GUS Daily Digest Thu, 6 Jan 94 007 Volume 10: Issue 6 Today's Topics: CD audio pins DRAM Epas is slow! GUS/CD Faq GUS Daily Digest V10 #5 MegaEm More on the FS5 patch... Star Control II Unreal 1.1 Yet another mention of GUS in a magazine Standard Info: - Meta-info about the GUS can be found at the end of the Digest. - Before you ask a question, please READ THE FAQ. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 5 Jan 1994 06:28:24 -0700 (MST) From: "Lloyd Miller" Subject: Re: CD audio pins > From: Ron Dippold > > > 1. Does anyone know what the CD2 pinouts are on the new gus cards? I have > > the cd1 pinouts (l-gr-gr-r), but was wondering what that cd2 was for. > > > > it is a 3 conductor dip male socket. > > I haven't seen anything about the GUS CD2 pinouts, but the standard > 3-pin connector for CD audio cables these days is left - ground - right. The Toshiba 3401 that I have is g-r-l tho! ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Jan 94 08:24:09 EST From: aa993@freenet.carleton.ca (Christopher L. Tumber) Subject: DRAM I'll be upgrading my GUS DRAM this week-end, but I don't really know what I'm looking for...Can anybody clue me in? In particular, I've heard there's a couple brands to avoid, which? Thanks! -- ****************************************************************************** * Christopher L. Tumber "Extinct is... * * aa993@freenet.carleton.ca Just another marketing tool" * ****************************************************************************** ------------------------------ Date: 5 Jan 94 08:31:00 PST From: EBULALACAO@CSUPomona.Edu Subject: Epas is slow! Yeah...I've experienced the same problem. I downloaded something last night, and the transfer rate went only 1.2k per second! Before it used to be about 8k to 25k per second. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Jan 94 09:36:45 EST From: "Burns Fisher, VMS Engineering 05-Jan-1994 0909" Subject: GUS/CD Faq For the FAQ: There is a company called CD-ROM ACCESS which will make audio cables for all manner of sound/CD combinations for about $12 (+ S&H...$4 US, $6 CA). They specifically mention the GUS. They are a good, inexpensive source for some CDs also. (They are a good source for many CDs, but some cases they are much cheaper. In other cases, only competitive.) A small, friendly outfit with EMAIL!. VOICE (415) 941-2400 CD-ROM ACCESS FAX (415) 941-4900 27361 MOODY ROAD ORDERS (800) 959-5260 LOS ALTOS, CA 94022 Mon-Fri 7-7, Sat 8-5 PDT PAYMENT: We accept VISA or M/C (no surcharge), checks, and money orders. To subscribe to their mailing list: ----------------------- LISTSERV INSTRUCTIONS ------------------------ 1. Send email addressed to LISTSERV@SPACEBBS.COM (not listserve) 2. Subject: is optional. 3a. To unsubscribe, line 1 should be: UNSUB list-cdrom 3b. To subscribe, line 1 should be: SUB list-cdrom 3c. To confirm, line 1 should be: CONFIRM list-cdrom ( You will receive automatic confimation if SUB or UNSUB) Please note this listserv is outbound only to send occasional updates of the Cd-Rom Access catalog. Email addressed to 'list-cdrom' will be forwarded to the personnel at Cd-Rom Access. (I have no connection whatever to this company except as a satisfied customer.) Burns ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Jan 94 13:29:23 PST From: Scott Bobo Subject: Re: GUS Daily Digest V10 #5 Hi all - I've read a couple of complaints about the new windows drivers supplied with Patch Maker Lite. I too am having problems - I can barely hear the music on wav and midi files. The normal chord.wav that sounds when I start Windows is barely audible, even with the volume turned all the way up. When I run Midisoft Recording Session, I turn the main volume all the way up, and the sound is very weak, not nearly as loud as the old drivers. Really unsatisfactory. I looked in system.ini and increased a Vol parameter from 127 to 255, but no luck. Any hints as to what I may be doing wrong? Regards, Scott ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Jan 1994 22:39:21 -0500 (EST) From: Peter Joseph Guillaume Subject: MegaEm Just a quick question about MegaEm. I recently upgraded to a meg on my gus and tMegaem automagically detects that and loads my patches at 44khz, but still only at 8-bit. Is there something I am doing wrong or a limitation of the program. Also, I got Rebel