Hi DZ, > Anyone have any idea which PCI sound cards will work with with FreeDOS on > modern systems? Last I've read somewhere the modern motherboards have > changed drastically that it will no longer allow SoundBlaster or similar > clone cards to work correctly with Sound Blaster emulation. > > Any suggestions on what PCI sound cards I should get to get sound to work > with some older DOS applications, particularly older DOS games? I recall > reading somewhere Aureal Vortex cards might work but I want to get some real > advice from subscribers here.
There are some wiki and faq pages about this question: www.unet.univie.ac.at/~a0503736/php/drdoswiki/index.php?n=Main.SoundCardChip www.unet.univie.ac.at/~a0503736/php/drdoswiki/index.php?n=Main.DevelSound http://fd-doc.sourceforge.net/faq/cgi-bin/viewfaq.cgi?faq=Using_FreeDOS/119 http://fd-doc.sourceforge.net/faq/cgi-bin/viewfaq.cgi?faq=Using_FreeDOS/157 http://fd-doc.sourceforge.net/faq/cgi-bin/viewfaq.cgi?faq=Using_FreeDOS/438 The short story is: If you cannot use ISA slots for a real soundblaster compatible soundcard, you can only select which evil method you consider the least evil :-). PCI soundblasters (16, 128 or 512 PCI, Live, Audigy) come with "drivers" which create a whole virtual compatible soundblaster for your DOS software and then send the sound to the (actually AC97 in most cases) real PCI soundblaster hardware. Some VIA chips on mainboards from Pentium III times up to ca single core Athlon64 times create a decent SBPro hardware compatibility but need some (small) drivers for the volume control and init part of the work. They also sometimes use unusual IRQ numbers, which the small drivers try to work around. Cards based on ForteMedia FM801 chipset have similar properties: Hardware which can do AC97 and more or less compatible SBPro, with small drivers to cover some gaps... The FM801 chips are unable to support DMA on a newer (Athlon64x2 etc) mainboard, I assume VIA would have the same problem but I do not know if you can even get VIA based PCI soundcards. I only know the VIA way from sound hardware built into mainboards themselves. Last but not least, there is VSB, a virtual soundblaster (Pro or worse) for DOS which is free software. The idea is similar to the SB Live and other SB-PCI "drivers" but the software is not maintained and there is no support for AC97 hardware yet. You would have to use something like the internal beeper / PC speaker or a Covox printer port D/A converter. Eric PS: Can anybody access (or provide a mirror of) http://easymamecab.mameworld.net/html/snddosdr.htm or http://vsynchmame.mameworld.net/ at the moment? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Crystal Reports - New Free Runtime and 30 Day Trial Check out the new simplified licensing option that enables unlimited royalty-free distribution of the report engine for externally facing server and web deployment. http://p.sf.net/sfu/businessobjects _______________________________________________ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
