviously I set manual, which then leave me more options for IRQs or DMA. I've set IRQ5 and dma 1 to "legacy isa" instead of "pci/isa pnp". There is also "pci slot 4 use irq" that i've set to 5 because the pci slot where my card is plugged into is the 4th one.

Then I rebooted with everything disabled, started setupds /s, quit, restarted setupds, but when I want to save ... it still does the exact same thing ... I forgot earlier to mention that I can test the 16 bit and fm sound and that they work perfectly (not the 8 bit one though)

You want to change your PCI IRQ on slot 4 from IRQ 5 to something else that isn't used by Sound Blaster, e.g. IRQ 3 or 4 (ensure these are PnP). Rinse and repeat.

I've seen this issue before where settings cannot be saved. Can you confirm that you are using SB-Link? Ensure you run "Setupds /s" with everything disabled, and it's acknowledged in DOS that the settings are disabled.

What kind of motherboard are you using?

Yes, tell us what board you are using, including chipset.

Also, when troubleshooting, it would help to disable Serial and Parallel ports in BIOS as they can hog IRQs.

EDIT: Reminder to reset ESCD or equivalent in BIOS. It's usually found in the PnP IRQ/ DMA screen.

Tried that, didn't work ...
What is ESCD ? I didn't find anything in the bios that says "ESCD"

The board was manufactured by octek. According to the bios string, it's a DFI CB60-BX (I flashed the BIOS of that board on mine in order to have access to bigger drives and it worked perfectly, I never encountered any issues)
As you may have guessed, it has an i440BX chipset

And yes I'm using SB_link

However, how can I know if everything is disabled under MS-DOS ?
I removed pretty munch everything from autoexec.bat and config.sys

You can always try to change the FIRSTTRY value in DS.INI to 1 and reboot to automatically reconfigure (as I have suggested to others before). Just a shot in the dark. 😀

Uhm that was already set to 1 ...

However I tried to set 0 and after a reboot, when I tried setupds /s, instead of starting setupds just like if there was no "/s" parameter, it listed the configuration. But I still can't edit it. (the IRQ is 10 instead of 5)

I just tried doom without touching anything into the setup and it crashed. Before that it ran without sound. I think it's just due to the irq still being set to 10, but I didn't try that ...

I see. You can try to play around with the YMFIRQ utility to change IRQ before loading SETUPDS. http://vsynchmame.mameworld.info/ymf724_dos.zip

Deksor wrote:

Tried that, didn't work ... What is ESCD ? I didn't find anything in the bios that says "ESCD" […]
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Tried that, didn't work ...
What is ESCD ? I didn't find anything in the bios that says "ESCD"

The board was manufactured by octek. According to the bios string, it's a DFI CB60-BX (I flashed the BIOS of that board on mine in order to have access to bigger drives and it worked perfectly, I never encountered any issues)
As you may have guessed, it has an i440BX chipset

And yes I'm using SB_link

However, how can I know if everything is disabled under MS-DOS ?
I removed pretty munch everything from autoexec.bat and config.sys

The fix is easy, but I can't see what you've done.

Try what Kamerat has posted. If that doesn't work, then can you remove all cards except YMF and VGA, and print screens of your BIOS. Any screen that has an IRQ/ DMA setting, and I can talk you through this.

I tried that today ... Didn't work, "ymfirq 5" doesn't seem to change the card's irq ... setupds /s keeps saying that the irq is 10. However when puting irq 5 to pnp pci/isa in bios and irq 10 and 7 to legacy isa, it takes the 5th irq 😮
Same for dma.
The fm chip works with doom, but sfx don't (they're making a "transfer stack overflow"). And the game do not start

I will remove my cards and take photos of the bios later

Alright, I'm here all evening to answer questions.

BTW, please confirm that you have the SB_Link cable oriented and connected the correct way. You'll know this when you have S-IRQ and PC/PCI settings available to select in Setupds.

Thank you for devoting me your time 😊

So when I plugged my SB_link I remember that I double checked my connection with each pins on the sound card to be connected with each pins of the motherboard. The SB_link is a direct connection, right ? There are no twists in the wire inbetween the sound card and the board ?

And in setupds, I do have the S-IRQ and PC/PCI settings available, so with what you told me, I'm pretty sure that it's connected properly

Deksor wrote:

Thank you for devoting me your time 😊

So when I plugged my SB_link I remember that I double checked my connection with each pins on the sound card to be connected with each pins of the motherboard. The SB_link is a direct connection, right ? There are no twists in the wire inbetween the sound card and the board ?

And in setupds, I do have the S-IRQ and PC/PCI settings available, so with what you told me, I'm pretty sure that it's connected properly

Okay, it seems fine, although, I always have one 180 degrees twist with my cables. What version of Setupds are you using? The latest is 3.16, IIRC.

I don't know, but I got that from the "DSXGDOS.exe" driver from yamaha's website

You can confirm version when you run Setupds /s, it will show the version number in DOS. Also, whilst in Setupds, it will show version number somewhere at the top of the utility.

Ran setupds /s once again. I've got the latest version
Also, here is my bios :

Thanks, can you also post your BIOS screen where you change Serial/ Parallel IRQs, and also the BIOS screen where you change Power Management (ACPI) settings. I want to double check a few things.

Here they are 😀