Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2024-02-16, 10:13:

Small update: I was looking over the SBPCI.INI file to see if there are any other relevant settings for DOS gaming, when I notic […]
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Small update: I was looking over the SBPCI.INI file to see if there are any other relevant settings for DOS gaming, when I noticed this block:

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1; Switches - Self-Config, Sound Blaster emulation enable,
2; Joystick enable, CD-DA enable, MM KeyBd enable
3SelfConfig=true
4SBEnable=true
5JSEnable=true
6KBEnable=false

Nothing out of the ordinary right? Well, notice how the developer's comment mentions CD-DA yet there is no such option listed below. This made me curious, so I opened SBCFG.EXE using Norton Commander's viewer and found a reference to CDDAEnable right next to the other settings listed above. Then, I added that line to SBPCI.INI so that the relevant block now looks like this:

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1; Switches - Self-Config, Sound Blaster emulation enable,
2; Joystick enable, CD-DA enable, MM KeyBd enable
3SelfConfig=true
4SBEnable=true
5JSEnable=true
6CDDAEnable=true
7KBEnable=false

And sure enough, this made the card pull digital CD audio over the ATA interface in pure DOS! To make certain of this, I powered down the computer and physically disconnected the analog CD audio cable. Then, I powered the PC back on, started Tomb Raider and got CD music playing properly. Pretty cool, eh? If anyone's curious, here's how the card's initialization feedback looks when this setting is enabled:

SB128_Digital_CD.jpg

Unfortunately, this isn't perfect, as there is some distortion on the CD audio during heavy disk access. Also, a CD which contains audio tracks needs to be in the drive for the card to initialize correctly while this setting is enabled. Both of these issues make me think the developers chose to hide this option for a reason. Still, it's interesting that there's a sound card which can pull digital CD audio from the ATA interface in pure DOS.

Nice find! I wonder if that option exists in Live or even Audigy DOS drivers and whether it works any better or worse.

Additionally, I wondewonder if it might work better if the CDROM was run as a single drive on an IDE port rather than as a slave like in the config in your screenshot.

darry wrote on 2024-02-16, 14:47:

Nice find! I wonder if that option exists in Live or even Audigy DOS drivers and whether it works any better or worse.

I checked the Audigy DOS drivers, but unfortunately, the .INI file included there doesn't contain any of the parameters that are used by Audio PCI cards. In fact, the Audigy's .INI seems to serve a different purpose altogether, which is to identify chipsets that aren't compatible with Creative's DOS audio emulation. Despite sharing the same roots, it seems that Creative modified the SBLive/Audigy drivers far enough that they no longer recognize Audio PCI sound cards, and don't accept any .INI parameters related to them.

Additionally, I wondewonder if it might work better if the CDROM was run as a single drive on an IDE port rather than as a slave like in the config in your screenshot.

I wouldn't hold out much hope, since the developers removed the "CDDAEnable" parameter by default, and they probably had a good reason for that. Also, this only works in pure DOS. If you boot back into Win9x, the card's auto-config will always erase this parameter from the .INI file.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2024-02-16, 15:15:

I checked the Audigy DOS drivers, but unfortunately, the .INI file included there doesn't contain any of the parameters that are […]
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darry wrote on 2024-02-16, 14:47:

Nice find! I wonder if that option exists in Live or even Audigy DOS drivers and whether it works any better or worse.

I checked the Audigy DOS drivers, but unfortunately, the .INI file included there doesn't contain any of the parameters that are used by Audio PCI cards. In fact, the Audigy's .INI seems to serve a different purpose altogether, which is to identify chipsets that aren't compatible with Creative's DOS audio emulation. Despite sharing the same roots, it seems that Creative modified the SBLive/Audigy drivers far enough that they no longer recognize Audio PCI sound cards, and don't accept any .INI parameters related to them.

Additionally, I wondewonder if it might work better if the CDROM was run as a single drive on an IDE port rather than as a slave like in the config in your screenshot.

I wouldn't hold out much hope, since the developers removed the "CDDAEnable" parameter by default, and probably had a good reason for that. Also, this only works in pure DOS. If you boot back into Win9x, the card's auto-config will always erase this parameter from the .INI file.

