Thanks, the new version does detect my card properly. I think the fact that is isn't actually working is an issue with my system, pretty much every sound card I've tried has issues to some extent.

Absolutely awesome tool. Hat off to you, Sir!

Alright I don't know why but suddenly my azt2320 started working, I think it's BIOS related. In any case, thanks for the great tool, it's great that it takes its config from the BLASTER variable and Just Works.

Edit: I think I discovered my issue. If Windows has been booted first, both AZTPNP and UniSound say they've configured the card but it doesn't work. CTRL+ALT+DEL and then booting straight into DOS doesn't fix this - I need to physically reset the computer and boot straight into DOS. Perhaps the card is stuck in WSS mode?

Tool updated to v0.67b

Changelog:

- Added SB AWE Memory detection. RAM amount is displayed at init time.
- Bug fix: ALS1xx wrong detection in some models corrected.
- Bug fix: ALS100 Inverted DMA & HDMA assignation corrected.
- Bug fix: Missing master volume setting for some ES968+ES1688 cards added.

The download link is updated at the end of the first post as usual:
UNISOUND - Universal ISA PnP Sound Card Driver for DOS v0.81b

I've haven't been able to get it working with a Crystal CS4236B card. Says not supported.

I've also tried with 2 ESS1869 cards, it says it is programming them, but unisound /R does not read the settings back correctly, and sound does not work in games.

Edit: Worked great with SB16 CT2260 Softsetting card

Also works great with Yamaha YMF719E-S card. Makes a good card for XT systems.

canthearu wrote on 2020-04-17, 14:59:

I've haven't been able to get it working with a Crystal CS4236B card. Says not supported. […]
Show full quote

I've haven't been able to get it working with a Crystal CS4236B card. Says not supported.

I've also tried with 2 ESS1869 cards, it says it is programming them, but unisound /R does not read the settings back correctly, and sound does not work in games.

Edit: Worked great with SB16 CT2260 Softsetting card

Also works great with Yamaha YMF719E-S card. Makes a good card for XT systems.

Thanks for your feedback!

Let's try to fix the issues with your cards...

Could you provide more details for every non-working card? After running Unisound, the Vendor ID (in square brackets, like [CTL0049]) and the detected name of the card... the settings, etc.. (a photo of the screen after Unisound execution would be nice, too). It would be also useful, if possible, a photo of the cards.

Even better, if you have a system with PnP BIOS (like a pentium or better machine) with ISA slots, it would help a lot if your run this with every problematic card:

https://mega.nz/file/SMwRRToT#wOoKfXOFgV_4NQj … 1FhIyonHXSN5lY4

After every run of DUMP.EXE (with every card), ZIP the whole folder with the resulting files, and upload them (3 cards, 3 dumps) here.

This will help to improve the tool.

Thanks!!

Thanks for the reply.

Lets start with the card that doesn't work at all.

This is what I get from UNISOUND

I have also attached the full contents of dump.exe

Regarding my ESS1689 cards, it seems that unisound worked perfectly fine on my Pentium computer with a PnP BIOS. (Pentium MMX-233)

This is an example of one of the cards, I have a couple of others:

However, on XT (8-bit slot) and 286 (16-bit slot) I get the following results from unisound, and the sound does not work.

Do you have any suggestions on how to help you debug this situation?

@canthearu

Hi, Thank you for the details!

I compiled a new test version (v0.48a-TEST) with new Vendor IDs for compatible Crystal cards, and fixed some bugs with card listing. Your Crystal card should work now. Test it and let me know:

https://mega.nz/file/ZZMkSYzQ#oyLgOoSeFfdJ2K- … P99CH8ImMVZHH_w

canthearu wrote on 2020-04-18, 01:08:

Regarding my ESS1689 cards, it seems that unisound worked perfectly fine on my Pentium computer with a PnP BIOS. (Pentium MMX-23 […]
Show full quote

Regarding my ESS1689 cards, it seems that unisound worked perfectly fine on my Pentium computer with a PnP BIOS. (Pentium MMX-233)

This is an example of one of the cards, I have a couple of others:

[...]

