Ultrasound Daily Digest Sat, 21 Nov 92 Volume 1 : Issue 26 Today's Topics: 486 compatibility - anyone else? A few first impressions Damark dealing working fine Joystick connections as well as MIDI Manual Errors Telemart? Telemart Ships! Ultrasound Daily Digest V1 #25 USS8 Problems and Pleasures What I've heard from Telemart. Digest Address: ultrasound@dsd.es.com To post to tomorrow's digest. Request Server Address: ultrasound-request@dsd.es.com To subscribe, unsubscribe, and request files. Owner Address: ultrasound-owner@dsd.es.com To contact a human if the server has troubles. FTP Site #1: ftp epas.utoronto.ca (/pub/pc/ultrasound) Digest back issues, mirror of request server People responsible: David DeBry, Adam Iles, Thomas Wong, Chris Yuzik, and many others who should be thanked often. :) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 20 Nov 92 8:05:30 CST From: ibmpa!hartmann.austin.ibm.com!lance@ibminet.awdpa.ibm.com (Lance Hartmann) Message-Id: <9211201405.AA10955@hartmann.austin.ibm.com> Subject: 486 compatibility - anyone else? To: Ultrasound Daily Digest I read the account of the UNsuccessful story of installing GUS on a 486/33 in digest #25. Is anyone else running on a 486? I got burned trying to run a SB Pro on my 486/50, so I've put off buying a GUS until I hear some good news from REAL people (ie. NON-Gravis employees). By virtue of the volume of the posts to this mailing list, SURELY someone else has tried the GUS on a 486. Anyone? Anyone? Lance Hartmann (lance%hartmann.austin.ibm.com@ibmpa.awdpa.ibm.com) Yes, that IS a '%' (percent sign) in my network address. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ All statements, comments, opinions, etc. herein reflect those of the author and shall NOT be miscontrued as those of IBM or anyone else for that matter. ------------------------------ Date: 20 Nov 92 10:11:08 EDT From: Richard Wyckoff Message-Id: Subject: A few first impressions To: Ultrasound Daily Digest Like some of us, I just received my GUS from EA. I sent in my order on August 18. Now what sucks is that a friend who ordered his in late September got his on the same day I got mine. Anyway, if you ordered a loooong time ago, and haven't received it yet, get in touch with EA. Following the messages here, it really seems like the problems with the EA deal are not Gravis' fault at all. But then I haven't liked EA since about 1985 (and WHY OH WHY did they have to buy Origin?). If you sent EA a check, find out if they have cashed it yet. It says specifically on their order form that THEY WILL NOT BILL YOUR ACCOUNT until they ship, yet my check was cashed at least three weeks before my GUS arrived. Had I not received the card when I did, there would have been some heads rolling in San Mateo, let me tell you! But about the card itself - it comes in an enormous box that is almost completely empty - just the card, 6 disks, and two tiny little manuals. I was expecting at least an audio cable (though I'm told the only sound card manufacturer that actually goes the extra distance and includes the audio cables is Creative Labs). When I first installed it I tried to get it to co- exist with my SoundBlaster, but ended up just yanking the SB. After that, installation was a snap (surprisingly). I picked all the defaults, and all the software ran the way it was supposed to. I installed the Windows drivers with no problems (except for forgetting to copy in Gravis' midimap.cfg). SBOS works well for me (although for some reason it manages to make the music in any game sound comical). I have a 486/33 with the AMI BIOS, and a slew of other cards. Finally, I tried the card with Starcon2, and was just blown away (and the game itself is fun, too). I do wonder, though, if it is really using the GUS or just playing MODs through the DAC, as a post in Friday's digest hinted. Despite my amazingly pleasant first encounter with this board (I had expected more bugs than Ultima 7), I still have some concerns about it. One is that my friend who got his at the same time still can't get SBOS to emulate the SB's DAC, and is having major problems with Windows. He has a Fastdata 486/33, which is at least not cobbled together like my machine is, and as far as we can tell, did nothing different in the installation. Another concern is the fact that the software it ships with is almost totally useless. There is no DOS mixer, (even though the board is supposed to have a built-in mixer - maybe it's just me, but I would expect some software to control that...) and the Windows 'mixer' is hardly worth the disk space. USS8 is brain-dead (but then I have yet to