Thanks for checking.

I don't hold out much hope for CD audio in DOS being perfect with the CDROM as single master, but it might be be more resistant to disk I/O related skips. Too bad there is no source code to this available. It might have been possible to make this feature work better.

I've tried a few games on the SB128 using my Celeron 466 + Abit ZM6 (440ZX) system. These are just titles that I either regularly play or use for testing purposes. I don't plan on testing every single DOS game, but the list of titles that I chose should give people a decent idea of the card's compatibility. All of these tests were conducted in pure DOS 7.1. Here are the results:

• Aladdin - works
• Command & Conquer - works
• Crusader: No Remorse - works
• Dark Forces - works
• Descent - works
• Doom 1 - works
• Doom 2 - works
• Duke Nukem 2 - digital sound effects don't work, FM synth works
• Duke Nukem 3D - works
• Dyna Blaster - needs slowdown to work
• Gabriel Knight - works
• Gods - works
• Heretic - works
• Heroes of Might & Magic 2 - works
• Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis - needs slowdown to work
• Jagged Alliance - works
• Jazz Jackrabbit - works
• King's Quest VI - works
• Lemmings - works
• Master of Orion 2 - works
• Monkey Island 1 - works
• Monkey Island 2 - needs slowdown to work
• Mortal Kombat 1 - FM synth works, digital sound effects partially work, but sometimes cut out
• Mortal Kombat 2 - works
• Mortal Kombat 3 - works
• One Must Fall 2097 - works
• Prehistorik - fm synth works, digital sound effects don't work even with slowdown
• Prince of Persia 1 - doesn't work, freezes on start
• Prince of Persia 2 - works
• Quake - works
• Rambo 3 - doesn't work, crashes on start
• Red Alert - works
• Settlers 2 - works
• Simon the Sorcerer 2 - works
• Space Quest V - General MIDI works, digital sound effects don't work even with slowdown
• Stonekeep - works
• Tomb Raider - works
• Transport Tycoon - works
• Turrican 2 - doesn't work due to EMM386 being loaded
• Tyrian - works
• WarCraft 1 - works
• WarCraft 2 - works
• X-Wing - needs slowdown to work

Note: by "needs slowdown" I mean through utilities like THROTTLE or SETMUL. As with all PCI sound cards, game compatibility may vary based on the chipset that your motherboard uses. So take these results as indicative of the 440ZX/440BX chipset only. Also, I didn't do any extensive testing with these games. I just made sure that they start, and then played for a minute or two.

8MB ECW soundbank is not optimal, got the sound glitches in MT-32 mode with Lotus III

Babasha wrote on 2024-02-17, 09:20:

8MB ECW soundbank is not optimal, got the sound glitches in MT-32 mode with Lotus III

I'm not familiar with that game, but the MT-32 Vogons wiki page states that it requires CM-series/LAPC-I for proper MT-32 output.

Not sure if it also uses custom instruments, but those most certainly won't work on the SB128.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2024-02-17, 09:35:

Babasha wrote on 2024-02-17, 09:20:

8MB ECW soundbank is not optimal, got the sound glitches in MT-32 mode with Lotus III

I'm not familiar with that game, but the MT-32 Vogons wiki page states that it requires CM-series/LAPC-I for proper MT-32 output.

Not sure if it also uses custom instruments, but those most certainly won't work on the SB128.

I test this game with Ensoniq/Creative cards. 4MB ECW soundbank are nice, 8MB has distorted sounds.

Babasha wrote on 2024-02-17, 18:33:

I test this game with Ensoniq/Creative cards. 4MB ECW soundbank are nice, 8MB has distorted sounds.

Interesting. It's too bad those ECW sets are proprietary, would be nice if someone could actually open them up and check the contents.

I'm just guessing, but maybe the developers wanted to cram in higher quality samples into the 8MB set so badly that they accidentally overwrote some of the MT-32 stuff.

Another update regarding digital CD audio over the ATA interface in pure DOS.