However, on XT (8-bit slot) and 286 (16-bit slot) I get the following results from unisound, and the sound does not work.

[...]

Do you have any suggestions on how to help you debug this situation?

About ES1869 card, I have been testing a lot with my ES1869 card with different machines and I got very similar result to yours. I am still investigating, but I am almost sure that this chip does not work on very slow systems (ES1868 does).

In my Turbo XT board with a 8088 @8Mhz, PnP settings are not retained by the card, like in your case, and the sound does not work. With a NEC V20 CPU got the same result.
The next "slowest" machine I have now to test is a 386DX, with turbo off (about 8 points in SysInfo benchmark), and there the card works without issues. I tried in 8 bit slots in the same board and the card is working OK as well. I don't have a 286 here.
And with faster machines I tested (486DX, DX2, DX4, Pentium...) the card works OK.

About your 286 machine... at what speed? Do you have similar machines to test it? maybe a slow 386SX, a faster 286...?

Thanks.

JazeFox wrote on 2020-04-18, 13:39:

I compiled a new test version (v0.48a-TEST) with new Vendor IDs for compatible Crystal cards, and fixed some bugs with card listing. Your Crystal card should work now. Test it and let me know:

Plugged the crystal card into my XT, booted it up, and the UNISOUND program worked great.

Tested compatibility with:

Keen 4 - Adlib/soundblaster detected - Sound working
Prince of Persia - OPL2 music / SB2 digital working
Bubble Bobble - OPL2 music and sound working.

So that is awesome.

JazeFox wrote on 2020-04-18, 13:39:

About ES1869 card, I have been testing a lot with my ES1869 card with different machines and I got very similar result to yours. […]
Show full quote

About ES1869 card, I have been testing a lot with my ES1869 card with different machines and I got very similar result to yours. I am still investigating, but I am almost sure that this chip does not work on very slow systems (ES1868 does).

In my Turbo XT board with a 8088 @8Mhz, PnP settings are not retained by the card, like in your case, and the sound does not work. With a NEC V20 CPU got the same result.
The next "slowest" machine I have now to test is a 386DX, with turbo off (about 8 points in SysInfo benchmark), and there the card works without issues. I tried in 8 bit slots in the same board and the card is working OK as well. I don't have a 286 here.
And with faster machines I tested (486DX, DX2, DX4, Pentium...) the card works OK.

About your 286 machine... at what speed? Do you have similar machines to test it? maybe a slow 386SX, a faster 286...?

Thanks.

My 286 is an 12mhz machine.

I also did some testing on my 386DX40 machine, and I noticed that the variation of card makes a difference.

Card 1 - Compaq ESS1869 AUDIO FEATURE CARD:
Works great UNISOUND.
Works great with ESSCFG.

Card 2 - ESS1869 card with QS100 Wavetable chip and IDE interface :
UNISOUND appears to set up the card ok, and reading back seems OK as well, but audio doesn't in Prince of Persia (neither OPL2 or Digital)
Works great with ESSCFG.

Card 3 - ESS1869 card, partial length (photo in previous post)
UNISOUND locks up when I first run it with normal detection. Fast detection does not find the card
Works great with ESSCFG

Since all these cards work properly with ESSCFG, unisound doesn't seem to be dealing with all the different variations of cards properly. Did you want me to use DUMP.EXE on the pentium system for both of the cards that aren't working right. I did notice that Card 2 was had MPU settings twice in the list.

UNISOUND sounds like a really useful tool, I will definitely try it out. Have you thought about releasing it as open-source? That might help with improving compatibility.

canthearu wrote on 2020-04-19, 06:04:

Since all these cards work properly with ESSCFG, unisound doesn't seem to be dealing with all the different variations of cards properly. Did you want me to use DUMP.EXE on the pentium system for both of the cards that aren't working right. I did notice that Card 2 was had MPU settings twice in the list.

