brunobox99 wrote on 2023-11-09, 03:14:

Only one game has no sound: Tyrian 2000.

Both the unpatched (v1.0) and the patched (v1.3) versions does not produce any digital sound. Only MIDI is available.

Can anyone confirm this?

Yeah, Tyrian is very picky when it comes to sound cards. I think it might work in pure DOS (Restart in MS-DOS mode) but it's been a while since I tested that.

Also, Creative'a SB16 emulation isn't perfect, and you will eventually run into games which either have crackling/distortions (Quake, WarCraft 2) or outright don't work. That's simply the trade off for using a PCI sound card for DOS gaming.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2023-11-09, 06:37:

brunobox99 wrote on 2023-11-09, 03:14:

Only one game has no sound: Tyrian 2000.

Both the unpatched (v1.0) and the patched (v1.3) versions does not produce any digital sound. Only MIDI is available.

Can anyone confirm this?

Yeah, Tyrian is very picky when it comes to sound cards. I think it might work in pure DOS (Restart in MS-DOS mode) but it's been a while since I tested that.

Also, Creative'a SB16 emulation isn't perfect, and you will eventually run into games which either have crackling/distortions (Quake, WarCraft 2) or outright don't work. That's simply the trade off for using a PCI sound card for DOS gaming.

I think it is related to the driver version. I have tried with another SBLive CD, and Tyrian 2000 worked fine, with digital sounds and MIDI (but using the ECW files, not the SF2 fonts).

brunobox99 wrote on 2023-11-09, 07:10:

I think it is related to the driver version. I have tried with another SBLive CD, and Tyrian 2000 worked fine, with digital sounds and MIDI (but using the ECW files, not the SF2 fonts).

Could be that too.

Do note that the SB16 emulation always uses ECW sets in pure DOS, so it might be worth trying that as well.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2023-11-09, 07:28:

brunobox99 wrote on 2023-11-09, 07:10:

I think it is related to the driver version. I have tried with another SBLive CD, and Tyrian 2000 worked fine, with digital sounds and MIDI (but using the ECW files, not the SF2 fonts).

Could be that too.

Do note that the SB16 emulation always uses ECW sets in pure DOS, so it might be worth trying that as well.

Yes, I tried in Windows and DOS, but in DOS I get a strange message (Unknown Error).

But, anyway, thank you very much for the effort, your procedure works really well for most games I have tried, it was good to hear Tyrian with the SC-55 soundfont. Sadly some games will remain mute or with digital audio disabled (Tyrian 2000, Champ Games).

I tried the other CD you posted (For SBLive 5.1) and it worked flawlessly on my CT4830. Thanks for that, now Tyrian 2000 and Champ games worked fine.

Sadly, the ECW is a closed format to this day, it would be great if one could convert SF2 to ECW.

Update: SqallStrife kindly set up a Vogons Drivers account for me, so the modified driver image is now hosted there.

ok great but having slight difficulties with the soundfont manager, not actually starting, guide covers usage but not install.

Eimer wrote on 2023-12-23, 15:53:

ok great but having slight difficulties with the soundfont manager, not actually starting, guide covers usage but not install.

With this driver pack, the SoundFont Manager is a part of Creative's AudioHQ utility. It's not a separate application. AudioHQ should be installed by default, if you followed all the steps correctly.

This section describes how to use the Creative AudioHQ utility to configure the soundfont:

6.5 Start > Programs > Creative > Creative AudioHQ > SoundFont
6.6 Click on "Options" and use the slider to set SoundFont Cache to 50 MB
6.7 Click on "Configure Bank" then click on the default soundfont (2GMGSMT Rev N++) to select it, then click Replace, point to C:\AU3\Sc-55.sf2 wait a few seconds until it loads then click Ok > Close

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2023-12-23, 16:07:

With this driver pack, the SoundFont Manager is a part of Creative's AudioHQ utility. It's not a separate application. AudioHQ s […]
Show full quote

Eimer wrote on 2023-12-23, 15:53:

ok great but having slight difficulties with the soundfont manager, not actually starting, guide covers usage but not install.

With this driver pack, the SoundFont Manager is a part of Creative's AudioHQ utility. It's not a separate application. AudioHQ should be installed by default, if you followed all the steps correctly.

This section describes how to use the Creative AudioHQ utility to configure the soundfont:

6.5 Start > Programs > Creative > Creative AudioHQ > SoundFont
6.6 Click on "Options" and use the slider to set SoundFont Cache to 50 MB
6.7 Click on "Configure Bank" then click on the default soundfont (2GMGSMT Rev N++) to select it, then click Replace, point to C:\AU3\Sc-55.sf2 wait a few seconds until it loads then click Ok > Close

Driver and audiohq including everything described is installed.
The soundfont manager won’t launch when clicking on it in audio hq
Everything else including ea effects works

Eimer wrote on 2023-12-23, 16:12:

Driver and audiohq including everything described is installed.
The soundfont manager won’t launch when clicking on it in audio hq
Everything else including ea effects works

Very odd. This indicates that something may have gone wrong with the installation.

Try uninstalling AudioHQ from Add/Remove Programs and then reinstall it from the disc.

I may end up fully reinstalling windows 98 since I now also got VXD related bluescreens

Anyone know if SB0090 works using this method`?

Eimer wrote on 2023-12-25, 11:19:

Anyone know if SB0090 works using this method`?

