That is quite some card, oldest Aztech I've seen...

It uses some weird components (that ST TDA7302 is a 4 (!) channel mixer with over half the pins unutilized), but I suspect that it will work fine as an SB1.x-clone without any drivers. You say "it always says, that the card hasn't been found" who/what says that?

Looking at the pic, the card is at I/O 220, IRQ7 and as there's no jumper for it, I guess hard-coded for DMA 1.

So, use SET BLASTER=A220 I7 D1 T1 and see what happens. Make sure you don't have anything (parallel port...) conflicting at IRQ7 - or set it to IRQ5 if that is free (and update the SET BLASTER appropriately)

dionb wrote on 2020-04-12, 21:09:

You say "it always says, that the card hasn't been found" who/what says that?

The driver installation program say that.

But I'll try to use SET BLASTER and let you know how it went.

There used to be some drivers / utilities for that card but I have so far been unsuccessful in finding them.

On sound-drivers.com, the file names were:
sgnx_1.rar
sgnx_2.rar

sgnx.zip
File contents of sgnx.zip were:

1 Length     Date   Time    Name
2 --------    ----   ----    ----
3   197697  04-14-92 16:05   EAR.LZH
4   579691  04-14-92 15:34   BB.LZH
5   352641  04-23-92 14:14   GMASTER.LZH
6    31256  08-31-89 11:38   LHARC.EXE
7   470146  05-27-92 09:17   MONOLOG.LZH
8   131943  04-14-92 16:08   NOTE.LZH
9     4639  07-02-92 09:46   README.DOC
10   147101  05-27-92 18:48   SONG.LZH
11   176702  07-02-92 10:15   UTILITY.LZH
12   171783  07-02-92 16:30   WINDOWS.LZH
13 --------                   -------
14  2263599                   10 files

So.. without the original software being available, it looks like the mixer will not be able to be used in DOS at least. Not sure about Windows.

There really shouldn't need to be any drivers in DOS, but the mixer would be useful to be able to set.

I was looking through the SDK and iot looks like any of the pre-compiled sample applications should work. OR at least there is detection code for the NX in the mixer code.

This also makes me think that the utility programs for say the NX II or NX Pro may work as well unless they had specific utilities for each model.

Looking at the install disks for the NX II, it looks like the NX II package may work for the NX according to what I am seeing in the Setup.inf file.

No matter what I do, bloody card doesn't work. Maybe it's dead.

What are the specs of the system you are trying it in? Does the power supply have -5v ?

Try running DEMOFM and see if you get any FM music. It doesn't require an IRQ or DMA, it directly accesses the port.
Aztech cards are notorious of checking the exact card the drivers were intended for.

cyclone3d wrote on 2020-04-13, 08:05:

What are the specs of the system you are trying it in? Does the power supply have -5v ?

It works! I tried different system, and it works there. First system I tried it in, was a BX chipset with PIII installed, now I've put it in an old 386 and it works like a charm.

Thanks everyone!

daikatana_ wrote on 2020-04-13, 11:41:

cyclone3d wrote on 2020-04-13, 08:05:

What are the specs of the system you are trying it in? Does the power supply have -5v ?

It works! I tried different system, and it works there. First system I tried it in, was a BX chipset with PIII installed, now I've put it in an old 386 and it works like a charm.

Thanks everyone!

Great news. Two reasons it didn't work in that BX system:

- onboard parallel port using IRQ7 almost certainly enabled
- if you have a board with PnP BIOS you need to reserve resources as "Legacy/non-PnP" for old non-PnP stuff like this - which you probably didn't do

There may have also been speed-related problems, but they usually present as distorted/missing sound, not completely failing to do anything - and -5V might have been an issue if your power supply was too new. Once again, full specs are very useful when you're asking for help...

When you say "it works!", what did you test?

This card does:
- AdLib compatible OPL2
- Sound Blaster 1.0 compatible DA
- Covox/Disney Sound Source compatible DA

According to reviews from 1992-ish, it was considered to sound better than the original Sound Blaster at OPL2 and DA, and with decent Covox too. The latter is of course the unique selling point vs other clones. I have a NXPro and it sounds pretty good (although support isn't wide enough to see it as more than a gimmic)

dionb wrote on 2020-04-13, 12:05:

Great news. Two reasons it didn't work in that BX system: […]
Show full quote

daikatana_ wrote on 2020-04-13, 11:41:

cyclone3d wrote on 2020-04-13, 08:05:

What are the specs of the system you are trying it in? Does the power supply have -5v ?

It works! I tried different system, and it works there. First system I tried it in, was a BX chipset with PIII installed, now I've put it in an old 386 and it works like a charm.

Thanks everyone!

Great news. Two reasons it didn't work in that BX system:

- onboard parallel port using IRQ7 almost certainly enabled
- if you have a board with PnP BIOS you need to reserve resources as "Legacy/non-PnP" for old non-PnP stuff like this - which you probably didn't do

There may have also been speed-related problems, but they usually present as distorted/missing sound, not completely failing to do anything - and -5V might have been an issue if your power supply was too new. Once again, full specs are very useful when you're asking for help...

When you say "it works!", what did you test?

This card does:
- AdLib compatible OPL2
- Sound Blaster 1.0 compatible DA
- Covox/Disney Sound Source compatible DA

According to reviews from 1992-ish, it was considered to sound better than the original Sound Blaster at OPL2 and DA, and with decent Covox too. The latter is of course the unique selling point vs other clones. I have a NXPro and it sounds pretty good (although support isn't wide enough to see it as more than a gimmic)

😀

It couldn't have been those things:

1. I set the card to IRQ5
2. I always disable LPT and COM ports in bios, because I almost never use them
3. I always reserve IRQ 5, 7 and 9 for ISA in BIOS

I tested the card in Gabriel Knight. Both, sound and music set to Sound Blaster.

Early Sound Galaxy cards are known to not function properly in fast systems (even on very fast 486 L1 cache WB systems). My Sound Galaxy Basic/Pro 16 (I38-MMSN810) sound card has the same problem.
These earlier models are better suited for older systems like the 386 you tested the card in.

jesolo wrote on 2020-04-13, 15:11:

Early Sound Galaxy cards are known to not function properly in fast systems (even on very fast 486 L1 cache WB systems). My Sound Galaxy Basic/Pro 16 (I38-MMSN810) sound card has the same problem.
These earlier models are better suited for older systems like the 386 you tested the card in.

I just wanted to test what you said, pulled out the fastest system I've got, which is Pentium 4 3.4GHz and it's working fine. Tested it in Gabriel Knight, Duke 2, Bioforge and I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream. All worked, except Scream, where I couldn't get the sound working.

Very interesting... guessing that P4 system has an ITE 8888 PCI/ISA bridge chip?

Speed sensitive sound cards is something I have been meaning to test on my industrial Pentium IV setups.

You're right, it has an ITE IT8888F.

Now I definitely want to test all my speed sensitive ISA sound cards in one of those systems.

I bet they are designed to not have the same issues as consumer boards do in order to work with everything.

Was thinking of selling some of my extra PIAGP stuff... but now I am not so sure I want to.