see an IBM digitized audio program that even begins to approach SoundTools II for the Mac), and even USS10 doesn't look like much of an improvement. Actually, USS8 really seems to be demo crippleware. We don't support this in shareware, why should we put up with it in a commercial product? The rest of the utilities do what they are supposed to do, but are very basic. The manual itself is almost devoid of any technical information. The section on the SBOS options seems to indicate a "this is way too complicated for you to understand so we won't even attempt to explain it" attitude. It would also be nice to know a little bit about the patches the board uses, and how to create your own (maybe the 16-bit daughterboard will come with a patch recorder/editor?). Again, though, I can only compare the GUS to the original Soundblaster 1.0, which included a section on the VOC file format in the manual (something Creative Labs dropped in later versions). To sum up, I like the card, but it's seriously lacking in many areas. I know the shipping delays were because they were waiting for the software, but was this software really worth the wait? ** Richard Wyckoff - Catullus - .Sig radio edit ** ** RWYCKOFF@CARDINAL.SC107.WESLEYAN.EDU -- RWYCKOFF@EAGLE.WESLEYAN.EDU ** ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 20 Nov 92 15:09:04 CST From: Bob Wilson Message-Id: <9211202109.AA22702@schaefer.math.wisc.edu> Subject: Damark dealing working fine To: Ultrasound Daily Digest Early in the GUS's fitful emergence I asked about the Damark deal with a GUS and an LMSI CD drive for $399. Several people have asked me by email how it worked out and I responded privately, but there seems to be enough interest to deserve a general post. The drive is LMSI 205. The interface is daughter card from Gravis. The daughter card is very simple, one main chip, and can be jumpered for different addresses, etc. Damark sent me my unit very promptly, before some of the hints now available on setting things up, and I had to fight the same battles. I got parity error messages when starting Windows, which were due to address conflict between GUS and something. I am not sure what, but readdressing GUS made that go away. The default IRQs for both GUS and CD were unusable, but that got ironed out. Now everything is working fine with one exception, and I have one other complaint. The exception: I disarmed my other joystick port, to use the speed compensating one on GUS. The Gravis software finds it, but Chuck Yeager's Air Combat (which came with the package) doesn't see any joystick. I am not much of a game player and haven't bothered with this one yet, and it seems unlikely to have anything to do with this particular package. The complaint: The driver for the LMSI CD drive, supplied by LMSI, works fine but can't be loaded into high memory. With the default CD buffer assignments (in addition to ones in hardware) this driver takes about 25K and I'd rather move it on up. Presumably all code could be moved up if properly written, although some buffers may need to stay low. I'd gladly settle for a new driver which made that partial move. The bottom line: The Damark deal is fine. The drive isn't fancy but it all works. Setting up addresses and interrupts was a pain but that had nothing to do with this deal but comes from a lack of documentation details from Gravis. I love the board, hate the lack of information! Bob Wilson wilson@math.wisc.edu ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 20 Nov 92 14:58:29 CST From: Bob Wilson Message-Id: <9211202058.AA22237@schaefer.math.wisc.edu> Subject: Joystick connections as well as MIDI To: Ultrasound Daily Digest Earlier there was a request for info on building a MIDI breakout connector for the GUS's 15 pin connector. Dion made available a nice piece on that. What it doesn't show is how to feed through the joystick connections. The first game port connections are shown on the literature with any I/O card, but what is the pinout for the second joystick at the Gravis connector? I would feed that through to a connector for a second joystick, where they would appear on the same pins as for joystick 1. Thanks, Bob Wilson wilson@math.wisc.edu ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 20 Nov 92 10:51:27 PST From: echuang@cco.caltech.edu (Ernest Y. Chuang) Message-Id: <9211201851.AA13109@punisher.caltech.edu> Subject: Manual Errors To: Ultrasound Daily Digest >I found two minor errors in the manuals (I have the newer ones that give >a longer explination about GUS with Windows). The errors are: >(1) On page 19 there is a picture of the