VOGONS


First post, by vetz

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I've spent so much time trying to figure out what was what with the Realmagic cards so I made a list:

+----------------------------+----------------+-----------+--------+-------------------------------------------------+
| Name | Chip | PN | Form | Comment |
+----------------------------+----------------+-----------+--------+-------------------------------------------------+
| ReelMagic | EM7000/EM7010 | 53-000327 | ISA | |
| ReelMagic CD | EM7000/EM7010 | 53-000331 | ISA | Rebrand of 53-000327 |
| ReelMagic CD (Lite) | EM7000/EM7010 | 53-000366 | ISA | Sold as Lite. No CD connector, no daughterboard |
| ReelMagic 2 | EM7000/EM7010A | 53-000347 | ISA | 3 CD connectors, MIDI, recording |
| ReelMagic Lite | EM7000/EM7010A | 53-000362 | ISA | |
| RealMagic Nec PC98 | EM7000/EM7010A | 53-000372 | PC98 | |
| ReelMagic Lite rev2 | EM7000/EM7010A | 53-000387 | ISA | |
| RealMagic Rave | EM7010A | 53-000377 | VLB | PN not confirmed |
| RealMagic Lite NFC | EM7010A | 53-000417 | ISA | Maxima with 7010A chip. PN not confirmed |
| RealMagic Maxima | EM7011 | 53-000417 | ISA | Up to 1280x1024 MPEG scaling |
| RealMagic Ultra | EM7110 | 53-000467 | ISA | Optional TV output. Up to 1600x1200 scaling |
| RealMagic Maxima Pro | EM7110 | 53-000411 | ISA | Up to 1600x1200 scaling |
| ReelMagic Producer | CL-4000 | 53-000??? | PCI | MPEG Encoder card |
| RealMagic Explorer PCMCIA | EM7510 | ? | PCMCIA | Type II PCMCIA card |
| RealMagic PC-MPEG | EM8000 | 53-000491 | ISA | OEM only |
| RealMagic Netstream 1 | EM8010 | 53-000517 | ISA | |
| RealMagic Netstream 2 | EM7210 | 53-000537 | PCI | |
| RealMagic Hollywood | EM7210 | 53-000499 | PCI | No S/PDIF output or 3.5mm jack |
| RealMagic Hollywood 2 | EM7210 | 53-000511 | PCI | S/PDIF output + 3.5mm jack |
| RealMagic Hollywood Plus | EM8300 | 53-000519 | PCI | SGRAM |
| RealMagic Hollywood Plus | EM8300 | 53-000569 | PCI | DRAM, OEM (same as DXR3) |
| RealMagic Ventura | EM8210 | 53-000521 | PCI | VESA featureconnector OEM Only |
| RealMagic Ventura Plus | EM8220 | 53-000597 | PCI | VESA featureconnector OEM Only |
| RealMagic Ventura 2000 | EM8400 | 53-000647 | PCI | OEM Only, karaoke |
| RealMagic Dragon/Fullscreen| EM8220 | 53-000604 | PCI | OEM Only |
| RealMagic DVR | EM8300 | 53-000618 | PCI | |
| RealMagic Netstream 2000 | EM8400 | 53-000626 | PCI | |
| RealMagic Netstream 2000TV | EM8400 | 53-000613 | PCI | |
| RealMagic Netstream 4000 | EM8470 | 53-000694 | PCI | |
| RealMagic X-Card | EM8475 | 53-000661 | PCI | |
| RealMagic Melody | EM8470 | 53-000662 | PCI | OEM Only |
| RealMagic Symphony-2 | EM8475 | 53-000663 | PCI | OEM Only* |
+----------------------------+----------------+-----------+--------+-------------------------------------------------+
+----------------------------+----------------+-----------+--------+-------------------------------------------------+

*Part nr 53-000663 was sold with a variety of chips and functionality from 3rd parties in China, not all of them are Symphony-2

Supported games: Confirmed

1. Dragon's Lair.
2. Space Ace.
3. Return to Zork.
4. The Horde.
5. The Psychotron.
6. Entity.
7. Conspiracy.
8. Flash Traffic.
9. Silent Steel.
10. Prince Interactive.