In games like Tomb Raider, which both stream data and play CD audio from the disc, distortions do occasionally appear. Also, I did try attaching the CD-ROM on the secondary channel as the only device, and the distortions still occurred. However, in other games like Quake, which completely install their data to the hard drive, and only use the disc for playing back CD audio music, there are almost no distortions.

In short, the more a game accesses data from the disc while playing back CD audio, the higher the chance of distortions.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2024-02-18, 12:08:

Another update regarding digital CD audio over the ATA interface in pure DOS.

In games like Tomb Raider, which both stream data and play CD audio from the disc, distortions do occasionally appear. Also, I did try attaching the CD-ROM on the secondary channel as the only device, and the distortions still occurred. However, in other games like Quake, which completely install their data to the hard drive, and only use the disc for playing back CD audio music, there are almost no distortions.

In short, the more a game accesses data from the disc while playing back CD audio, the higher the chance of distortions.

TY for the extra tests. So it makes sense that this option was left undocumented.

And another update regarding GS support in various ECW sets. I've mainly tested this with Dune 2 configured to use Roland GS for both music and sound effects. The game's intro is a good showcase for GS instruments.

• The 2MB set seems to have very limited GS instrument support, and the effects get substituted by incorrect sounds in some cases. For example, when rockets are launching, it sounds like an old telephone is ringing
• The 4MB set seems to lack most GS instruments and many effects that are supposed to play simply remain silent
• The 8MB set seems to have all GS instruments, at least judging by the fact that every sound effect played correctly. Meaning, I could properly hear wind blowing, ships landing, guns firing and rockets launching during the intro

This is not a very comprehensive test, so don't take my findings as gospel. Again, without being able to open the ECW sets, it's difficult to say what's actually contained in there.

I tried opening the ECW files using Total Commander's built-in viewer. There's a text header at the top of each file, and here's what it says:

2MB ECW

1ECLW Copyright © 1999, Creative Technology Ltd.
22 MB Waveset ver 3
32MEG_R_3.ECW

4MB ECW

1ECLW Copyright © 1999, Creative Technology Ltd.
24 MB Waveset ver 4
34MEG_R_4.ECW

8MB ECW

1ECLW Copyright © 1999, Creative Technology Ltd.
28 MB GM/GS Waveset ver 5
38MEG_R_5.ECW
48 Megabyte Waveset with full GM/GS implementation

The last line in the header of the 8MB file confirms that it does have the full GS implementation. Note that there's no such line for the 2MB and 4MB files, and based on my previous tests, it doesn't look like their GS support is entirely functional.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2024-02-18, 20:41:

I tried opening the ECW files using Total Commander's built-in viewer. There's a text header at the top of each file, and here's […]
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I tried opening the ECW files using Total Commander's built-in viewer. There's a text header at the top of each file, and here's what it says:

2MB ECW

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1ECLW Copyright © 1999, Creative Technology Ltd.
22 MB Waveset ver 3
32MEG_R_3.ECW

4MB ECW

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1ECLW Copyright © 1999, Creative Technology Ltd.
24 MB Waveset ver 4
34MEG_R_4.ECW

8MB ECW

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1ECLW Copyright © 1999, Creative Technology Ltd.
28 MB GM/GS Waveset ver 5
38MEG_R_5.ECW
48 Megabyte Waveset with full GM/GS implementation

The last line in the header of the 8MB file confirms that it does have the full GS implementation. Note that there's no such line for the 2MB and 4MB files, and based on my previous tests, it doesn't look like their GS support is entirely functional.

There is an archived copy of https://web.archive.org/web/20110819020545/ht … y/ecw/index.php
which contains some info and was previously referenced here : ECW Wavetable format available!? (SBPCI/Live)

2 reviews on the Ensonic PCI range in as many days!
About ES13** PCI card

For such an unpopular range of cards they are getting some love at the moment.

a bit out of scope of this review but I always had problems with Creative's PCI dos driver, network driver and C&C/RA in pure dos
This was on 2 different PC's, with Realtek and Intel NIC's

For a budget card I thought they were fine, dos support still been important for me at the time.
These days the cheap and plentiful supply of SB Live! does kind of make these cards pointless unless you already own one

darry wrote on 2024-02-18, 20:55:

There is an archived copy of https://web.archive.org/web/20110819020545/ht … y/ecw/index.php
which contains some info and was previously referenced here : ECW Wavetable format available!? (SBPCI/Live)

Interesting, so there was an attempt to reverse engineer these at some point.

