I've put one of these in a machine with SB16, but I can't tell whether it's being used or not.
The SB16 "speaker out" is connected to the Yamaha "line in", the speakers are connected to the Yamaha.
Games seem to sound the same as with just the SB16.
How can I tell if the Yamaha is working, and how do I make sure it gets used by games?
Running Windows 98.
Grateful for advice!
Play a midi file and disconnect the SB16 to the speakers. You will need to make sure that the SW60XG is properly setup in Windows, and it should have specific drivers (instead of the generic MPU-401 driver.) Interestingly, it even has drivers for Windows 2K/XP!
There is a potential resource conflict between the SW60XG and the SB16. Both have midi interfaces which default to I/O 330. Make sure that the SW60XG is set to 330 and set the SB16 to the alternate I/O 300.
Many thanks, that's worked - I can play a MIDI file either on the SB16 or the SW60XG [which sounds better].
Now I can't get music to play in Heretic - when I select "general MIDI" and the address 300, it tells me the MPU-401 device is in use... I guess it will play through the SB16 but I want to use the Yamaha to see if it's any different.
I see my device manager shows the SB16 [presumably the software syntesizer?], MIDI-out [the joystick port?], the Yamaha, and a Roland MPU401. What is the latter? Is it just the previous drivers for the Yamaha, or something on the SB16?
wrote:when I select "general MIDI" and the address 300, it tells me the MPU-401 device is in use...
Probably there still is some I/O address conflict. Which device do you currently have set to address 300h? And the message about the device being in use, did it come from Windows or Heretic?
wrote:What is the latter? Is it just the previous drivers for the Yamaha, or something on the SB16?
Maybe it is left over from a previous attempt to get the Yamaha card running. You could try to temporarily disable it in the Windows device manager. If that solves the problem, you can remove it from the list.
Right, got it. Deleted the MPU 401, and now the Yamaha works fine with Heretic [it was a Windows error message].
Now swapped the SB16 for an AWE64 Gold [cos I've bought the cables I needed] and it all seems to work fine. I can play MIDI through either AWE64 or the Yamaha, Heretic works. Even played a MIDI file while paying Quake [which I have never done before]. Heh heh, this is excellent. Now I can try to work out whether the AWE64 is better than the SB16 - it sounds a lot "duller" somehow - and whether the SW60XG/AWE64 combination is better or worse than an EWS64XL.
Many thanks!
Glad you got it working 😁
wrote:Now I can try to work out whether the AWE64 is better than the SB16 - it sounds a lot "duller" somehow
Strange - Normally SB16 are the "dull" sounding ones, at least when compared to a AWE64. If you route the AWE64 output through the SW60XG (this seems to be a very nice feature of that card, btw), playing around with the AWE64 mixer settings would perhaps help a bit - specifically the "output gain" setting comes into mind here...
wrote:and whether the SW60XG/AWE64 combination is better or worse than an EWS64XL.
A very interesting question, at least for me, because I have an unused EWS64XL (ver 1.2) lying around. I didn't try it out in my old gaming rigs yet. In terms of overall sound quality, the EWS certainly is superior, but I'm not so sure about using it for games (the card seems far too sophisticated for that purpose). Terratec claims it's SB Pro compatible, but no sign of a SB16 emulation, instead it has a WSS codec and a high-end MIDI synth. Tough decision 🤣
Yes, I had an EWS64XL in this machine before trying out the Yamaha. Wanted to be able to swap between the Terratec and an SB, but the machine actually would not boot with both of them in - didn't even get as far as Windows starting as I recall. And that's with the EWS set up to use different resources. So the setup [for this machine, which has only 2 ISA slots] is either EWS or Yamaha+SB.
My recollection is that the Terratec was good for the DOS/early Windows games I was using it for, and was very easy to set up.
wrote:If you route the AWE64 output through the SW60XG (this seems to be a very nice feature of that card, btw), playing around with the AWE64 mixer settings would perhaps help a bit - specifically the "output gain" setting comes into mind here...
Unfortunatelly SW60XG signal-to-nose ratio is incredible low even in comparision with SB16. This card is one big noise. 🙁
Nope, did not like the AWE64 Gold / SW60XG combination - the sound was seemed sort of rich but muffled. Have now gone back to the EWS64XL [but left the SW60XG in] - has the best sound for me I think.
Hmmm, seems I've got to try out the EWS64XL some day 😀
