aigeek wrote on 2020-12-07, 14:14:

What a great undocument parameter for BLASTER ! I can set the IRQ parameters of MPU-401 synchronously now.

Undocumented? Did you read the BLASTER environment variable in unisound.txt? It's listed right there.

It's not a normal BLASTER switch that other programs use. It's something custom for unisound.

SScorpio wrote on 2020-12-07, 15:15:

Undocumented? Did you read the BLASTER environment variable in unisound.txt? It's listed right there.

It's not a normal BLASTER switch that other programs use. It's something custom for unisound.

It’s my stupidity, I didn’t look at UNISOUND.TXT carefully but went to Google >.<

1In addition to the regular BLASTER parameters, this tool also accepts new
2custom ones (optional). All of them are explained here (example values):
3
4A220 I5 D1 H1 P330 E620 W530 J200 C168 Rxxx M310 F388 U9
5
6......
7
8  U: MPU IRQ (for cards that require it. For cards that don't use a MPU IRQ,
9     this parameter will be ignored). It is optional. If not set, best known
10     value for each card will be used.

I have an STB SoundRage 32 (non-Pro) and when I run the TSR, it says I have 0KB RAM. Is there anything I did wrong here?

Thank you for that nice driver/initializer unisound

In my DOS system it runs well and on top it is a very useful tool for test issues. So allow me to ask why the version v0.75e doesen't detect the Terratec Base-1? (AD1816 AJS)
In a video I have seen the version v0.68d, that does detect it very well. Since I have two of these cards, it is unlikely that this is the cause.

Or I'm wrong? May be the error is on my side?

Regards 😀
- Backfire -

@JazeFox, i have a 386 with PC Chips M321 board with CT2830 SoundBlaster 16 and it's a bit unstable and your tool is providing reliable testing grounds as it always crashes at the same point, if i do soft-reboot. (ctrl+alt+del)

It prints the header and after the line, it prints just one dot/period.

What could i provide to you so you could maybe tell me, what it is doing at that point and this way maybe i can get better understanding, why that PC is unstable?

Just a quick success message:

Unisound works great with a "Terratec Gold 16/96 (ESS1868F based)" and also enables the wavetable volume.
(The ESSVOL.EXE tool that originally ships with the card won't enable the wavetable by default, i.e. volume is zero unless set manually)

GigAHerZ wrote on 2020-12-21, 22:54:

@JazeFox, i have a 386 with PC Chips M321 board with CT2830 SoundBlaster 16 and it's a bit unstable and your tool is providing reliable testing grounds as it always crashes at the same point, if i do soft-reboot. (ctrl+alt+del)

It prints the header and after the line, it prints just one dot/period.

What could i provide to you so you could maybe tell me, what it is doing at that point and this way maybe i can get better understanding, why that PC is unstable?

Oh, a quick follow-up: With CT2940 it doesn't happen.
Seems like there is some incompatibility between that 386 PC and CT2830.

For background, i'm successfully using UNISOUND for CT2940, a Vibra16 PnP card and a AWE64 card. (Don't have the board codes at hand right now)
Thank you so much for such a great tool!

OK I need help with setting UNISOUND up for this weird setup:

Card #1: Creative AWE64 (Internally Line Out routed to CM8330 Line In header): I want the configuration to be A240, I5 D3 H7 P300 E620 T6
Zoltrix AV310 (CMI8330A): I want the configuration to be A220 I7 D1 H5 P330 T4

Card #2: Basically I want the AV310 to be used for PCM Audio and FM modulation as well as wavetable MIDI on port 330. I want to use the AWE64 only for routing AWE MIDI output from E620 or external MIDI from P300 (which is routed back into the AWE64 Line In) to the AV310

Can UNISOUND do this kind of initialization by itself?

appiah4 wrote on 2021-01-07, 06:46:

Card #1: Creative AWE64 (Internally Line Out routed to CM8330 Line In header): I want the configuration to be A240, I5 D3 H7 P300 E620 T6

Slightly unrelated, but I remember reading somewhere that certain games expect the AWE port to be SB port + 400. So if you use A240 then it's expected to also go with E640.

I did some limited testing with this (before returning to stock A220 and E620) and I seem to recall Doom engine games not working reliably when the AWE address was not SB+400.

EDIT - found the source for this, it was stated in the AWE32 FAQ (available from Creative's website).

12. What I/O port addresses are used by the EMU8000?

The addresses used by the EMU8000 are relative to the base I/O address of the SB16. EMU8000 Addresses are at 6xxH, AxxH and ExxH. It occupies the first four addresses at each location. For example, if the SB16 base I/O address is 220H, the EMU8000 addresses are 620H-623H, A20H-A23H and E20H- E23H.