cable connections on the GUS. >The picture is labeled incorrectly. The Audio In plug is reversed with >the Microphone in plug, but the back of the GUS box has it labeled >correctly ( the Audio plug should be the closest to the joystick/MIDI) Are you sure about this? What are you doing to test this? Apparently we have different manuals, since the connection diagram is on page 16 in my manual, but it sounds like they show the same thing. The picture in the manual shows the Audio In to be the one further from the joystick port, while the back of the box indicates that the Audio In is the one closer to the joystick port. However, for my card at least, the *manual* is correct. (Either that, or Gravis' Mixer program (for Windows) has its labels reversed...) Toggling the "Line" box in the Mixer applet controls whether I hear the input I plugged into the plug further from the joystick port; while toggling the "Microphone" box in the Mixer controls the input closer to the joystick port. - Ernest Chuang echuang@cco.caltech.edu ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 21 Nov 92 1:15:11 EET From: Lasse Hero Message-Id: <199211202315.AA11804@mdata.fi> Subject: Telemart? To: Ultrasound Daily Digest krusz@krypton.mankato.msus.edu (Jeff M Krusz) wrote: > Anyone got they're GUS from Telemart yet? I was hoping it >would have come today. But hey maybe tommorow or next week or ... >According to Telemart they were supposed to get a shipment in on >Tuesday Anyone know if the got it in? I am trying to be as patient as >possible, I even didn't call Telemart last week :) I guess that it >won't kill me to wait, but maybe I should have waited to sell my >Adlib, since I have been without a sound card for a over a month! >Anyone want to buy an Adlib Programmer's Guide? Send replies to >email please (for everything) or post I guess, I don't care which. I tried faxing then in the beginning of the week, but got no response. (Usually they are very eager to answer question, what comes to my experience..) Maybe you should call them and let us all know..? (And I shouldn't have sold my SBPro so soon..:() ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 20 Nov 92 12:20:58 EST From: elewis@eve.wright.edu (Edward Lewis IV) Message-Id: <9211201720.AA08822@eve.wright.edu.> Subject: Telemart Ships! To: Ultrasound Daily Digest To all of those wondering if Telemart finally has GUS's the answer must be yes! I ordered my GUS from TELEMART on July 17th and received it this morning(Nov 20.). EA gave my a better response time. I ordered on Aug 19 and received that one on Nov 12. Although both of them were beat by MICROCENTER . They had GUS's on Nov 11th. Oh well, I'm a Happy Camper now! The long wait may finally be over for some of you. I do not know how many GUS'sTelemart received. Just thought I would try to keep the anxious informed... Edward Lewis IV elewis@eve.wright.edu Here is Beautiful, Wonderful Dayton, Ohio! ------------------------------ Date: 20 Nov 92 14:08:04 +0100 From: BJORNHK@dhhalden.no Message-Id: Subject: Ultrasound Daily Digest V1 #25 To: Ultrasound Daily Digest > Finally when I was at the earth base under "outfit shit" and I I guess you mean "outfit shiP"? ;-) > took out my "crew holding module" it put little "dispatch" ships on my > screen, maybe 15 of em? Can't do anything with them -- they aren't > really there, but they never go away, even if I leave the screen and > come back. SIGH! > > I hve played less than 2 hours and I am having all these troubles. Is > This game REALLY this buggy or what? Actually I started experiencing the same problem with CIVILIZATION after I installed the GUS, even if it didn't use it. Now, I don't know if it is the GUS' fault, it may just be my processor running hot (no lid..), but still, it's kinda suspicious.... -=* Bjorn :: bjornhk@sofus.dhhalden.no ACCESS DATA :: TEL: (+47)-9-17 50 48/61-97 791 BBS: 61-97 304/97 945 ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 20 Nov 92 20:10:09 AST From: F. Wallace Peers Message-Id: <9211210010.AA12294@orca.es.com> Subject: USS8 Problems and Pleasures To: Ultrasound Daily Digest I just finished experimenting with USS8 and I noticed some wierd things with it. Before I mention them, however, I should tell you that I'm using USS8 ver 3.04 with a 25MHz 386dx computer (no math co if that makes a difference). I have a stacker drive (C) and an unstacked drive (D). I ran USS8, no problem. I connected a line from my radio into the audio line in connector. I then set USS8 to 22kHZ sampling rate, stereo, and clicked the sampling button. First thing I noticed was that my mouse response