I had one of these, down to the same box and bundled software. I cost about 100 CAN$ or so in 1992 or 1993 . It was my first sound card.

It identified as DSP version 2.01 Sound Blaster (non pro), AFAICR . It had an OPL2 clone chip onboard to complete things. Sound Blaster compatibility was pretty much perfect, AFAICR .

I do remember that playback 44.1KHz, obviously 8-bit and in mono, did work. Recording topped of at maybe 15360Hz (I could be off on that as it has been 30 years).

Ooh it's the same as my Anchor Electronics Media Concept 2.0 card. Thank you very much for scanning and sharing the manual, there are some connectors that I don't know what they do and the text manual version I could find was missing that. Here's my thread on it: Anchor Electronics - Media Concept 2.0 Souncard - SB 2.0 clone with real OPL2

This card is essentially a 100% Sound Blaster 2.0 clone, you can put the CMS chips and GAL into the U18/U19/U15 slots for CMS support which I've done on mine. The SC801 and SC802 chips are funny packaged clones of the YM3812 and the DAC, to the point where I've replaced the SC802 DAC on mine with an original Yamaha part because it failed.

Something that isn't well known, I think, is that the contents of the DSP chip on this card are what the Snark Barker project includes in its release files, since the DSP chip wasn't read-out protected and it's not Creative's code.

darry wrote on 2022-11-01, 19:25:

I had one of these, down to the same box and bundled software. I cost about 100 CAN$ or so in 1992 or 1993 . It was my first sound card.

It identified as DSP version 2.01 Sound Blaster (non pro), AFAICR . It had an OPL2 clone chip onboard to complete things. Sound Blaster compatibility was pretty much perfect, AFAICR .

I do remember that playback 44.1KHz, obviously 8-bit and in mono, did work. Recording topped of at maybe 15360Hz (I could be off on that as it has been 30 years).

Nice, thanks for the info. Not sure yet what to do with this card, gonna see if I have a suitable pc for it within or near it's time period.

Thermalwrong wrote on 2022-11-01, 23:48:

Ooh it's the same as my Anchor Electronics Media Concept 2.0 card. Thank you very much for scanning and sharing the manual, there are some connectors that I don't know what they do and the text manual version I could find was missing that. Here's my thread on it: Anchor Electronics - Media Concept 2.0 Souncard - SB 2.0 clone with real OPL2

This card is essentially a 100% Sound Blaster 2.0 clone, you can put the CMS chips and GAL into the U18/U19/U15 slots for CMS support which I've done on mine. The SC801 and SC802 chips are funny packaged clones of the YM3812 and the DAC, to the point where I've replaced the SC802 DAC on mine with an original Yamaha part because it failed.

Something that isn't well known, I think, is that the contents of the DSP chip on this card are what the Snark Barker project includes in its release files, since the DSP chip wasn't read-out protected and it's not Creative's code.

Np, glad it can be to use. Could you please point me out where to either buy the chips pre-programmed or blank if it's possible to program them myself, thanks. I am about to do some digging and have found some threads and perhaps some drama about the chip and cms already. Monkey Island sounds nice with cms from what I've found on youtube.

Nice info, i checked eBay and there's a Snark Barker card, quite pricey at 120EUR. I am looking for a Roland RAP-10 since I got the the original box and manuals etc. Will probably cost an arm or leg with these prices.

Yeah the Roland cards got somewhat pricey in the last few years. 😀

The Snark Barker or CT1320 reproduction cards cost a fair bit because of the number of separate components and they're all hand-made if you see one for sale. I've built a couple and it's not easy.

For the CMS sound chips, my MF-002 card has a GAL16V8D on it that I think I got from ebay new-old-stock. Then I programmed it with my TL866 using the .JED files that Necroware on Youtube / Scorp on here shared: https://github.com/necroware/sbcms/releases/tag/20190410.
If you don't have a TL866, it's probably best to buy one of the kits on ebay that includes the programmed GAL and the two SAA1099P chips
It also requires changing a jumper setting that puts the chip select lines to the GAL instead of direct to the FM chip.

