Which PCI Soundcard \ VOGONS

Which PCI Soundcard

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First post, by Almoststew1990

Posted on 2019-07-28, 10:41

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I've been "meh" about retro PCs for a while now, and have sold a load of my kit. But I've been tempted to get back into it and I like the more unusual approaches to retro gaming. I've bought a Via 800MHz C3 ITX soldered CPU motherboard thing and it has an PCI slot. I'll put my voodoo 3 in there for Windows 98 gaming and a PCI soundcard in there for DOS gaming.

I have a SB Live that "just works" (generally) but I want something different (and maybe a little unusual). I only need FM synthesis and normal SB pro or 16 support. GM would be a bonus. I've found:

Genius Soundmaker 32x2. This uses a FM801-AU chip. I can find very little about this on line! Any ideas what it is like?

Ensoniq ES1370 and 1371
many CT47xx 48xx
a few CT5803 and 5807
TYPHOON 94V-0 E229493
SIIG Soundwave IC-137012 SV750 (literally no idea what this is)

Reply 1 of 9, by Srandista

Posted on 2019-07-28, 10:51

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I would go for ESS Solo-1 or Yamaha YMF-724/744.

Socket 775 - ASRock 4CoreDual-VSTA, Pentium E6500K, 4GB RAM, Radeon 9800XT, ESS Solo-1, Win 98/XP
Socket A - Chaintech CT-7AIA, AMD Athlon XP 2400+, 1GB RAM, Radeon 9600XT, ESS ES1869F, Win 98

Reply 2 of 9, by dionb

Posted on 2019-07-28, 12:42

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C3-800?

Those things generally came with on-board Via audio with good DOS legacy support. Which southbridge does the board have? You might not need a PCI card with those requirements. That said, the ESS Solo-1 is a solid choice for compatibility and you won't beat the sound quality of the Yamaha, although it needs a big-ass TSR if you don't have SBLink.

Reply 3 of 9, by Almoststew1990

Posted on 2019-07-30, 08:48

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It has a CN400 chipset and comes with a VIA VT1617A for audio. So this might be OK for DOS audio?

Reply 4 of 9, by chinny22

Posted on 2019-07-30, 09:40

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I'd skip the Ensoniq ES137x cards, the experience will be almost identical to a Live. DOS uses the same drivers but emulates SB Pro rather then SB16. Windows you don't get EAX and dont think any soundfont equivalents (ecw) exist accept the default 2, 4, 8MB ones

Reply 5 of 9, by LightStruk

Posted on 2019-07-30, 14:15

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Another vote for YMF724 or YMF744. 100% SB Pro 2.0 compatible with a real OPL3 (not emulated or reimplemented) inside, plus multiple ways to get full DOS support (DDMA / SBLINK / TSR). Nice wavetable MIDI too.

Reply 6 of 9, by gdjacobs

Posted on 2019-07-30, 19:28

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LightStruk wrote:
100% SB Pro 2.0 compatible with a real OPL3.

Compatibility is good, but not 100%.

LightStruk wrote:
Nice wavetable MIDI too.

It's a software based emulator which may use some hardware functions (information is unclear on this). Windows only. For full hardware wavetable, you need something plugged into the game port.

It's a nice card, but I don't think it's necessary to dress it up as more than it really is.

All hail the Great Capacitor Brand Finder

Reply 7 of 9, by dionb

Posted on 2019-08-01, 13:06

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Almoststew1990 wrote:
It has a CN400 chipset and comes with a VIA VT1617A for audio. So this might be OK for DOS audio?

That's the northbridge (CN400) and AC97 codec (VT1617A). What's the southbridge? If VT82C686B or VT8231 you should be in luck, if VT8233 or above less so and you need a PCI card.

Reply 8 of 9, by LightStruk

Posted on 2019-08-01, 13:58

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gdjacobs wrote:
It's a software based emulator which may use some hardware functions (information is unclear on this). Windows only. For full hardware wavetable, you need something plugged into the game port.

You're correct, it's not a full hardware wavetable implementation. Perhaps the most accurate way to describe it would be "hardware assisted." According to the YMF744 datasheet, it has

PCI Audio block allows Software Driver to handle maximum of 73 concurrent audio streams with the Bus Master DMA engine. The PCI Audio Engine converts the sampling rate of each audio stream and the streams are mixed without utilizing the CPU or causing system latency. By using the Software Driver from YAMAHA, PCI Audio provides 64-voice XG wavetable synthesizer with Reverb and variation. It also supports DirectSound hardware accelerator, Downloadable Sound (DLS) and DirectMusic accelerator.

In other words, there's hardware mixing and hardware sample rate conversion. It would be interesting to compare the CPU load of running YAMAHA's XG software synth on a YMF724/740/744/754 versus an AC'97 codec running the same synth. I would bet the YAMAHA cards leverage the hardware mixer to combine the individual notes.

Reply 9 of 9, by Kamerat

Posted on 2019-08-01, 16:40

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The SIIG Soundwave IC-137012 SV750 should be using the Avance Logic ALS4000 that support both SB PRO and SB 16. Should run nice on VIA chipsets, use the third party initializer from this site: http://vsynchmame.mameworld.info/

DOS Sound Blaster compatibility: PCI sound cards vs. PCI chipsets
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