time went down... way down. I'd compare it to playing Wing Commander on a XT (yes, it was really that bad). Any mouse movement I made was delayed by at least a second which made it next to immpossible to click the sample button off again. The best way I found to stop sampling is to move the mouse pointer to the menu bar across the top of the screen and click like mad. Any where on the bar will do. Next thing I noticed was that although the stero button was selected, I was only getting mono (only one of the meters was moving). So I stoped sampling, clicked the button to mon and started sampling again. Bingo! I was now sampling in stereo. This seemed to be a little weird so I tried it several times, but the buttons are definitely reversed for me. The big question now is "are the audio line in buttons and mic in buttons reversed as well?". I posted to digest #25 and told you that the mannuals had a picture with them labeled wrong, but that the box had them right. I received email from a reader who thought I the manual was right and the box was wrong. All I know is that when I set USS8 to line input and put the feed into the second connector up from the bottom, I get proper input (incidently, if I switch the feed input the signal becomes very weak but I still get a signal). Would someone from Gravis please post the correct audio in and mic in connections? I just don't know for sure anymore. Anyway, previous problems aside, I got brave and decided to record anyway. Once again I set up USS8 at 22kHZ and stero input (which is actually the mono setting for me remember?). I set the sampling levels at 50 for left and right. Then, without pressing the sample button, I hit the recored button. The mouse slowed down a little but not as much as before. I recorded about 15 sec and then stopped it. I then played it back, only to hear what I recorded coming out slow. What I mean is that the voices and music sounded streched out kinda like what a cassette sounds like just before your tape player eats it :-) My guess as to whay is because I was recording on my stacker drive. I also have a virus checker that stays TSR and checks constantly for a virus. So I changed to my unstacked drive, disabled my virus checker and then rebooted. I then repeated the same steps as above for recording and played it back. The result? Would you believe SUCCESS!! It worked great. I plaed it to my girlfriend over the phone and she couldn't tell it wasn't the radio, so I guess it passes the test :-) Seriously though it did sound good. As for why it didn't work the first time, my bet is on the stacker. I'd like to get somebody with a 486 to try it on a stacker drive just to see if maybe my computer isn't fast enough to handle the recording and stacker at the same time... Any takers? PS- Sorry for being so long winded but I thought the more detailed I was the better in this case. Happy recording! -- <><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> <> <> <> PEERSFW@NEWTON.CCS.TUNS.CA F. Wallace Peers <> <> <> <> <> <> "There is no law that vulgarity and literary <> <> excellence cannot coexist." <> <> - A. Trevor Hodge <> <> <> <> <> <> "But we'll never survive!" - Buttercup <> <> "Nonsense. You're just saying that because <> <> no one has ever done it before." - Westly <> <> - The Princess Bride <> <> <> <><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 20 Nov 92 11:53:08 EST From: Kevin Dangoor Message-Id: <199211201653.AA16117@quip.eecs.umich.edu> Subject: What I've heard from Telemart. To: Ultrasound Daily Digest I talked for several minutes with one of the people at Telemart. He said that Gravis was possibly having trouble with customs and that he heard that the card may not be available stateside until February. He was rather surprised when I told him that Diskcount software had already had two shipments of them and that people had also gotten them from PC Zone, Electronic Arts and Damark. Anyway, November 23rd is their ETA, but they just keep moving that back so it's not very trustworthy. It seems that Telemart buys their stuff from Ingram (and once Ingram's got it, it will probably be all over the place). So if anyone wants to pester Gravis about where the GUS cards are going, ask them about Ingram. -- Kevin (Tazzzzz) Dangoor \ Locomotive (adj): powered by insanity. University of Michigan / Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA \ This ultraDeluxe powerpack sig has 50% less internet: tazzzzz@eecs.umich.edu / saturated sponge than the competing brands! ------------------------------ End of Ultrasound Daily Digest V1 #26 ******************************