Supported games: Unconfirmed (most likely numbers 13, 20, 25 were actually published)

11. 11th Hour.
12. Brain Dead at 13.
13. Cowboy Casino.
14. Crime Patrol.
15. Dragon's Lair II.
16. Dune.
17. Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers.
18. King's Quest VI.
19. Lord of the Rings.
20. Man Enough.
21. Police Quest 4.
22. Return to Cyber City.
23. Space Pirates.
24. Under a Killing Moon.
25. Video Cube - Space.

Thanks to Uka here on Vogons for gamelist.

I think I have managed to source almost all drivers (which I will attach to this thread and to vogonsdrivers), the only exception is:

- RealMagic Hollywood 2: Sigma Designs ONLY released driver updates on their website which required the drivers that came with the card. Looking for the original drivers/floppy images. (Already have the latest driver updates.)
- RealMagic Rave: All drivers missing.
- NKT_2_5_ME2.zip - NetStream 2000TV v2.5 application file for Win9x
- N2K_2_5ME2.zip - NetStream 2000 v2.5 application file for Win9x
- N4_2_2w2.zip - Netstream 4000 v2.2 application file for Win9x
- N4_2_2k2.zip - Netstream 4000 v2.2 application file for Win2k/XP (might be interchangeable with Win9x application since v1.0 have same filesize/CRC)
- XC_2_1W2.zip - Xcard v2.1 application file for Win9x
- vp122aw2.zip - Ventura Plus v1.22 application file for Win9x (the one available on the web is corrupted and cannot be restored).

If anyone else have anything to contribute, please do. I'll continue to edit this post with photos, drivers and more.

Attachments

  • Filename
    Reelmagic FAQ 1.03.txt
    File size
    59.74 KiB
    Downloads
    255 downloads
    File comment
    ReelMagic(TM) FAQ Guide by Gerard J. Pinzone Version 1.03 - June 3, 1994
    File license
    Public domain
Last edited by vetz on 2021-04-05, 16:27. Edited 37 times in total.

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Reply 1 of 70, by Stiletto

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Somewhere I have the original driver disc and manual for the REALmagic Hollywood Plus in case it helps.

"I see a little silhouette-o of a man, Scaramouche, Scaramouche, will you
do the Fandango!" - Queen

Stiletto

Reply 2 of 70, by vetz

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Stiletto wrote on 2020-11-09, 22:55:

Somewhere I have the original driver disc and manual for the REALmagic Hollywood Plus in case it helps.

Think I have them. The Hollywood Plus always had full drivers on the website so it's not that much of an issue, but I'm trying to collect all driver versions here so feel free to send it 😀

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Reply 3 of 70, by vetz

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Files on FTP in 1995, including Rave:

ravedos.zip -Rave, DOS Utilities & Drivers
raveins2.zip -Rave, Install Disk 2
realmg22.zip -RealMagic Lite & RealMagic 2.0 drivers, ver 2.20
rprod12b.zip -RealMagic Producer drivers 1.2 Beta 2
raveins1.zip -Rave, Install Disk 1
realm221.zip -RealMagic Lite & RealMagic 2.0 drivers, ver 2.21 beta 7
rprod113.zip -RealMagic Producer drivers 1.1.3

Later in 95, Windows 95 drivers were released as well for the Rave card (no known filenames). Sigma's website have no mention of the Rave card.

Last edited by vetz on 2020-11-11, 11:24. Edited 2 times in total.

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Reply 4 of 70, by vetz

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I had a look through my storage shed to find my RealMagic ISA card and I was 100% certain it was a Maxima or Lite. To my discovery it was NOT either of those, but a card that is not on the list.

