Ultrasound Daily Digest Fri, 12 Feb 93 Volume 2 : Issue 40 Today's Topics: 1 Meg GUS update was a piece-o-cake Answer to two minor questions CakeWalk + GUS Comanche Errors playing mid files. GUS: OPTI chipset problems + a few phone numbers for everyone GUS and Guitars GUS Standard Mode Windows Drivers IRQ Lines Midi Percussion patches MOD2MIDI More DSP... Piano patch seems short to me too Samples and wav2pat.exe SBOS The GUS SDK Ultima Underworld USS8/Playfile recording background noises Will it emulate anything else? Winjammer X-Wing demo and SBOS X-Wing Demo working XWing w/ GUS Information about the UltraSound Daily Digest (such as mail addresses, request servers, ftp sites, etc., etc.) can be found at the end of the Digest. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 11 Feb 93 15:39:59 EST From: rjw@genrad.com (Rod J. Wittmier) Message-Id: <9302112039.AA18419@animal.genrad.com> Subject: 1 Meg GUS update was a piece-o-cake To: Ultrasound Daily Digest A friend and I order 16 70nsec 256K DRAMS from Elkco Corp (as referred to in past digests) for 68.20 delivered. Each chip was 3.85 and 3% for credit card. We had the chips within two days. We replaced the orginal 256K of 100nsec with the 70nsec raising our chip count for two boards from 12 to 16. I had no problem installing the 1 Meg and the dram tester (dram10b.arj) said that all was ok. If you haven't run the tester yet let me reduce your shock. When it starts, it creates a text based color picture of the card on the right of the screen. At first glance you think the thing has put your video card in a strange mode, but its ok. I would recommend you run it with 256K to get an idea of the display and board confidence. When you run it with a Meg you'll think its hung, as its not real fast (must mean its testing alot?). Just watch the indicators showing the banks of memory gradually say OK I can now load every midi file that refused to load before. I had no problem with Star Control II as many had reported. My configuration is a OPTI chipset based 386DX-33 and Adaptec 1542 SCSI and 12 Megs of RAM. All in all a piece-o-cake. If you haven't went for a Meg yet, go for it and have a GUS of a time, Rod Wittmier ------------------------------ Date: 11 Feb 1993 09:07:20 -0500 (EST) From: STU_JABIRCHE@VAX1.ACS.JMU.EDU Message-Id: <01GUL8ZVN7JC8YF2GJ@VAX1.ACS.JMU.EDU> Subject: Answer to two minor questions To: Ultrasound Daily Digest First of all, someone asked about using a drum machine with a sequencer. I have done this with cakewalk. As a matter of fact, it's the only midi instrument I have, being a guitarist. The way I record with it is, to answer another question asked quite awhile ago, with the sound blaster pro midi cables, left over from my fried SBP. :) Works like a charm. -=Marc=- ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 1993 08:18:57 EST From: Matthew E. Bernold Message-Id: <93042.081858MEB117@psuvm.psu.edu> Subject: CakeWalk + GUS To: Ultrasound Daily Digest Realize that the original poster was having problems with a GUS, which has to load patches into memory from disk. The burden is on the program to load the patches it desires. Read on.... In article <1993Feb11.112939.1@cc.curtin.edu.au>, nmurrayr@cc.curtin.edu.au (Ron Murray) says: > >In article <8FEB93.06235684@skyfox>, e37larsen@skyfox writes: > >> I like cakewalk, but it does not patch cache. In other words, you >> first have to save your song, quit, load it into media player, quit >> load cakewalk, and then edit it. If you change any voices, you do >> it again. Pretty usesless. > > I'm not quite sure what you're on about here. Either the demo version or >the full version of Cakewalk should play midi files for you (assuming that >you have the correct midi driver for your sound board loaded and that the >driver functions properly). One of the advantages of Windows is that such >things should be (relatively) hardware-independent; the program should only >have to make the proper calls to the Windows API to play a midi file. Exactly what Cakewalk (and most other programs) don't do. There is a Windows API call to cache patches which the Ultrasound needs to work. Cakewalk doesn't make this call. Since the Ultrasound is the first widely sold synth that actually uses this call, we are just now finding out which products had the foresight to include these calls. (It's a one or two line call, so it wasn't excluded because of programming difficulties) >It certainly works fine on my Roland MPU-IPC and MT-32, and I expect that it >will work on my PAS16 once I build the MIDI interface. > > Note that the demo version of Cakewalk won't save files; it should still >play them however. > >> I use WinJammer. > > If files play correctly under WinJammer, then they should play under >Cakewalk, which is a much better package (IMHO). I refuse to use WinJammer The only reason that Winjammer works with the GUS is because the author has a Compu$erve address, and is very responsive to the needs of his users. It took him less than 2 weeks to release a maintenance upgrade that included the Patch Caching call. Cakewalk is doing the same thing...in it's next scheduled upgrade in MAY. See how much faster change can be made when you're dealing with