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Readme.eng
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Optimized MAD16 PRO sound card driver for DOS
----------------------------------------------
In the mid-1990s sound cards build around an OPTi 82c929 chip and a Windows
Sound System compatible codec were widely used. The 82c929 chip is a pure
controller chip and does not produce any sound itself. Its task is to connect a
Windows Sound System compatible 16-bit codec and other components of the sound
card (CD-ROM, FM synthesizer, MIDI interface) to the BUS system of the computer
and to take over the control of these components. In addition it emulates the
DSP of a Sound Blaster Pro on the corresponding ports and converts incoming
commands into those that can be interpreted by the WSS codec.
A sound card constructed in this way supports both the Windows Sound System
Standard with up to 50 kHz sample rate and 16 bit stereo sound, as well as
Sound Blaster Pro - the standard at that time for the sound output of games
under DOS. However, due to the rapid spread of Windows with its audio API,
driver support for DOS became increasingly secondary and the DOS drivers
provided often only served to initialize the card before the Windows driver
took over and often not all functions of the sound card were available under
plain DOS. Later driver versions have therefore often been adapted only scantily
to the further developments of the hardware. But the codecs used in particular
were subject to rapid technical development.
This makes it difficult for today's collectors and friends of old hardware to
get these sound cards to run flawlessly under DOS. Therefore, there are various
hints and tricks for these sound cards on the Internet, such as initializing
the card first with the driver of the card manufacturer and then again with the
reference driver of OPTi.
When I restored an old 486 PC myself and tried to run a Miro FM10 sound card
under DOS, I noticed that the games I tested worked differently well with
different versions of the drivers. In addition, the manufacturer's driver was a
single, badly programmed nuisance. The OPTi driver did improve, but not all
games ran with it....but with every tested version of this driver other games
ran....
So I thought to myself that it should be possible to make more games run well
with some fine-tuning
via software....
The data sheets for the OPTi chips are easy to find on the internet and so I
decided to try it with my own program. I presented these first attempts in the
german DOS-Reloaded Forum and they found great approval.
Every now and then I continued programming, added functions and so I created
my own DOS driver, which lets the user change all settings himself and
configure his sound card optimally.
The driver consists of the following programs:
SETUP.EXE
MIXER.EXE
929INIT.EXE
SETUP
------
Setup.exe allows you the comfortable configuration of all resources of the
sound card and further fine tuning of the sound controller.
The program can be operated either with the keyboard or with the mouse,
if a mouse is detected, the mouse control is automatically switched on.
After starting the program, you can make the usual default settings for
Sound Blaster, WSS, the MPU401 Midi interface and a CD-ROM drive connected
to the card.
When controlling with the mouse, simply click on the small arrows to the
right of the individual settings to increase or decrease the values.
For keyboard control, select the desired option with the arrow keys and
switch the values with "+" or "-". Alternatively also with Enter.
You can select the buttons either with the cursor keys, which are called
with the respective initial letters (A,T,S (or also Q for Quit) ).
With "Save and Quit" the settings are saved and the program is terminated.
At this point you will be asked whether the AUTOEXEC.BAT should be adjusted.
If you answer with "Yes", the SET BLASTER variable will be adjusted to the
current Sound Blaster settings and the file 929INIT.EXE will be entered,
whereby the sound card will be activated every time the computer is started.
If you want to quit the program without saving any changes, simply press ESC.
Test Settings
With the button "Test settings" you can try out whether the sound card works
with the settings made or whether there are hardware conflicts.
Advanced Options
The button "Advances Options" opens another menu with settings that influence
the functionality of the sound chips and especially their compatibility with
the Sound Blaster Pro Standard.
Codec Selection
Here you can select whether a codec from Crystal Semiconductor or one from
Analog Devices is installed on your sound card.
These codecs are compatible with each other, but there are minimal differences
in access times etc. If you should notice problems with distorted sound
output or similar, then first check whether the correct codec is set here.
Frequency for WSS mode / Frequency for SB mode
Here you can select with which settings the codec is set up for the respective
operating mode. This has a big impact on many games.
If audio errors occur in games, sound effects are played back too quickly or
too slowly, or in too low a quality, you can adjust the sample rate here.
While some older games programmed for the simple Sound Blaster work better with
an initialization of the card in mono, newer games for the Sound Blaster Pro
require an initialization with 22 kHz, 8 bit, stereo to output sound effects
in stereo. If you encounter problems with stereo playback despite this setting,
please also use the SBFIX.COM included with the Sound Blaster Pro.
Crystals used for SB frequencies
This setting is closely related to the previous one. Your sound card's codec
uses two crystals (24.5 and 16.9 MHz) to generate sample rates between 5 and 48 kHz.
This setting allows you to select whether both or only the 16 MHz crystal is
available for sample rates in Sound Blaster mode.
If the 16 MHz crystal is used alone, the sample rates will be correspondingly
lower. A few games do not work with the 16+24 MHz option and do not produce
any or distorted sound effects (e.g. Hocus Pocus).
Yamaha Synthesis Chip selection
Select whether your sound card has a Yamaha OPL3 or OPL4 synthesizer chip
installed. An OPL4 must be addressed (also in FM mode) with different waiting
cycles than its predecessor. Therefore, first check these settings if games do
not recognize an FM chip correctly when using an OPL4.
Sound Blaster DSP Version
Here you can select which version of a Sound Blaster DSP is shown to other
programs.
