Hey all. I took alpha3 for a spin on my Windows 98SE running natively on ThinkPad T42 2374. (I wrote a post about running W98SE on this configuration here).

Links to VCREDIST.EXE in OP are not working anymore and aren't archived. I am pretty sure I only had to install Visual C++ 2005 Redistributable x86 beforehand (link courtesy of Microsoft and archive.org).

The only issue is that after I'm done with it and run VXDSBOOM.EXE to terminate it, the integrated card becomes unavailable/undetectable to DOS games and I need to reboot the OS to get it working again.
SBPro/SB16 MIDI also doesn't sound quite right and it misses notes in my games (in games with RAD Miles driver at least), but Adlib MIDI works well.
Some games are hit or miss, for example I still couldn't run Earth 2140' due to its terrible sound code.
Despite these shortcomings, it seems to work exactly as described. Thanks for your work.

vdmsound can be executed on MS-DOS?

cambalinho wrote on 2021-06-19, 20:27:

vdmsound can be executed on MS-DOS?

Not under actual real-mode DOS . It must be run under Windows . See
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/VDMSound and https://sourceforge.net/projects/vdmsound/

It doesn't work for me on my Windows 98 with my AC-97. After installing, add SET BLASTER = A220 I7 D1 H5 P330 T6 to DOSDRV, run DOSDRV, games like Fatal Racing make horrible noise or the system becomes unstable with a blue screen error related to VXDSOUND.VXD.

I'm testing with VDMSound.win9x.bin.alpha3, does anyone know if there is any workaround for VDMSound Alpha to work on Windows 98?

Well, I was trying VDMSound for MIDI specifically to route game's GM into one of Windows 98 MIDI devices using an updated build from this thread (packaged by @Deemster I think). It has not worked for me, neither with SB Audigy 1 VxD nor with Vortex 1. Issues you are describing sound different, so wondering if you tried that updated package.

Also the updated versions in this thread seem to do away with VXDSBOOM and are claimed to unload upon DOS sessoon termination.

One small issue I had some success with was getting rid of the "tip of the day" error by following this guide.

is there an installation of VDMSound for W9X\ME?

I'm not sure if this info has already been posted here, if so, I've missed it, so here it is:

You can eliminate the "tip of the day" pop-up by making a xxx.reg text file and adding these 6 lines below to it:

REGEDIT4

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Freeware\VDMSound]
"NextTip"=dword:00000000
"TipsFile"="C:\\Program Files\\VDMSound\\VDMSound.tips"
"ShowTips"=dword:00000000

Save and execute the file and approve adding to the registry.

NOTE:
- if needed change the TipsFile path (watch for double \\) to the one you have (c:\\vdmsound or so), or copy your vdmsound dir to program files
- if not working, check the regedit, try to find the entry HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Freeware\VDMSound, and check if all 3 sub-entries are there. If "ShowTips"=dword:00000000 is missing, add it manually as a DWORD entry

Now you can make a bat file to load your game with sound, without the popup hassle.

I found this info on this page - https://www.subsim.com/tips/tip_silenthunter_xp.html

Cheers!

Hello everyone,

i do realize that this is a very old thread but I hope that I am still able to get some help here. I recently aquired a T42 to play early windows games and DOS games. I know that in terms of DOS support, this is not the optimal machine as it lacks a sound card. But this is basically why I am here. I have been trying to get VDM-Sound to work. The first issue I ran into was acquiring the vcredist.exe. All the links here were dead. However if anyone runs into the same issue, you can download a compatible version here: https://www.betaarchive.com/wiki/index.php/Mi … _Archive/259403 I installed it, restarted and then successfully executed the install file linked in the original thread. Executing dosdrv gave me the "Tip of the day" error that seems to be expected. I edited the autoexec.bat as described in the installation file (Had to open it in nodepad and copy pasted it into the autoexec.bat). I restarted the machine, hoping that this would load up the emulation. I tried executing the sound configuration tool for God Of Thunder (a dos game) but it was not able to find a soundblaster on the machine. Maybe the game isn't compatible or i missed a step. Although I have owned a windows98 machine back in the day I realized how little i know about how to fix stuff. Hope you guys can help! Kind regards, Jonas

Ok, I got it running. I did not realize that the configuration is only present for the dos window opened (at least it seems to me this way). I thought about deleting my earlier post, but realized that the link to the vcredist might be of help to other fellow retro games. I hope that's okay.

ludicrous_peridot wrote on 2021-08-18, 11:53:

Well, I was trying VDMSound for MIDI specifically to route game's GM into one of Windows 98 MIDI devices using an updated build from this thread (packaged by @Deemster I think). It has not worked for me, neither with SB Audigy 1 VxD nor with Vortex 1. Issues you are describing sound different, so wondering if you tried that updated package.

Also the updated versions in this thread seem to do away with VXDSBOOM and are claimed to unload upon DOS sessoon termination.

One small issue I had some success with was getting rid of the "tip of the day" error by following this guide.

I tried excactly that, but with a Soft Synth from Yamaha: XG50. It sounds incredible (General Midi with the default Port 330h). The issue was, that I had troubles in getting Soundblaster Emulation running. Logs complained about handletransfer dma updates too infrequent. I have a Pentium M (Inspiron 8600 (with legacy Ports) - there is a Sigmatel limited XG50 Version that works perfectly with this Device), so it might be too slow at 600Mhz. So I configured Vdmsound with nonsense Settings and used SBEmul from Windows ME and it works perfectly (with Descent). The only downside is that it's limited to Soundblaster Pro 8Bit Samples.

Is there a possibility to limit VDMSound to Midi only? I tried to remove it by commenting out the SB Emulation in the configurarion file, but then VDMSound complains about missing dependencies. Ore are ther Alternatives for Midi Emulation only?

yes, i disable everything in the config except mpu401 emulation as that's all i care about since i have vxd drivers with sb compatibility support. runs smoothly for me and i select my softsynth of choice with the windows midi mapper.