Thermalwrong wrote on 2022-11-02, 16:26:

Yeah the Roland cards got somewhat pricey in the last few years. :) […]
Show full quote

Yeah the Roland cards got somewhat pricey in the last few years. 😀

The Snark Barker or CT1320 reproduction cards cost a fair bit because of the number of separate components and they're all hand-made if you see one for sale. I've built a couple and it's not easy.

For the CMS sound chips, my MF-002 card has a GAL16V8D on it that I think I got from ebay new-old-stock. Then I programmed it with my TL866 using the .JED files that Necroware on Youtube / Scorp on here shared: https://github.com/necroware/sbcms/releases/tag/20190410.
If you don't have a TL866, it's probably best to buy one of the kits on ebay that includes the programmed GAL and the two SAA1099P chips
It also requires changing a jumper setting that puts the chip select lines to the GAL instead of direct to the FM chip.

Ahh, I see, well then of course the price reflects the hard work of course.

Thanks sounds great, I'll look into it to it. I also saw that video on YouTube by Necrowave.

Also, i've added some scans by a request of konc, I hope you see this I cannot yet reply via PM yet.

Loganix wrote on 2022-11-10, 17:33:

Also, i've added some scans by a request of konc, I hope you see this I cannot yet reply via PM yet.

yay thank you very much for this!

I posted about its younger brother, the "baby boomer" around ten years ago here.

Like @darry, I'm also in Canada... So these must have been brought over here somewhat exclusively by an importer.

mockingbird wrote on 2022-11-10, 21:20:

I posted about its younger brother, the "baby boomer" around ten years ago here.

Like @darry, I'm also in Canada... So these must have been brought over here somewhat exclusively by an importer.

I can tell you where I got mine.

It was at a store named Compumax inside a mall (Mail Carnaval) in Greenfield Park, province of Quebec, Canada .

The store closed years ago and though the mall still exists, the segment where the store was located was torn down at some point. Grass grows on that spot now.

I still remember the name of the I person I believe was the owner . According to Google, that person passed away in 2018. 🙁

Probably TMI.

darry wrote on 2022-11-10, 23:30:

I can tell you where I got mine. […]
Show full quote

I can tell you where I got mine.

It was at a store named Compumax inside a mall (Mail Carnaval) in Greenfield Park, province of Quebec, Canada .

The store closed years ago and though the mall still exists, the segment where the store was located was torn down at some point. Grass grows on that spot now.

I still remember the name of the I person I believe was the owner . According to Google, that person passed away in 2018. 🙁

Probably TMI.

Thanks for that... Personally, I dealt with distributors and not retailers, but I can't for the life of me remember which one sold it to me... The main hub here in the GTA for Taiwanese goods back in the 80s and 90s was in Markham, Ontario, where all the Cantonese ex-pats lived. We had new distributors regularly set up shop overnight, but most of them were fly-by-night operations. I must have dealt with at least a dozen of them.

I'm pretty sure I still have the invoice buried here somewhere... I'm also pretty certain I sold a Master Boomer at least once or twice.

mockingbird wrote on 2022-11-10, 21:20:

I posted about its younger brother, the "baby boomer" around ten years ago here.

Like @darry, I'm also in Canada... So these must have been brought over here somewhat exclusively by an importer.

These were also sold in Europe, at least in UK and Greece that I'm aware of. So probably they were sold in many more places than we think, but in small numbers since they're not that well known.

I never knew about its younger brother, but I had its older brother called Master Boomer II. Unfortunately what's left of it are only the driver disks (shared and added to vogonsdrivers).

Thermalwrong wrote on 2022-11-01, 23:48:

Ooh it's the same as my Anchor Electronics Media Concept 2.0 card. Thank you very much for scanning and sharing the manual, there are some connectors that I don't know what they do and the text manual version I could find was missing that. Here's my thread on it: Anchor Electronics - Media Concept 2.0 Souncard - SB 2.0 clone with real OPL2

This card is essentially a 100% Sound Blaster 2.0 clone, you can put the CMS chips and GAL into the U18/U19/U15 slots for CMS support which I've done on mine. The SC801 and SC802 chips are funny packaged clones of the YM3812 and the DAC, to the point where I've replaced the SC802 DAC on mine with an original Yamaha part because it failed.

