I have an IBM Aptiva PIII-800 with a GF256 and no ISA slots, and i would like to add a proper sound card to it. I am looking for something that came out before 2000, and preferably has HW acceleration of some kind, like Direct audio, EAX, A3D etc. DOS compatibility is of lower priority.
Any suggestions besides a Sound Blaster Live, or are there any Sound Blaster Live models which are better than others?
The best Live that was released before 2000 was the Live! Platinum. The model number is CT4760P. I'm not sure if that is actually the model number on the card or if it is just CT4760 as there were different packages with CT4760 cards. The last letter may just denote what software and accessories was included.
Edit: From what I can find, as long as you get the CT4760, you should be good. /Edit
you can go here to see a list for the different model numbers for Creative cards:
http://www.ask.asia.creative.com/wwenglish/ge … _list_audio.htm
If you want A3d, you will want to get an Aureal Vortex 2 based card though.
Yamaha YM724 cards like the waveforce 192xg are pre year 2000 and do directsound 3d, eax and have nice OPL3 and midi support.
might be worth checking out
Be aware that the WF192 doesn't have provisions for SPDIF, so please have a look at some of the other YMF7x4 cards as well.
All hail the Great Capacitor Brand Finder
Vortex 2 or SBLive. Ideally both because Live is useless for A3D 2.0 and Vortex 2 is the same for EAX.
I'm not sure any of the Live variants are truly worse or superior because I think they all have a relatively noisy main output due to poor design.
I haven't used the Yamaha card so don't know how well its EAX support works. Non-Creative cards sometimes don't sound quite right.
wrote:Vortex 2 or SBLive. Ideally both because Live is useless for A3D 2.0 and Vortex 2 is the same for EAX.
I'm not sure any of the Live variants are truly worse or superior because I think they all have a relatively noisy main output due to poor design.
I haven't used the Yamaha card so don't know how well its EAX support works. Non-Creative cards sometimes don't sound quite right.
Funny thing is, if you use the Audigy drivers on a Live, the output suddenly becomes clearer.
Thank you for the suggestions!
I have ordered a Waveforce card as its synth capabilities sound appealing along with its DirectAudio support - i dont use SPDIF anyway. If i can find a decently priced SB Live then i will probably get one of those too for proper EAX.