IMG_20201110_160539.jpg
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PN 53-000387. I suspect this is either the ReelMagic 2 or a later revision of the ReelMagic Lite. I'm leaning more towards ReelMagic 2 since it has CD connections, even though they are not soldered to this card.

Also hard1k just sold his Rave card, but could try to contact the buyer next year when its out of storage, that is unless someone else discovers the drivers.

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Reply 5 of 70, by RichB93

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There's also a RealMagic Malibu which is an addon card for the Intel 740. I had one, and it's now in elianda's hands. He has a page on it here:

https://retronn.de/imports/hwgal/hw_intel_i74 … gns_malibu.html

Reply 6 of 70, by vetz

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RichB93 wrote on 2020-11-10, 16:05:

There's also a RealMagic Malibu which is an addon card for the Intel 740. I had one, and it's now in elianda's hands. He has a page on it here:

https://retronn.de/imports/hwgal/hw_intel_i74 … gns_malibu.html

Cheers. Sigma Designs outsourced their chipsets to OEMs and other brands/products, this is one of them. I'll try and focus on the RealMagic series products in the first post or else it will go completely overboard, but feel free to mention other products using the EM chip in this thread 😀

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Reply 7 of 70, by vetz

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Another drivercollection day . First and foremost looking for the latest drivers. Do anyone have:

NKT_2_5_ME2.zip - NetStream 2000TV v2.5 application file for Win9x
N2K_2_5ME2.zip - NetStream 2000 v2.5 application file for Win9x

N4_2_2w2.zip - Netstream 4000 v2.2 application file for Win9x
N4_2_2k2.zip - Netstream 4000 v2.2 application file for Win2k/XP (might be interchangeable with Win9x application since v1.0 have same filesize/CRC)

XC_2_1W2.zip - Xcard v2.1 application file for Win9x

and ofc as mentioned in first post:
- RealMagic Hollywood 1 and 2: Sigma Designs ONLY released driver updates on their website which required the drivers that came with the card. Looking for the original drivers/floppy images. Already have the driver updates.
- RealMagic Rave: All drivers missing.
- RealMagic Producer: All drivers missing

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Reply 8 of 70, by lolo799

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The Explorer is missing from your list.

rm-explorer.jpg
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rm-explorer.jpg
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https://web.archive.org/web/20010411112603/ht … gc/explorer.htm
Drivers for it and for the Producer are available at:
https://web.archive.org/web/20010409174153/ht … ort/drivers.htm

The card uses the EM7510 chipset:
http://www.mosarca.com/MMINFO/SIGMA1.HTM
Clones of that card were also sold by Kingmax as the "Scenic Wonder" and by other brands as well.
https://web.archive.org/web/19970110181821/ht … ourtyard/press/
https://web.archive.org/web/19970110182013/ht … e/explorer.html

PCMCIA Sound, Storage & Graphics

Reply 10 of 70, by vetz

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Managed to acquire:

- Hollywood 1 driver and app as well as the driver update file.
- Ventura driver and app
- Producer drivers
- MultiMode 120 drivers (early Sigma Designs graphic card)

Hollywood 2 still missing (except the driver update file), but I've contacted MrGlasspoole who claimed he received these drivers from Sigma Designs in 2011, hopefully he still has them.

Squallstrife have created a separate "Sigma Designs" category on Vogonsdrivers where all these files will be uploaded.

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Reply 11 of 70, by vlask

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You seems to be missing at last one of their graphics cards 😀
http://vgamuseum.info/index.php/cards/item/38 … realmagic-64-gx
I know that your list seems to be aimed at video accelerators, but this one has realmagic in name too...
They did some older products too, but not with this marking....

Not only mine graphics cards collection at http://www.vgamuseum.info

Reply 12 of 70, by 386SX

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Great list for these great products! I was always a fan of these cards. Beside the VGA cable problem imho both cause too thin and also the concept itself, the Hollywood Plus was capable of a great decoding quality but most important smoothness/stability considering how slow were the requirements for it to work.
Too bad they didn't go for some digital composition logic to mantain the video card quality and adding the decoder output. Maybe with the DVI connection cause the classic old style feature connector I remember having difficult time to work with.