Automatic Volume Control
Automatic volume adjustment. This option causes problems in many games and
should therefore be turned off. A good example for issues with this option
turned on is the shot when starting the game Black Thorne. If this option is
turned on, this sample will be played with hardly audible volume.
Sound Blaster ADPCM support
Turns support for ADPCM compressed audio data on or off.
Unlike the original Sound Blaster models from Creative Labs, most WSS codecs
do not support this method in their hardware.
Decompression is performed by the controller (and CPU) when this option is
turned on.
Command FIFO in Sound Blaster mode
Toggles a small buffer memory on or off where commands for the Sound Blaster
DSP are buffered for sequential processing.
This option should be turned on, especially on faster systems.
SB mixer voice volume emulation
If this setting is enabled, some special properties of the Sound Blaster Pro
mixer chip will be emulated.
I recommend that you leave it turned on, otherwise some games and programs
will have trouble recognizing the card as Sound Blaster.
Allow access to codec in SB mode
When enabled, this option allows direct access to the codec even when
Sound Blaster mode is active. Should be switched off, otherwise malfunctions
may occur.
The "Main menu" button takes you back to the main menu and the "Next" button
opens another page with settings.
Advanced settings - Page 2:
Disable access to FM and SB/WSS
If this option is enabled, the FM chip, Sound Blaster, and Windows Sound System
will not be available and will be disconnected from the system bus.
Only the MPU401 interface is available. This setting is useful if the sound
card is used together with another sound card that does not have an MPU401.
Game Port Timer Mode
Should the internal timer of the sound card or one of the timers of an
externally connected device be used for the timing of the data transfer
via the joystick and MIDI connection?
Filter SB output
Turns the filter in the emulated Sound Blaster Mixer on or off.
Of course, this only works if the sound card is equipped with an appropriate
filter. When outputting in stereo or higher sample rates, the filter should
be switched off.
The other options should only be changed for testing purposes.
Here you can also make settings that have been declared as reserved by the
manufacturer. I strongly recommend to change these settings bur with caution,
as they can lead to malfunctions of the sound card!
Command line commands for Setup.exe:
The setup program supports the following command line commands:
/K Activates keyboard control even if a mouse is present
/NODETECT When the program is started, the hardware is not checked.
/NOINIT The sound card is not reinitialized at the end of the program.
/RESET Overwrites the currently stored settings with the default settings
provided by OPTi.
929INIT
-------
This program initializes the sound card with the settings stored in the setup.
The mode of the sound card can also be easily changed from the command line.
"/INIT"
initializes the sound card with the current settings from the setup.
"/SB" or "/WSS"
set the card to Sound Blaster or Windows Sound System mode.
"/S" or "/M"
switch between mono and stereo output in the current mode.
"/INFO"
outputs the current setting of the sound controller.
"/Q" and "/N"
are additional options:
"/Q" reduces the text output to a minimum
(e.g. for starting from Autoexec.bat)
"/N" allows several initializations in a row
The operation from the command line allows to create batch files for single
games or programs. For example, if the card is normally operated in
Sound Blaster mode and is only to be set to Windows Sound System mode
for a few games and then to Sound Blaster mode again at the end of the game, or
if individual games require an initialization in stereo or mono.
Example for a batch file to run the game Tyrian in WSS mode and then
switch back to Sound Blaster mode:
@ECHO OFF
C:\SOUND\929INIT.EXE /WSS /Q
C:\GAMES\TYRIAN\TYRIAN.EXE
C:\SOUND\929INIT.EXE /SB /Q
MIXER
------
The mixer allows you to set the volume for each of the sound card's inputs
and outputs, as well as perform a sound check.
As in the setup, the mouse is used by default. If no mouse is available,
the cursor keys can be used to select a volume or an option.
With +/- or Enter or the space bar you can adjust the volume or activate or
deactivate settings.
Note: When the mixer is started, the volume levels currently set in the codec
are displayed. By pressing the F1 key, you can quickly load the most recently
saved settings.
Command line commands for Mixer.exe:
The mixer also allows you to change the volume from the command line:
"MIXER.EXE DAC 50 50" sets e.g. the playback volume of digital audio
data (DAC output) for both channels to 50%.
Other possible parameters are:
/K Switches the keyboard control on even if the mouse is present.
/NODETECT Does not check the hardware at program start...
SBFIX
-----
SBFIX is a small, memory-resident program that forces the sound card to output
in stereo in Sound Blaster mode.
Some games have problems with stereo output with OPTi82c929 sound cards and
switch to mono after a short time. Here this small program provides remedy.
Just run it before starting the game.
INSTALLATION OF THE DRIVER
--------------------------
Installing the driver is very easy:
1. Simply copy the files 929INIT.EXE, SETUP.EXE and MIXER.EXEto any directory
on the hard disk.
2. Now change to the directory on your hard disk and start Setup.exe.
Configure the sound card and let the setup program make the necessary
entries in the Autoexec.bat.
3. Start Mixer.exe and set the desired volumes.
That's it. Installation is done.
SOURCE CODE
-----------
The complete source code for the programs contained here has been made available
for free (under MIT license) and can be viewed and downloaded at
https://github.com/JKnipperts/OPTi82c929_Driver
DISCLAIMER
----------
At the end the unfortunately necessary sentence:
I assume no liability for any damage caused by the use of my programs!
February 2019
Jan Knipperts