VOGONS


First post, by alex.schroedsen

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I have gained interest again, in grabbing new recordings from DUNE. Since my last submission, I have learned how to grab SPDIF from the most common YMF724-bearing "LABWAY A301 G50" sound card. I was riding home on the bus and went to listen to the DUNE Ad Lib GOLD (with reverb module) recordings by Cloudshatze. My favorite song in Dune is Morning /Chani's Eyes, I had ignored the other Ad Lib GOLD recordings, well I decided to give "Sign of the Worm" a listen and was amazed by how well done the instruments were done, further so than the Ad Lib soundtrack.

I decided that I would try to record the Ad Lib GOLD music anew, so I started up the floppy-version of DUNE with the custom driver from here and BOOM, beautiful music. I then realized that the music shuffling feature is not in the same place as it was in the CD version of DUNE, I can't find a place to select the shuffle/"CD-mode".

I did make a recording of the intro sequence. I'm looking for help in finding where to initiate the other songs in DUNE (floppy) to play, I'm not very experienced in this game, to the point where I haven't met Chani. My digital recording of the Intro can be found below as MP3 and WavPack.

http://www.mediafire.com/download/ecpprnb5e86 … bGold-ymf724.wv
http://www.mediafire.com/listen/c841xxeeqbkbt … Gold-ymf724.mp3

EDIT: renamed from "Attempting DUNE Ad Lib Gold-like recordings." to "DUNE Ad Lib Gold-like (OPL-3/stereo without reverb) recordings."

These recordings are digitally transferred from a ymf724 (YMF262-equivalent) into a file without volume attenuation or post processing (used sb0380 Audigy 4 PRO with waveshop.sourceforge.net). These recordings are made with the floppy edition of DUNE and ripsaw8080's custom Ad Lib gold driver.

Download link here http://www.mediafire.com/download/cgbvtp6pyrt … ORDINGS1648.zip

Last edited by alex.schroedsen on 2016-01-23, 00:19. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 1 of 9, by ripsaw8080

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alex.schroedsen wrote:

I decided that I would try to record the Ad Lib GOLD music anew, so I started up the floppy-version of DUNE with the custom driver from here and BOOM, beautiful music.

I'm glad that the modified driver sounds good to your ears. The "-like" in your thread title implies that you know there is a difference, but I still think it's better if you don't characterize it as AdLib Gold music -- it is OPL3 music minus the stereo, reverb, and (optional) surround enhancements of an AdLib Gold.

alex.schroedsen wrote:

I then realized that the music shuffling feature is not in the same place as it was in the CD version of DUNE, I can't find a place to select the shuffle/"CD-mode".

Select the map from the menu, click on the globe in the lower left of the screen, select options from the menu, the setting you're looking for is there. There is a "game relative" mode (your location in the game determines which song plays), and a "CD-style" mode (all songs play sequentially), but no "shuffle" mode.

alex.schroedsen wrote:

I'm looking for help in finding where to initiate the other songs in DUNE (floppy) to play

In the same thread where you got the modified driver, one of my later comments has a suggestion for renaming the .AGD song files so that a specific song plays during the game's intro, which I think would be useful for your purpose.

Reply 2 of 9, by Beegle

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I think RdosPlay (software) can play AGD files directly in DOS without the need to load the game.
https://web.archive.org/web/20060901220640/ht … /rdos/rdosplay/

Also, thanks for the recording. Very interesting to compare it to a real Adlib Gold output. Some things sound very similar, some... a little less.

The more sound cards, the better.
AdLib documentary : Official Thread
Youtube Channel : The Sound Card Database

Reply 3 of 9, by ripsaw8080

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Beegle wrote:

I think RdosPlay (software) can play AGD files directly in DOS without the need to load the game.

Yes, but if you have just OPL3 and not an AdLib Gold then the music will be messed up because there is no control chip, and I think it's fairly clear that the thread starter is not using an AdLib Gold. An exception to this, according to Cloudschatze, is the Audiotrix soundcard. The Audiotrix has some support for the control chip, but does not support the effects of the AdLib Gold, so I guess it just "filters out" the control commands and prevents them from being written to the OPL3 chip.

Reply 4 of 9, by Beegle

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ripsaw8080 wrote:

Yes, but if you have just OPL3 and not an AdLib Gold then the music will be messed up because there is no control chip, and I think it's fairly clear that the thread starter is not using an AdLib Gold.

Certainly. The recording he posted was grabbed from his OPL3 card which doesn't have the control chip. That is why it sounds different from the expected Adlib Gold output. So with no control chip either way, using the game or RdosPlay to output the songs would make no difference.

And if the output is the same either way, at least RdosPlay will save him some renaming and repetitive game-starting for when he does his recordings. That is mostly why I posted the link. Sorry if that wasn't clear the first time!

The more sound cards, the better.
AdLib documentary : Official Thread
Youtube Channel : The Sound Card Database

Reply 5 of 9, by ripsaw8080

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I guess you missed the fact that he is using a modified version of Dune's AdLib Gold driver, one that bypasses the control chip writes, so the output is definitely not the same.

Reply 6 of 9, by Beegle

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ripsaw8080 wrote:

I guess you missed the fact that he is using a modified version of Dune's AdLib Gold driver, one that bypasses the control chip writes, so the output is definitely not the same.

You got me there, ripsaw8080.

The more sound cards, the better.
AdLib documentary : Official Thread
Youtube Channel : The Sound Card Database

Reply 7 of 9, by ripsaw8080

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I would actually be interested to hear a recording of what RdosPlay sounds like when playing the AGD files on plain OPL3. In DOSBox it sounds quite messed up when the control chip commands are written to the OPL3 chip. On a side note, DOSBox SVN now has an oplmode=opl3gold setting that allows the AdLib Gold music in Dune to work, minus the stereo, reverb, and surround effects -- pretty much like using the modified driver, except you can use the stock driver and the install program doesn't have to be forced into accepting the configuration; also helps RdosPlay when playing AGD files.

Reply 8 of 9, by alex.schroedsen

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ripsaw8080,
Thanks for all the advice especially for where to find the CD-style and game-relative options! Because of you I've been able to get these recording. As for the -like prefix, I suppose I could have named the thread "DUNE OPL-3 recordings" or something, I figure I'll get the raw OPL-3 captured and whoever chooses to download it can apply gain, reverb. In addition, I should thank you, ripsaw8080 for making the DUNE driver, thanks for making such a useful tool!

Beegle,
thanks for the tip about Rdosplay, I tried it out without success, but it'll be a fun tool for making recordings in the future no doubt.

Here's a link for now, I'll eventually get around to doing an archive.org version, but this should be good for the meantime. http://www.mediafire.com/download/cgbvtp6pyrt … ORDINGS1648.zip

Reply 9 of 9, by avx

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If someone can hook this so that the Dune Ad Lib music goes through the BREVERB (in Munt code or similar) and shows what commands (that could be assumed to be reverb commands) have been sent, a mapping could be created to make the breverb code sound like the Gold reverb. This may sound "impossible" but only to non-musicians. The reverb algos and hardware implementations are based on very similar designs so tweaking them by ear without any measurements is definitely possible - that is how the Munt reverb was tweaked. It may have later been tweaked through measurements but I can't hear any difference to the parameters I came up with just by ear-based-tweaking. (in music, perhaps with single test noises you could)