Are you sure about that model number? Because SB0090 is an Audigy card, and this guide is for SBLive cards only.

For Audigy cards, I have a different one. Despite having some similarities, these guides are not interchangeable. The utilities that accompany the drivers are different between Audigy and SBLive cards.

What are the drivers you've included on the modified CD? I'm curious, because while it contains a slightly newer EMU10k driver, the CTSB16.VXD SB16 emulation driver looks like an older version : 4.12.01.0153-0.75.1640 (beta-release) on your CD vs 4.12.01.0308-1.42.2050 on the original CD.

GL1zdA wrote on 2023-12-29, 09:27:

What are the drivers you've included on the modified CD? I'm curious, because while it contains a slightly newer EMU10k driver, the CTSB16.VXD SB16 emulation driver looks like an older version : 4.12.01.0153-0.75.1640 (beta-release) on your CD vs 4.12.01.0308-1.42.2050 on the original CD.

For the SBLive image, the Windows drivers were taken straight from this Audigy 2 ZS disc. And the SB16 emulation was taken either from an Audigy 1 driver CD or from this pack.

I can look into updating the SB16 emulation driver if there's a newer version available.

The SBMA-SIS1D-W2-LB you've used as the base has the "4.12.01.0308-1.42.2050" version of CTSB16.VXD, which is the latest I've seen. I assume they didn't change the numbering in the middle.

The "4.12.01.0153-0.75.1640 (beta-release)" is on all the Audigy 2 and ZS CDs except for the very first one I've found (SBA2-CDS1D-W1-LB), where it is 4.12.01.0282-1.40.0020 which also sound like a newer version then the beta one. It's a mystery to me why they would put an older version on the newer CDs.

It's only a problem with the SB16 emulation driver. The CTAUD9X.VXD is indeed in the latest version I've seen: "4.12.01.0381-1.80.0010".

GL1zdA wrote on 2023-12-29, 10:35:

It's only a problem with the SB16 emulation driver. The CTAUD9X.VXD is indeed in the latest version I've seen: "4.12.01.0381-1.80.0010".

Back when I was first testing this, I tried the drivers from the base CD and got a bunch of crashes.

For that reason, I decided to only keep the Creative utilities from that disc (which work fine) while using drivers from other sources.

OK, good to know that the original one was problematic.

8. SC-55 Sound Font Installation (optional)

8.1 Download Patch93's SC-55 soundfont and extract the archive contents to C:\AU3
8.2 Download SF Pack and extract the archive contents to C:\AU3
8.3 Run C:\AU3\SFPACK.EXE > Ok > File > Add Files > Files of type: SFPack Files > C:\AU3\SC-55.sfpack > Open
8.4 After that, click File > Go/Stop. Wait for about 30 seconds. Now, if everything worked ok, you should have a SC-55.sf2 file in C:\AU3 (file size should be 45.1 MB)
8.5 Start > Programs > Creative > Creative AudioHQ > SoundFont
8.6 Click on "Options" and use the slider to set SoundFont Cache to 50 MB
8.7 Click on "Configure Bank" then click on the current soundfont to select it, then click Replace, point to C:\AU3\Sc-55.sf2 wait a few seconds until it loads then click Ok > Close
8.8 Run your favorite DOS game (like Duke3D for example) and in setup choose General MIDI for music

Listen to the this playlist to check how games sound on a SBLive using this SC-55 soundfont. For comparison, here's how the games sound on a real Roland Sound Canvas.

From my testing, it appears that GS support varies between Creative's default soundfonts. These are my testing notes:

• 2GMGSMT.SF2 - lowest quality samples, nearly complete GS support (default soundfont which is initially installed by the drivers)
• 4GMGSMT.SF2 - decent quality samples, nearly complete GS support
• 8GMGSMT.SF2 - high quality samples, incomplete GS support

Similarly, here are my testing notes on the ECW sets which are used in pure DOS:

• EAPCI2M.ECW - lowest quality samples, incomplete GS support, basic MT-32 support (default set which is initially installed by the drivers)
• EAPCI4M.ECW - decent quality samples, incomplete GS support, optimal MT-32 support
• EAPCI8M.ECW - high quality samples, complete GS support, possibly broken MT-32 support

In summary, I recommend 8GMGSMT.SF2 if you're playing DOS games in General MIDI mode and want high quality samples. However, if you're playing games which make use of GS instruments, and you want to select the "Sound Canvas" option in setup (or similar) then it might be better to go with 4GMGSMT.SF2. Dune 2 and Stonekeep are two examples of games which can make use of GS instruments.

For pure DOS, I recommend using EAPCI8M.ECW if you're playing games which use GS instruments. However, if you're playing games in MT-32 mode, you may want to use EAPCI4M.ECW instead.

Guide updated to version 3.1. Changes in this release:

• Added Creative's 4GMGSMT.SF2 and 8GMGSMT.SF2 to the modified image (the soundfonts were taken from this driver CD)
• Added Creative's EAPCI4M.ECW and EAPCI8M.ECW to the modified image (the sets were taken from this driver CD)
• Autorun has been disabled on the modified driver CD image

Basically, this update adds the option to use Creative's higher quality soundfonts and ECW sets. Also, the SC-55 soundfont is no longer used by default, but rather suggested as an alternative option. The instructions for using it have been moved into a separate post.