Reply 13 of 70, by vetz

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vlask wrote on 2020-11-20, 08:04:

You seems to be missing at last one of their graphics cards 😀
http://vgamuseum.info/index.php/cards/item/38 … realmagic-64-gx

I'm aware, will be included with the drivers, but not sure how to include it with the list above. Need to read more if they only sold the chip to OEMs or actually produced their own cards.

386SX wrote on 2020-11-21, 15:35:

Great list for these great products! I was always a fan of these cards. Beside the VGA cable problem imho both cause too thin and also the concept itself, the Hollywood Plus was capable of a great decoding quality but most important smoothness/stability considering how slow were the requirements for it to work.
Too bad they didn't go for some digital composition logic to mantain the video card quality and adding the decoder output. Maybe with the DVI connection cause the classic old style feature connector I remember having difficult time to work with.

I think they ditched the VESA feature connector as it had too many compatibility problems. If you search on Google Groups or read Sigma's readme.txts you see they mention it alot. Only a few selected cards worked. Reading older reviews of the Xcard (from 2002) you see they mention the same thing regarding VGA connection. I think there just wasn't any good business case to move to DVI, CPUs and computers were getting to the point that dedicated decoding cards made little sense, also the GPUs could handle much of it.

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Reply 14 of 70, by RichB93

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I had a Hollywood 2 at one point, and frankly the quality was awful. But on the flip side, the quality of the Hollywood+ was outstanding, with the composite/s-video out being fantastic, easily matching the very best DVD players - it was much sharper than any TV-out from a graphics card at the time. It was also great as someone wrote a DivX player that used the card for playing DivX videos to the TV using the card.

I seem to recall using it in a number of machines, from a Pentium 133MHz Apricot MS540, all the way through to a P3. At that time software/GPU assisted decoding was already a thing, but the Hollywood still did it better. Great cards for sure.

Reply 15 of 70, by vetz

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RichB93 wrote on 2020-11-22, 03:23:

I had a Hollywood 2 at one point, and frankly the quality was awful. But on the flip side, the quality of the Hollywood+ was outstanding, with the composite/s-video out being fantastic, easily matching the very best DVD players - it was much sharper than any TV-out from a graphics card at the time. It was also great as someone wrote a DivX player that used the card for playing DivX videos to the TV using the card.

I seem to recall using it in a number of machines, from a Pentium 133MHz Apricot MS540, all the way through to a P3. At that time software/GPU assisted decoding was already a thing, but the Hollywood still did it better. Great cards for sure.

Interesting that you owned a Hollywood 2, I take it you don't still have the drivers? The Hollywood 1/2 was products that was not long on the marked before it was superseeded by the much better (and popular) Hollywood Plus.

I've acquired the Xcard so looking forward to test the Divx capabilities on the card (as well as the DVD quality)

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Reply 16 of 70, by 386SX

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vetz wrote on 2020-11-21, 20:05:
I'm aware, will be included with the drivers, but not sure how to include it with the list above. Need to read more if they only […]
Show full quote
vlask wrote on 2020-11-20, 08:04:

You seems to be missing at last one of their graphics cards 😀
http://vgamuseum.info/index.php/cards/item/38 … realmagic-64-gx

I'm aware, will be included with the drivers, but not sure how to include it with the list above. Need to read more if they only sold the chip to OEMs or actually produced their own cards.

386SX wrote on 2020-11-21, 15:35:

Great list for these great products! I was always a fan of these cards. Beside the VGA cable problem imho both cause too thin and also the concept itself, the Hollywood Plus was capable of a great decoding quality but most important smoothness/stability considering how slow were the requirements for it to work.
Too bad they didn't go for some digital composition logic to mantain the video card quality and adding the decoder output. Maybe with the DVI connection cause the classic old style feature connector I remember having difficult time to work with.