Assault the other day (after being pleased to see a great game with native GUS support) and was horrified when I loaded it up. The sounds are choppy to the point of being intolerable. It sounds like an old record with skips and all. I've read at least one other post concerning this and it seems to have gone unnoticed. Has anyone else had this problem and more importantly, found a solution. Thanks, -Pete ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 05 Jan 1994 12:34:55 -0700 From: ttrusk@post.its.mcw.edu (Thomas C Trusk) Subject: More on the FS5 patch... I have uploaded FS5PATCH.ZIP to the EPAS submit directory. See FS5PATCH.TXT for the readme that originally accompanied the file. The install directions are missing: simply unzip and place the .fso file into your \FLTSIM5 directory with the other .fso files. The patch has a unique name and does not replace any existing file. I quickly tested FS5 with the new SBOS and the patch in place... my computer freezes up during loading after a bit of garbled noises. In the next few days I will attempt to get it working and post my results here. Input from anyone else is encouraged! By the way, the site ftp.iup.edu was back online just a few minutes ago. There are more files FS5 owners may wish to investigate, but there are no new patches. Thomas *=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=* *Thomas Trusk, PhD * MaBellNet: (414) 257-8504 * *Dept. of Cellular Biology & Anatomy * PAGERnet: (414) 778-6825 * *Medical College of Wisconsin * INTERNET: ttrusk@its.mcw.edu * *Milwaukee, WI 53226 * FAXnet: (414) 778-4293 * *=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=* * Send Email (<500 words) to my pager: ttrusk@pager.mcw.edu * *=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=* include "disclaimer.h" ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Jan 1994 16:38:42 -0500 (EST) From: gt7039a@prism.gatech.edu (An anonymous word of wisdom) Subject: Star Control II Need some help on Star Control II... Star Control II sounded great with the GUS set at 256k RAM... However, when I upgraded to 1024k, I kept getting some problems with the instruments clearing... I tried clearing the GUS RAM before I ran the game... but in the middle of the game even, some of the instruments will not change... Is there a patch to fix this problem? I understand that Accolade assumed 256k when writing the game... ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 05 Jan 94 11:12:10 -0500 From: "Momentary language, sexual situations" Subject: Unreal 1.1 Has anyone been able to get this to work? If so, what OS are you running (i.e. MS-DOS, DR DOS, OS/2)? I'm running DR DOS 6.0 and it consistently says it needs 14xxx more bytes, despite the fact that I have 625K free, thanks to QEMM's Stealth. When I run it under OS/2 2.1, the music plays at about 1/2 speed. And it appears that FC changed some of the scroller messages! Anyway, if anyone from FC is out there, it should be not be difficult for such fine coders as yourselves to get Unreal to work under DR DOS. Second Reality does (for the most part). On the same note, does Avalanche's Motion (version 2) produce sound for anyone? Is this yet another case of the "GUS must be at 220h to work?" DDA ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Jan 94 08:22:02 EST From: dklash%sedofis@VM1.NYSED.GOV Subject: Yet another mention of GUS in a magazine ================== *ENCLOSURE* ================== FYI... In the Dec 27th-Jan 3rd, 1994 (2 weeks in one) issue of PC Week Magazine, page 59, Jim Seymour's Opinion column, paragraph 7: "Price is always an issue with equipment for homes PCs, so its low price (just over $100 on the street) makes another Advanced Gravis product, the UltraSound card, one of my favorites. It sounds worlds better than any other low-priced sound card, and it's one of the easiest to install." (he also recommends the Advanced Gravis' PC Game Pad in paragraph 5). I have to agree with the *easiest to install* part. Over Xmas vacation my brother wanted a sound card for his machine. Since he wanted it primarily for games, I did *not* recommend the GUS. We bought a PAS Basic. Although it worked in SoundBlaster emulation, it had numerous DMA conflicts in its diagnostics program and I could not get it to play any MOD files with its Trakker software or DMP 2.78. I took it back