Those are not shorted capacitors but RF bypasses from one ground plane to another, which is why they appear as shorts. What you doescribe sounds more like a bad opamp or a capacitor.

When you say MIDI do you mean Waveblaster header or "MIDI" in Volume control (in which case it is both WB header and OPL3 together) ?

Tiido wrote on 2025-12-27, 10:57:

Those are not shorted capacitors but RF bypasses from one ground plane to another, which is why they appear as shorts. What you doescribe sounds more like a bad opamp or a capacitor.

When you say MIDI do you mean Waveblaster header or "MIDI" in Volume control (in which case it is both WB header and OPL3 together) ?

Thank You on the info about those capacitors,

I tested to play a MIDI file in Windows, one of those included in Windows 98, in MS-DOS with Creative Diagnostics tool, failed the synthesized audio test, I don't have a Waveblater board attached, and I don't know were to look in the board for problems.

So that means OPL3 output in this case.

Have you set the MIDI/music volume in the mixer ? I recall it is muted by default (but my memory is hazy)

As far as which electrolythic capacitors to look at, the ones next to CT1745 are all subject to scrutiny, and especially ones connected to pins 42 and 43 which are the OPL3+WB music input signals.