I think they ditched the VESA feature connector as it had too many compatibility problems. If you search on Google Groups or read Sigma's readme.txts you see they mention it alot. Only a few selected cards worked. Reading older reviews of the Xcard (from 2002) you see they mention the same thing regarding VGA connection. I think there just wasn't any good business case to move to DVI, CPUs and computers were getting to the point that dedicated decoding cards made little sense, also the GPUs could handle much of it.

Yeah I suppose the vesa feature connector has always been a problem. I remember testing another DVD decoder card the C-Cube ZiVA 3.0 with that cable and only a single card of the many I tested was able to run a dvd with period correct monitor settings (like 1024x768 32bit) and was a Voodoo3. Probably that idea worked better with older cards/logic that were oriented for older o.s. like Win 95 and maybe older drivers design, who knows.
There were also some X-Card version that had that VESA connector installed (while mine has it desoldered by factory). Soon I suppose I'll test the X-Card again with classic 15" LCD 4:3.
From my experience anyway if anyone might test a Hollywood + card the main vga it's better to have the best vga output out there and imho my choice would go for a Matrox G450 or G550. Too bad that the original H+ vga cable was really thin while I remember the X-Card package having a better larger vga cable (even if the X-Card logic itself of switching the input/output like the Voodoo cards sort of did, was already a good solution at the big cost of loosing the windowed mode).
About the H+ cards it's also interesting that Creative solutions designed around the same layout had various revisions of it but if I've to say of the various I've tried seems like the original H+ still had the "best" vga processing quality, mantaining "most" of the original vga output and without interferences or noise that with most LCDs were amplified awfully. I don't know if it's cause some capacitors might be gone or what but I've like four different Dxr3 cards with four different final quality.
About the Divx capabilities of the X-Card, I remember it had some limited choice of Divx encoding modes to decode but I never tested it enough.

Last edited by 386SX on 2020-11-22, 14:16. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 17 of 70, by vetz

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386SX wrote on 2020-11-22, 14:06:

There were also some X-Card version that had that VESA connector installed (while mine has it desoldered by factory).

Do you have more information on this? From all my research the last card with VESA connector was the Ventura Plus from 1998 using the EM8220 chip.

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  • venplus.gif
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    venplus.gif
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    29.07 KiB
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Last edited by vetz on 2020-11-22, 14:39. Edited 1 time in total.

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Reply 18 of 70, by 386SX

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vetz wrote on 2020-11-22, 14:15:
386SX wrote on 2020-11-22, 14:06:

There were also some X-Card version that had that VESA connector installed (while mine has it desoldered by factory).

Do you have more information on this? From all my research the last card with VESA connector was the Ventura Plus from 1998 using the EM8220 chip.

I don't remember where but I saw some cards having it installed in the past online reviews and images and clearly the X-Card original layout PCB had it, maybe just some OEM models oriented design or some third party manufacturer. I saw some chinese version of it were released and I suppose was the original X-Card latest chipset (with a heatsink on it, needed I'd say cause it really heat up a lot).

EDIT: for example
http://www.vgamuseum.info/index.php/news/item … ealmagic-em8475
or
https://www.mini-itx.com/reviews/xcard/

I wish I had that layout (I suppose is the Rev. S2) to test that digital output connector that I suppose it's simply an old style feature connector (?). But I imagine also they might have removed it for the same reasons other cards didn't use it anymore, not even video cards themself had it at some point in the early 2000's. Compatibility problems maybe..

Reply 19 of 70, by vetz

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The chinese product you're mentioning is an OEM product sold as Symphony 2 (53-000663), atleast the one with VGA connector. I have not been able to source any drivers for this card and the sellers online does not include them from what I've seen. There are two versions out there with same PN number, one with no VGA connector (EM8401/EM8471 chip for use in karaoke machines) and one with VGA connector and EM8475 chip.

The manual only mentions the following with the digital video connector:

"Digital Video output header (future feature)"

Last edited by vetz on 2020-11-22, 14:48. Edited 1 time in total.

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