Hello!
I was looking at my PC's specifications, and it has an Intel HDA with a Realtek ALC897 codec. I'd like to know if it would work on it?

Lualb wrote on 2026-02-01, 23:49:

Hello!
I was looking at my PC's specifications, and it has an Intel HDA with a Realtek ALC897 codec. I'd like to know if it would work on it?

Probably would work, Intel chipset and Realtek codec is the best supported combination currently. You'll have to try it out and let us know.

someone commented on Github that SweetLow had done some reverse engineering of SBEMUL.SYS and indeed he had, there's a patched version of it on his old website sweetlow.orgfree.com which reports a T6 BLASTER string and allows 16-bit sound playback (but only using the same low DMA channel as the 8-bit because trapping of the high DMA channel accesses seems to be Broken in the DOS VDM.) It's only a 1 byte patch even! He also confirms that "SoftFM" just emulates the adlib presence detection at whatever port number. there's no actual FM emulation there though, just the Adlib timer for presence detection... well that's a pity. But it could potentially be decompiled and patched.

ALC892 on Asrock H81M-ITX works perfectly also with SBEMUL and Midi emulation. Dxdiag didn't play any tests, but I'm not sure if I had this issue with other boards either. IRQ is 5 and only shared with an "IRQ Holder for PCI Steering".

The DXDIAG test for DirectX 6.1 is broken in the current version because I changed the reported sample rates and I think it tries to ask for 22000 hz instead of 22050 and then fails when that isn't available. DirectX 8 and 9 DXDIAG seems to be fine. Will be fixed in the next release.

I'm trying to do a big refactor to support multiple codecs on a link, required for docking stations and HDMI display audio from integrated Intel graphics.

Hi 😀
I am trying to install this sound driver (WDMHDA Alpha-016) on an Igel 700 thin client (on Win 98 SE).
https://www.parkytowers.me.uk/thin/Igel/ud/ud5/H700C/
The driver installs correctly and the device shows no errors, but there is no sound output.
All tests seem to pass, but no sound is coming from the speakers.
I would appreciate any ideas 🙂
Just please don’t suggest switching to another thin client — I really want to get the sound working on this one.
USB sound works without any issues,
but I would prefer to use the native onboard sound, even if the quality is not great.
For your information:
I have a large collection of HP / Igel / Wyse thin clients, etc. If needed, I can also share drivers, advice, or other solutions.

shurok76 wrote on 2026-02-13, 14:28:

Hi :) I am trying to install this sound driver (WDMHDA Alpha-016) on an Igel 700 thin client (on Win 98 SE). https://www.parkyt […]
Show full quote

Hi 😀
I am trying to install this sound driver (WDMHDA Alpha-016) on an Igel 700 thin client (on Win 98 SE).
https://www.parkytowers.me.uk/thin/Igel/ud/ud5/H700C/
The driver installs correctly and the device shows no errors, but there is no sound output.
All tests seem to pass, but no sound is coming from the speakers.
I would appreciate any ideas 🙂
Just please don’t suggest switching to another thin client — I really want to get the sound working on this one.
USB sound works without any issues,
but I would prefer to use the native onboard sound, even if the quality is not great.
For your information:
I have a large collection of HP / Igel / Wyse thin clients, etc. If needed, I can also share drivers, advice, or other solutions.

VIA audio codecs are not currently supported and not for lack of trying. VIA controllers with Realtek codecs like the HP T5540 are already supported and functional.

I have a Wyse Cx0 and can work on this somewhat myself, but if you want to help, can you install the Debug version of the driver (in the hdac\obchk\i386 folder) and the WDEB386 kernel debugger, and capture the debug output over the serial port? I have linked instructions for the kernel debugger elsewhere in the thread.

Released version Alpha-017 https://github.com/andrew-hoffman/WDMHDA/rele … s/tag/Alpha-017

• Allows multiple codecs on a controller link to be used
• Added many more chipset device IDs for snoop flag.
• Should fix garbled audio on a lot of AMD and Nforce chipsets.
• Fixed inf file not specifying source disks correctly for 98se
• Increased range of reported sample rates again, fixes DXDIAG 6.1 playing no sounds

Unfortunately v017 does not work as expected on the AM1B-ITX. The Sound is still distorted and sounds OK when defragmenting. Also Windows ME tried to use the old driver hda.sys unless I deleted the file. I suspect the fixed inf might still have some quirks. I've double checked, that the first result comes from the v017 driver. I will try other boards next week. I also have a nForce Board somewhere, maybe I get time to check this, too.

Still doesn't seem to work any better on AMD chipsets. I think I need to do the WBINVD every interrupt, which will hurt performance but it can't be helped.

Wow, I'm really impressed! Installing the HDA driver on Windows Millennium and having everything work as expected is fantastic. I've been playing Blood, and it all sounds great, with no choppy sound or anything like that. With the help of DirectX 8.2, it runs really smoothly, hehe.

ECS C51GM-M 1.0 with nForce Chipset and ALC655: driver could not be installed, since the Hardware ID coult not be matched. Device ID is 10DE-026A, subsystem 1019-1b57. Even manual installation failed. I selected HD Audio in the Bios, but maybe they mean only the front panel.

So, seems to be AC 97 after all. Nothing I can help with 🙁.

Tested the new WDMHDA Alpha-017 2026-02-19 on an AM5 X670 motherboard with a Ryzen 9 9900X CPU.

Here's the video: https://youtu.be/uhWyH0TsrCc

Works really nicely. Maybe because the onboard codec is an ALC897, which is actually based (if not identical) on the older ALC892 chip.

The only issue I noticed so far is that sometimes the driver might lose contact with the mothership... so a restart was required. 😄

Hi! Any chance it’s gonna work with c media (it’s 98xx something )+ intel 925? Here is a debug. Ran on lg ls75 express laptop. Currently it says no driver or something like that.

Update: c media 9880

Pablo987 wrote on 2026-02-27, 14:23:

Hi! Any chance it’s gonna work with c media (it’s 98xx something )+ intel 925? Here is a debug. Ran on lg ls75 express laptop. Currently it says no driver or something like that.

PCI/VEN_104C&DEV_8034 is a Broadcom wireless card so you've force installed the driver on the wrong device. Do you have a "PCI Card" device with class code 0403? On Intel 925 chipsets it should be vendor 8086 device 266e. If not this laptop may use AC97 instead of HD Audio, the Intel ICH6 supports both, or the device may be disabled in the BIOS.

Okay…will check other devices, had several of them but that was the only one called pci card

https://eternallybored.org/misc/pciutils/

That has LSPCI

LiSt PCI.
It will show the vendor and device IDs of all hardware that's plugandplay.

Eg Ven 8086 = intel
Dev 1000 = whaeverthehelldevicethatis

In theory yours should be
ven_13f6
dev_9880