I have a SB16+DB50XG and a LAPC-I on my DOS machine.
I have left the LAPC-I at p330 and IRQ 2 (default settings) and the DB50XG uses port 300.
That way I have compatibillity with older games that only expect a roland an port 330 and for newer games I manually configure the GM port to 300. Descent that you mention works fine that way...

Good thoughts. Please keep 'em coming! 😀

In one of systems - a PIII 450, I have :

1. LAPC-I @ port 330 IRQ2/9

2. SBAWE32 CT3990 @ P300 IRQ5

3. The AWE32's MIDI port is connected to my SC-55 MKII - so I choose port 300 for General MIDI or Sound Canvas supported games.

Note : For SB cards, since the MIDI port supports only non-intelligent mode, it's best to let SCC-1 have the port330. If any game wants to support MIDI, the SCC-1 is the better candidate for that. Only the MT-32 supported games are usually programmed to only use the port330. By the time games started supporting the GM standard, most games would have allowed choosing or changing the MIDI port address.

digitaldoofus wrote:

keropi, I think you made a small typo, in your response (LAPCI should read "port 330")

yes I did, LAPC-I is at 330 😊

Yeah, that's kind of what I was thinking, too. Just let the Roland card have the MIDI port 330. Thanks for the input, guys.

If anyone else has some creative (heh, heh...no pun intended) port choices, it's always interesting to hear them!

FYI, the setup I'm currently playing around with is a 386/SX25 that has only *two* ISA ports -- so I must choose my add-on cards/options very carefully!

Right now, I've got the somewhat rare-ish SB16 CT2750 ASP (that has the accompanying Creative External 2X CD-ROM), in one ISA slot. The other slot is my Roland SCC1. And waiting in the wings, I've got an MT32 that I plan on using with the SCC1's intelligent MIDI port, for games that can benefit from it.

The OTHER possible setup I was contemplating, is using a SB Pro 1 in one ISA slot, and the SCC1 in the second ISA slot. And instead of the Creative 2X CD drive, I could use a different external CD-ROM drive that hooks up to my parallel port.

In either setup, I'd have SB audio effects, Roland GM and MT32 access, and a nice vintage optical drive (which I enjoy having, even on these older systems).

Does anyone have any thoughts on which SB setup you'd go with, if you were me...and why? Would you prefer the SB16, or the SB Pro 1? Remember: I'll mainly be running games designed to work with a 386SX 25MHz or lower speed, so nothing very "advanced" like Descent and the later games.

For my setup the real MPU401 interface (with intelligent mode and all that can drive a MT-32 in Wing Commander) gets to be at 330.

Every other MPU401 interface gets disabled or moved to another address.

My prefered setup is:

AWE 64 Gold: 220/5/1/5/300
MPU401AT: 330/2

The AWE64 is for speech and digital sound effects and has very little noise and no popping / crackling when you power up / reboot / shutdown the machine.

The MPU401 drives whatever Midi module I am using, be it a MT-32, CM-32L or SC-55.

Your SCC1 is a fantastic MPU401 interface AND General Midi in one card. You can drive external modules the same was as a MPU401AT.

Note that my "PC time / era" is a 386DX 33, so slightly more demanding than your games.

Regarding your SX scenario: You will likely have many games that only support Adlib/Sound Blaster and no midi whatsoever. For you I recommend a genuine OPL chip on your soundcard. SB 1, 1.5, 2.0 / Pro 1 or 2 or SB16 or AWE32 doesn't really matter. If you already got a card with an OPL chip just use that...

Personally I would go with a Pro 2 or SB 16 / AWE32 just in case there are games that have OPL3 support. I also prefer to have a line out and these cards are cheaper and easier to get...

Since we talking 386sx machine 😁 I have those cards on my IBM machine (that has 3 ISA slots)
1. CL 5429 vga (no brainer here, the onboard 512k vga is just not that good)
2. A SB 1.5 and I have ordered the gameblaster chips for it too
3. A real MPU-401AT interface which has onboard a Nec DB60-XG and connects externally with a CM-32L ... (haven't really put that combo in yet, but I don't see it won't work, all that is needed afterwards is a sound mixer to choose either DB60 or CM32)

along with a 486slc2/40mhz upgrade this IBM gets ~386DX performance 😀

Looks like an excellent retro rigg!

IBM with 3 ISA slots? What model is it?

it is a PS1/pro 2123, this I assume is a hybrid of a PS2 that had more "standard" parts... it is quite a strange machine in the details, it came with a 386sx/20 and an FPU, uses only 72pin simms with parity, it's slim 1.44 floppy does not have a power connector at all and in order to access the BIOS and it's settings you use a special boot-disk... and ofcourse in all IBM glory both keyboard and mouse ports are PS2 😀

Of course a PS/1! I believe you mentioned this for the cpubench database!

I love the PS/1 machines. PS/1 was targeted for home / education and PS/2 for business...