Interesting, I never knew about this. A240, I5 D3 H7 P300 E640 T6 for the AWE64 then..

How does UNISOUND configure this setup?

appiah4 wrote on 2021-01-07, 07:26:

How does UNISOUND configure this setup?

Not sure, I only ever used Creative's drivers. I do remember being able to change the parameters with relative ease using CTCU.EXE under DOS 6.22.

BTW, I have edited my previous post with the source for the address correlation, it was from the official AWE32 FAQ. An online version is also available here: http://archive.gamedev.net/archive/reference/ … article445.html

I have Unisound configuring dual sounds cards on my 486 under DOS. I have an SB16 Vibra and YMF719-B. The SB is the main card with a short audio cable from the YMF's unamped out to the SB's line in. The SB handles digital audio and game port, the YMF handles OPL and external MIDI. It's possible to create batch files to switch on the fly to have ADLIB handled by the SB for those few games that don't work on the YMF.

To configure this you need to set blaster for the resources of one card and then run UNISOUND with a -c <cardindex>, then change the blaster variable to the other card's settings and run UNISOUND again. Finally set the blaster one last time with the full list of ports that games will use to config themselves.

EDIT: Also, while it was tricky, you don't need to give a card a configuration for every resource. I believe you can set something to 0 in the set blaster variable and it won't initialize on the card. I don't have the MPU401 or ADLIB defined on the SB, and I don't have the SBPro or gameport configured on the YMF.

Just to follow up Carlostex on page 13, I have a ews64 l (it's an XL board but no front panel). I was all happy to install unisound on that computer (it share a sblive and a tandy nano) since I like your program so much as it saved my hide in the past and isa/pnp setup feel tidy after with a nice comprehensive summary. But I found it was not supported, if you still search for someone to help you test support for your program I would be more than glad to do so.

@JazeFox: I noticed that the description for the MPU address is missing from the BLASTER= documentation section. My proposal:

E: SB AWE base address (620 by default). Only for cards with EMU8000.
P: MPU port address (330 by default). P0 to disable (not all cards might allow to disable this port!)
W: WSS address for cards that require it (530 if not specified).

Disabling MPU worked fine with AWE64 Gold and Vibra16S. AWE64 is also fine with disabling the "OPL3" port btw.

Unisound tool tested with an Aztech Waverider Platinum 3D (AZT2320 chip, Samsung KS0164 General midi wavetable)
Works flawless. SB, FM and General Midi initialization successful, 486 ISA/VLB motherboard.
(just for info: before unisound, I could only get the card working in Windows98 on PnP supporting systems. The original Aztech DOS initialization tool never worked)

Thx a lot
[:Y:]

Awesome work! I replaced the AWE64 DOS drivers with UNISOUND, and it works great.
Just a very minor issue report: There's a typo in UNISOUND's usage screen. It shows /VTnn for both treble and bass.

My SB16 CT2940 works fine in my 286 Tandon thx to the UniSound Driver.
May be there someone who can tell me how to get the IDE Port working ? Currently the 4x Speed CD-Rom drive is connected with a GW2760EX IO controller and i
would like to use the Soundcard instead but the generic drivers and setup programs only work with 386cpu´s and up. I could use my SB-Pro2 CT1600 for Sure but then i have to find a rare Panasonic CD Drive...

Why i try to save one ISA slot? Because i want to install the RTL8090AS Network card.

Installed Devices:
Trident TVGA9000A
GW2760EX IO
SB16 CT2940
XTIDE-CF + 4GB (8Bit XT Slot)
XMS Memory-Card with 3MB (Total 4MB Ram)

I am curious, has anyone been in contact with JazeFox in the last months?
It seems he does not visit here anymore?

I was in communication with him late October last year as we were working on the EWS64 cards for Unisound, but I'm sure he mentioned he was going to be busy which probably explains why he has gone quiet as of late.

I'd also have something for him to look into, if or when he returns (a combination of an ESS 1868 with Ultrasound), where unisound seems to reset the PNP config of the ESS on any startup:

With both cards installed and the ESS configured by ESSCFG it is working nicely. Then add an Ultrasound PNP to this config and configure the ESS:

Then, start unisound to configure the Ultrasound (or even just do a /CL):

The ultrasound pnp gets configured nicely:

But the config of the ESS is lost (every time) - see IRQ / DMA settings:

We were testing a few GUS pnp builds and it drove us nuts, till we figured out that it's not a resource conflict, but an interaction of unisound with the ESS 😁
Using unisound to configure both cards didn't work either.

Going back to the official PnP- and ESS-drivers resolved this issue here.