Yes, please, it would be very useful to have dumps for those cards. Thanks!

gordon-creAtive.com wrote on 2020-04-19, 08:32:

UNISOUND sounds like a really useful tool, I will definitely try it out. Have you thought about releasing it as open-source? That might help with improving compatibility.

Thanks. I don't have plans for that right now, sorry.

I've dumped the 2 ESS1869 cards I was having trouble with:

Would you be willing to take a look at the issue I mentioned where an azt2320 card fails to produce sound if Windows has been booted first?

canthearu wrote on 2020-04-20, 14:53:

I've dumped the 2 ESS1869 cards I was having trouble with:

Card 2.zip
Card 3.zip

Thanks, I'll work on it, I guess I'll have a new test version later today.

Oetker wrote on 2020-04-20, 14:56:

Would you be willing to take a look at the issue I mentioned where an azt2320 card fails to produce sound if Windows has been booted first?

Hi, yes, I checked and that behaviour is not happening with my card, it works well after windows boot in pure DOS.

Let's check your card dump, just in case...

if you have a system with PnP BIOS (like a pentium or better machine) with ISA slots, plug the aztech card there, download and run this in a separate folder:

https://mega.nz/file/SMwRRToT#wOoKfXOFgV_4NQj … 1FhIyonHXSN5lY4

After running DUMP.EXE, ZIP the whole folder with the resulting files, and upload the archive here.

canthearu wrote on 2020-04-20, 14:53:

I've dumped the 2 ESS1869 cards I was having trouble with

New v0.68c-TEST version. Let me know if it fixed the initialization issues for those cards.

https://mega.nz/file/YBsyxQjY#1uq4MX8jGAz-fRp … 6_vetYFS6GfZ9kk

JazeFox wrote on 2020-04-20, 15:16:

After running DUMP.EXE, ZIP the whole folder with the resulting files, and upload the archive here.

Here you go, I ran the tool after restarting in MS-Dos mode from Windows and after directly booting into DOS, though I don't think it makes a difference in file content.

Oetker wrote on 2020-04-20, 19:37:

Here you go, I ran the tool after restarting in MS-Dos mode from Windows and after directly booting into DOS, though I don't think it makes a difference in file content.

I checked everything and it's ok. In fact, I tried to replicate your configuration in my system.. I re-wrote my AZT2320 EEPROM with your model's. I installed Windows drivers from Phil's site, recognized and installed HP AZT1008 OK, sound works in Windows, and after restarting in MS-DOS mode it works perfectly (no need to run AZTPNP nor Unisound, because card maintain the config, but anyway I tried the 3 options, without running anything, running AZTPNP and running Unisound. Everything is OK, card works). Rebooting (without turning off system) is OK too.

My test system: 486DX4/100, PCChips M919 (No PnP BIOS), Windows 98 SE.

Maybe your Windows version has something todo with it? other cards installed using similar resources assigned in device manager? What CPU, motherboard, BIOS?... I think the problem is present only in that particular system.... Do you have any other machine to try it? And when you say that the card doesn't work.. is it not recognized by games/apps in DOS? or it does but it does not output sound?

JazeFox wrote on 2020-04-20, 20:37:

I checked everything and it's ok.

Thanks for taking the effort to test this so thoroughly!

The card is not recognized by games, which is why I figured it might be in WSS mode. It could very well just be an issue with my system, I've had mysterious issues with all cards I've tried; I've also had issues with the on-board ESS card not working after re-enabling it in the BIOS because apparently the BIOS had gotten confused, I had to reset the BIOS to get it to work again.

It's a Compaq Deskpro EN SFF P3-550 system, unfortunately it's the only ISA system I've got. I'm running 98SE as well.

One difference is that I'm using the built-in Windows drivers, as those from Phil's site are for Win95. I could try those and see if they make a difference.

In any case there's a workaround (booting directly to DOS). Thanks again.