Something that isn't well known, I think, is that the contents of the DSP chip on this card are what the Snark Barker project includes in its release files, since the DSP chip wasn't read-out protected and it's not Creative's code.

yep, "92 Anchor Electronics Co.," in the firmware. Does anyone know anything about Anchor Electronics Co.? All I could find were
- one in Taiwan https://fccid.io/J98
- one in Singapore https://opengovsg.com/corporate/197900646H incorporated in 1979
- Chinese https://www.everychina.com/buy/c-za92d69/p-zh … ics_co_ltd.html but it seems to have been created in 1998 so not it
- US https://www.linkedin.com/company/anchor-electronics founded in 1974, but afaik they wouldnt call themselves "Co."
- Taiwan https://cn.linkedin.com/in/victor-chen-57b3b754 "1988~1989: Founder and Manager of Sweet Anchor Electronics Co., Ltd. Small electronics subcontract factory."

It looks like they fully reverse engineered SB 2.0 in 1992 down to cloned Adlib chips.

Interesting ! Found one website that listed: Anchor Electronics Company, Manufacture (s) sound cards but nothing to an old website
The fcc id lead me to Princeton Tech who made some audio IC's. One interesting thing is that the FCC register gives same date of register and city for Anchor Electronics (Taiwan https://fccid.io/J98 thanks for checking rasz_pl) and Princeton Technology

FCC for "J5QMF-002. 1992-09-02 DSP/Sound Card, Original Equipment
"Company Name - Princeton Technology Corp. Taiwan. Manufacture (s) sound cards
Home Page Princeton Technology Corp. Home Page " archived: http://web.archive.org/web/19980216184336/htt … m.tw/PTCtoc.htm
some audio stuff: http://web.archive.org/web/19980216184336/htt … m.tw/PTCtoc.htm
Interesting that many of their datasheets are archived, but no older than mid-1990's: http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.princ … w/pdfile/audio/*
Too bad they wiped/masked some of the original IC names off the sound card as it would have been fun to research them with other info....
added: makes me wonder if the fcc for J98MF-002, 1992-12-21 is related to the J5QMF-002. 1992-09-02... just thinking out loud ;p

Princeton Tech (PTC) is huge. I first learned about them in ~2002 when designing audio frontend and using their mux chip PT2322. They definitely could have dabbled in cloning Yamaha OPL2 in early nineties just to test new market.

Michal Necasek has an article about OPL3 clones http://www.os2museum.com/wp/opl3-copies/ but no clues as to origins/sources 🙁

mockingbird wrote on 2022-11-10, 21:20:

I posted about its younger brother, the "baby boomer" around ten years ago here

"Baby Boomer" Re: AdLib has become oh so rare!!!

is it really J5QMF-001? worthpoint archived Ebay picture of "ADLIB CLONE CARD J5QMF-001" and it uses 14 pin DAC/28pin YM3812 just like Master Boomer:

looks like maybe less advanced/cost optimized earlier version?

Ahh fascinating !! and Thanks for the Opl3 clones link, never read that before.

rasz_pl wrote on 2022-11-13, 07:57:

is it really J5QMF-001? worthpoint archived Ebay picture of "ADLIB CLONE CARD J5QMF-001" and it uses 14 pin DAC/28pin YM3812 just like Master Boomer:

https://www.vogons.org/thumbs/35901_2b4d1345409a8236f4cbec2b0cd33087/adlib-clone-card-j5qmf-001_1_86f691ac20ac40fd19e112cc3f2f56 […]
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looks like maybe less advanced/cost optimized earlier version?

I have one of those, the ebay seller I got it from said it was a "Sun Moon Star Adlib clone". I'm guessing thats the computer it came out of, I know they made 286 & 386 computers.

Mine didnt have a sticker on it but I see @ https://collection.batyra.pl/soundcards/adlib … e2#&gid=1&pid=1 that one has a sticker that says MF-001 though all the other ones I have seen are like mine without the JP1 & JP2 pins and without any kind of label at all. Only the FCC visible on the pcb.