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DOS32AWE - DOS/4G compatible DOS Extender with Sound Blaster AWEUTIL MIDI synthesizer support for Protected mode,VIASB

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Reply 160 of 286, by georgel

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Guys, great news. The SF2 to SBK (SF1) is now possible with Awave Studio from today!

Here is a link to a GM SF2 (Public domain) downloaded yesterday and its conversion to SBK for you to check the outcome:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1A9CHOk25I1Q4 … iew?usp=sharing

Markus (the author of Awave Studio) did a great job with humble logistic support from me in the last several weeks or so.

If you are interested I will convert your SF2 fonts to the corresponding SBKs (for free) let's say once per day I will devote time for this process. Just propose some ideas how to organize the procedure and exchange these relatively large files that do not fit here. Keep in mind that the soundfonts should fit your AWE card's RAM (e.g. max 28 MB)...

If you find problems feel free to report them.

Reply 162 of 286, by jheronimus

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georgel wrote on 2021-11-13, 20:23:

Guys, great news. The SF2 to SBK (SF1) is now possible with Awave Studio from today!

Markus (the author of Awave Studio) did a great job with humble logistic support from me in the last several weeks or so.

So cool! If it's not too much, could you ask Markus to take a look at SF2 to WFB conversion? There was a project for creating WFB soundfonts for Turtle Beach Tropez/Tropez Plus/Maui soundcards which involved Awave, but I think it failed because it didn't really work.

If you are interested I will convert your SF2 fonts to the corresponding SBKs (for free) let's say once per day I will devote time for this process. Just propose some ideas how to organize the procedure and exchange these relatively large files that do not fit here. Keep in mind that the soundfonts should fit your AWE card's RAM (e.g. max 28 MB)...

I think it would be useful to host them on Vogonsdrivers so that they don't get lost on Dropbox/Mega/etc. There are already some SBK soundfonts there.

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Reply 165 of 286, by badmojo

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maxtherabbit wrote on 2021-11-13, 22:23:

Please do Masterpiece.SF2. I can provide the file is needed. It's hands down the best soundfont that fits in the AWE64's memory (28MB)

+1

I was just thinking about messing around with my Goldfinch again!

Life? Don't talk to me about life.

Reply 166 of 286, by georgel

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maxtherabbit wrote on 2021-11-13, 22:23:

Please do Masterpiece.SF2. I can provide the file is needed. It's hands down the best soundfont that fits in the AWE64's memory (28MB)

Here you are:
EDIT: File replaced, new link is https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ubNOYgiBLk1h … iew?usp=sharing
Please note I don't have more than 8M for my AWE cards so far so this will be tested entirely by you 😀

Last edited by georgel on 2021-11-14, 13:11. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 167 of 286, by maxtherabbit

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georgel wrote on 2021-11-14, 01:47:
Here you are: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1w5nnqCM7F-_f … iew?usp=sharing Please note I don't have more than 8M for my AWE c […]
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maxtherabbit wrote on 2021-11-13, 22:23:

Please do Masterpiece.SF2. I can provide the file is needed. It's hands down the best soundfont that fits in the AWE64's memory (28MB)

Here you are:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1w5nnqCM7F-_f … iew?usp=sharing
Please note I don't have more than 8M for my AWE cards so far so this will be tested entirely by you 😀

Ok I tested it. First I loaded it in Windows 98 using the AWE Control Panel. It worked and most of the instruments sounded correct, however a couple of them sounded odd.

Then I rebooted into DOS and tried to load up the file using AWEUTIL /EM:GM with the file renamed to SYNTHGM.SBK. Unfortunately it just froze here and never loaded the file. I know large soundfonts can be quite slow to load so I waited a full 20 minutes before deciding it was locked up.

Reply 169 of 286, by schlomoe99

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georgel wrote on 2021-11-13, 20:23:

Guys, great news. The SF2 to SBK (SF1) is now possible with Awave Studio from today!

This is huge, it opens up whole new possibilities in DOS sound setups. Thanks for sharing and for volunteering your time!

Reply 170 of 286, by jesolo

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georgel wrote on 2021-11-13, 20:23:
Guys, great news. The SF2 to SBK (SF1) is now possible with Awave Studio from today! […]
Show full quote

Guys, great news. The SF2 to SBK (SF1) is now possible with Awave Studio from today!

Here is a link to a GM SF2 (Public domain) downloaded yesterday and its conversion to SBK for you to check the outcome:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1A9CHOk25I1Q4 … iew?usp=sharing

Markus (the author of Awave Studio) did a great job with humble logistic support from me in the last several weeks or so.