I've checked the documentation on that page, but I couldn't find any new info related to GS or MT-32 support at a cursory glance.

chinny22 wrote on 2024-02-19, 01:51:

2 reviews on the Ensonic PCI range in as many days!

Heh, maybe one of the retro YouTube channels will cover it as well! 😀 I have to say, despite my initial dislike for this card, it has slightly grown on me during the recent tests. The SB128 is not a bad choice for late DOS gaming, as long as you don't use its awful FM synth emulation and just stick to General MIDI.

a bit out of scope of this review but I always had problems with Creative's PCI dos driver, network driver and C&C/RA in pure dos
This was on 2 different PC's, with Realtek and Intel NIC's

Now that you mention it, I did notice that the Matrox MSI version of Tomb Raider doesn't work with this sound card, while the default software renderer runs fine. Not sure if it's related to your issue, but it does seem vaguely similar.

These days the cheap and plentiful supply of SB Live! does kind of make these cards pointless unless you already own one

Pretty much, yeah! Especially for Windows gaming, as EAX sounds significantly better on SBLive/Audigy cards.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2024-02-18, 12:08:

Another update regarding digital CD audio over the ATA interface in pure DOS.

In games like Tomb Raider, which both stream data and play CD audio from the disc, distortions do occasionally appear. Also, I did try attaching the CD-ROM on the secondary channel as the only device, and the distortions still occurred. However, in other games like Quake, which completely install their data to the hard drive, and only use the disc for playing back CD audio music, there are almost no distortions.

In short, the more a game accesses data from the disc while playing back CD audio, the higher the chance of distortions.

Loading Jack R Ellis XHDD and XDVD2 ultra DMA drivers for HD and CD might get rid of the distortions.
About Rambo III not working, I have found it does work with the SB emulation but only if I use a very old PCI video card, like S3 968. Using a newer PCI or AGP card and it just goes to a black screen. I think it's something to do with newer video bios and the emulation tsr.

Riikcakirds wrote on 2024-02-19, 18:07:

Loading Jack R Ellis XHDD and XDVD2 ultra DMA drivers for HD and CD might get rid of the distortions.

Interesting. I have never used those before, but I might give them a try at some point.

About Rambo III not working, I have found it does work with the SB emulation but only if I use a very old PCI video card, like S3 968. Using a newer PCI or AGP card and it just goes to a black screen. I think it's something to do with newer video bios and the emulation tsr.

Hmm, I have mostly been using a TNT2 M64 as my GPU on this particular system. I guess I could try an S3 Trio64V+ but I'm not sure if I have any PCI graphics cards older than that.

Were you using VXD drivers to get the nice control panel settings? I don't recall it, but its been a long time since I've used AudioPCI..
I also have a Audio PCI 3000 with the ES1370 and AKM AK5331 which seems to have 4 channel output for DS3D Quad mode, but I think SPDIF is reserved for the ES1373 based chips

holdencars11 wrote on 2024-02-24, 11:37:

Were you using VXD drivers to get the nice control panel settings? I don't recall it, but its been a long time since I've used AudioPCI..

Yes, those are stock VxD drivers from the installation CD that came with my card. I still have the actual disc.

I also have a Audio PCI 3000 with the ES1370 and AKM AK5331 which seems to have 4 channel output for DS3D Quad mode, but I think SPDIF is reserved for the ES1373 based chips

Interesting. I heard that some of these cards support 4 speaker surround, but my particular one doesn't seem to do that. At least there is no mention of that feature anywhere in the documentation.

Out of curiosity, did your card have a dedicated jack for the rear speakers? Or did they plug into one of the existing ports, which was then re-configured by the drivers?