and bought a Logitech SoundMan, which is basically the same thing as the PAS (minus a jumper). I did get that to work after fooling with the settings (my brother has a local bus machine, by the way). Everything seemed to be working except when I was playing mods with DMP on the day I was leaving, a song blew up in the middle of playing. Since the card has no problem with games, I gave up on mods. I've NEVER had any problems playing MODS with my GUS, and have always used the defaults for normal stuff. Of course, I always play MODs with GUSMOD, which seems to give me richer sound with no static than any other MOD player. --Dave (dklash%sedofis@sed.bitnet) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 05 Jan 94 11:45:00 PST From: Richards Roger I have used both of the latest GUS Windows drivers; first the one in gus0035.zip and then (released about 6 weeks later) the one shipped with pmak110.zip. The gus0035 driver fixed a number of problems: previous drivers consumed too much conventional memory and therefore would not allow some windows programs to work such as Outside/In for Windows and the Lasermaster WinPrint Postscript interpreter. In addition, I noticed that it also allowed me to set the REMIX parameter in wavemix.ini (this is installed by Microsoft Arcade) to be enabled (set to 1 instead of 2). If REMIX was set to 1 with previous drivers (the default) the MS Arcade games would lock up. Before gus0035 drivers were released, Gravis tech support said that setting REMIX=2 would fix the lockup and it did but the sound quality was poor (only one sound at a time-no mixing.) This made the GUS sound not near as good as a Soundblaster or Pro Audio Spectrum when playing MS Arcade. Now when I got the gus0035.zip drivers, I played with the REMIX parameter and set it to 1 and it worked! No more lockup and the GUS was now starting to give as good of sound in MS Arcade as other sound cards. Well, I installed the "latest" drivers found in pmak110.zip and now MS Arcade locks up if REMIX is set to 1, so I have to set it back to 2 and the lousy sound returns. Fortunately, the memory problems are still fixed and Outside/In and Lasermaster WinPrint still work with the pmak110.zip drivers. Also, it is interesting that the Gravis Mixer/control panel looks very different in each of these driver releases. The gus0035.zip drivers looked like they were developed for the GUS MAX since it had mixer controls that I could not use. Does anyone know the story behind all of these various GUS Windows driver releases? Has Gravis taken a step backwards with the latest Windows drivers? Now, my other problem with the GUS is this: The microphone input, if it is enabled, is *always* mixed with the sound output of the GUS. In my experience, this means that when the microphone is enabled you can hear it through the speakers and in most situations I get feedback! Now to do something as simple as recording a .WAV file, I have to go into the Mixer and turn off the output and enable the microphone, do my recording and then go back to the mixer and disable the mic and enable the output to listen to what I recorded. This is a royal pain. I wonder what it would be like to use the voice recognition programs for Windows? I'd have to pick between sound output or voice input, never both at once. I can't think of any reason why I would want the microphone input to be mixed with the GUS output. This should be adjustable in the Mixer (and other sound cards do let you do this!) This is what I consider to be one of the GUS's greatest design weaknesses. I have heard that the GUS MAX does have better mic mixing control. What I would like to have is a hardware hack that disconnects the mic from the GUS output. The mic input should only be routed to the analog to digital converter input. The Line input is properly routed, it is mixed with the GUS output so that you can mix CD audio with GUS output. It appears that the GUS mixes the mic in and line in and then applies that to the analog to digital converter *and* the output. Does anyone know the circuit design? Is a hardware hack possible? If I knew the schematic, I would take a crack at it. Gravis, will there be a trade-up deal to the GUS MAX? Signed, Feedback-in-Indy (Roger Richards) ------------------------------ End of GUS Daily Digest V10 #6 ******************************