If you are interested I will convert your SF2 fonts to the corresponding SBKs (for free) let's say once per day I will devote time for this process. Just propose some ideas how to organize the procedure and exchange these relatively large files that do not fit here. Keep in mind that the soundfonts should fit your AWE card's RAM (e.g. max 28 MB)...

If you find problems feel free to report them.

There's a soundfont called "Scc1t2.sf2" that is apparently the closest in sounding like the Roland SC-55 (as it uses the SC-55 instrument samples).
Maybe this is worth a try? Only 4MB in size.

Reply 171 of 286, by georgel

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jesolo wrote on 2021-11-14, 08:48:

There's a soundfont called "Scc1t2.sf2" that is apparently the closest in sounding like the Roland SC-55 (as it uses the SC-55 instrument samples).
Maybe this is worth a try? Only 4MB in size.

Here you are https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ZIVOxoex9aIa … iew?usp=sharing

@maxtherabbit , the link to masterpiece has been updated, please check if it loads now with AWEUTIL. It should not take more time than the widows drivers load it. The problem is as far as I caught it so far with the names of the sound collection. Not clear when it works and when it doesn't. It is not the length but appears more often with longer names and once renamed to something simple it disappears. As the name is irrelevant for now the problem is not considered critical.

Reply 172 of 286, by Gmlb256

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georgel wrote on 2021-11-13, 20:23:

Guys, great news. The SF2 to SBK (SF1) is now possible with Awave Studio from today!

This is a great achievement for AWE cards in DOS! 👍

VIA C3 Nehemiah 1.2A @ 1.46 GHz | ASUS P2-99 | 256 MB PC133 SDRAM | GeForce3 Ti 200 64 MB | Voodoo2 12 MB | SBLive! | AWE64 | SBPro2 | GUS

Reply 175 of 286, by maxtherabbit

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georgel wrote on 2021-11-14, 13:41:

@maxtherabbit , the link to masterpiece has been updated, please check if it loads now with AWEUTIL. It should not take more time than the widows drivers load it. The problem is as far as I caught it so far with the names of the sound collection. Not clear when it works and when it doesn't. It is not the length but appears more often with longer names and once renamed to something simple it disappears. As the name is irrelevant for now the problem is not considered critical.

I'm sorry to say that nothing has changed

Reply 176 of 286, by georgel

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maxtherabbit wrote on 2021-11-14, 21:51:

I'm sorry to say that nothing has changed

Would you try this one https://drive.google.com/file/d/1R_ELkPfzKuR3 … iew?usp=sharing
If you remove the expanded memory manager and under clean DOS do you get "Divide overflow"error?

Gmlb256 wrote on 2021-11-14, 20:12:

Could the 8MBGM ENHANCED soundfont be converted to SBK?

Here it is https://drive.google.com/file/d/1HxWbQ3P5me7W … iew?usp=sharing

Reply 177 of 286, by maxtherabbit

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georgel wrote on 2021-11-14, 22:13:

Would you try this one https://drive.google.com/file/d/1R_ELkPfzKuR3 … iew?usp=sharing
If you remove the expanded memory manager and under clean DOS do you get "Divide overflow"error?

No change. I'm not using any expanded memory manager. No error message, machine just locks up when running AWEUTIL

Reply 178 of 286, by Gmlb256

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maxtherabbit wrote on 2021-11-14, 23:40:

No change. I'm not using any expanded memory manager. No error message, machine just locks up when running AWEUTIL

I've tested both Masterpiece and 8MBGM ENHANCED SBK soundfonts. For me it crashes with a divide error with AWEUTIL after some time passes and the computer locks up if I attempt to use the command prompt afterwards.

VIA C3 Nehemiah 1.2A @ 1.46 GHz | ASUS P2-99 | 256 MB PC133 SDRAM | GeForce3 Ti 200 64 MB | Voodoo2 12 MB | SBLive! | AWE64 | SBPro2 | GUS

Reply 179 of 286, by 640K!enough

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Not to rain on the parade, but you do realise that even SF2 doesn't encode all of the information used by more sophisticated synthesisers. Then, the older SBK format is even simpler, not encoding even all of the information in that format. That is to say, don't expect a perfect one-to-one conversion of the fancier banks (or data extracted from other synths), as the format and player software simply won't support it. There is much more to the sound of a particular synthesiser than just the raw sample data, and as a few here have learned the hard way, conversion isn't always so simple.