an individual rather than a company?? >anyway due to the author's tendency to include those annoying time delays >in the demo versions. Granted, it's his right to include such things if he >wants to. It's also my right to refuse to use his products for that reason. > > .....Ron > >-- > *** > Ron Murray > Internet: nmurrayr@cc.curtin.edu.au > Are we having fun yet? -- Garfield Realize that I was not flaming you for your ignorance of this subject, for I was ignorant once, and someone else enlightened me. What goes around comes around... :-) Matthew E. Bernold MEB117@PSUVM.PSU.EDU <> meb@haydn.psu.edu ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 93 12:31:39 MST From: ehobbs@prism.nmt.edu (Eric Hobbs) Message-Id: <9302111931.AA08481@prism.nmt.edu> Subject: Comanche To: Ultrasound Daily Digest OK, ok. I re-installed comanche today. This is the setup I have: 386-40 4mb FOREX chipset. SBOS 1.22 (no options) V1.51 (?) Comanche Patch installed ULTRASND 220,1,1,11,5 BLASTER A220,I5 D1 T1 SOUNDSET PROG: SB Digitized SOund Port 220 IRQ 5 DMA 1 SB Music ONLY HIMEM and the GUS settings on Boot up. Works great for me. All sounds play (explosions, "incoming", "target destroyed", .....) Doesn't slow the system down. BTW, I've heard it played on s Sound Blaster, and I think the SBOS music sound MUCH better. Hope this helps Eric A Hobbs ehobbs@prism.nmt.edu ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 93 13:34:19 MST From: Rodney Lessard Message-Id: <9302112034.AA46821@acs5.acs.ucalgary.ca> Subject: Errors playing mid files. To: Ultrasound Daily Digest I just got a new GUS and I love it already, big change from that old pc speaker. I have been collecting some midi files and playing them with playmidi. Occasionally I get errors similar to the following: warning: could'nt find program 117 to put on channel 7 depending on the song it gives different program numbers or channel numbers, Load patch failed ghostie - 7 or other instruments. Do I just need to wait for the new patches or is there something else. I believe I have DMA set to a 16 bit channel. Sorry if I haven't got the lingo down right yet. Thanks, Rod | Rod Lessard lessard@acs.ucalgary.ca | | Cosmic Ray Group 2500 University Drive | | Dept. of Physics and Astronomy Calgary, AB, Canada | | University of Calgary (403) 220 - 3640 | ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 10 Feb 1993 20:56:09 GMT From: jrl8@cunixa.cc.columbia.edu (James R Lendino) Message-Id: <1993Feb10.205609.23269@news.columbia.edu> Subject: GUS: OPTI chipset problems + a few phone numbers for everyone To: Ultrasound Daily Digest Distribution: Organization: Columbia University Keywords: I have a 486-33 with an Opti chipset, so I called Gravis about compatibility problems. The tech support guy told me that there is a problem with chipsets 496 and 497, but the card still functions near perfectly. He said that the data-transfer rate is slowed down or something like that, and that it affects very few things. When I asked if it would ever effect the sound quality of the card, since I'm buying it solely for its wavetable synthesis and for its 16-bit sound, he said no. He said something about 8-bit and DMA only (someone help me here, please, I'm stumbling all over the terminology). Should I trust him and order the card, assuming I have the above chipsets? (I haven't ripped open my CPU case yet to see if that is what I have) Thanks for any help anyone can offer. As an aside, he also said that anyone who orders the card now can get free updates of the general MIDI and software, so don't bother waiting. All we have to do is send in our registration card. Also, I know people have been asking about phone numbers of this and that relating to the GUS. Here are a few: Tech support: (604)-431-1807 BBS #: (604)-431-5927 (didn't verify this one) Telemart (800)-521-1973 Telemart, by the way, is selling the card for only $127. They don't take returns for compatibility problems, though, which is why I'm posting this. I really don't need a $127 paperweight that looks like an expansion card, believe me. :-) One last question: 6 100ns 256k DRAM chips are sufficient for upgrading the card to 1 meg, right? I recall someone saying that 100 ns might not be fast enough. Ok, enough rambling for one post. good day to all. -JRL James R. Lendino | Computer Science | Phone: (212)-853-7783 Columbia S.E.A.S. | Internet: jrl8@cunixa.cc.columbia.edu ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 93 09:22:07 EST From: danc@seismo.emr.ca (Dan Carruthers) Message-Id: <9302111422.AA09526@cnsdbs.seismo.emr.ca> Subject: GUS and Guitars To: Ultrasound Daily Digest I just bought a GUS board with the hope brining my guitar into the world of MIDI and digital composing. I would appreciate input from fellow guitarists on their choice of software and hardware. Also, what additional hardware do I need? Somebody out there must have been through it all. Thanks, Dan ------------------------------ Date: 12 Feb 1993 15:31:16 +1000 From: CSC9242546G@lust.latrobe.edu.au Message-Id: <01GUN0M66JEK8Y4XMN@lust.latrobe.edu.au> Subject: GUS Standard Mode Windows Drivers To: Ultrasound Daily Digest Gravis, Well I've been waiting patiently with my OS/2 friends for a GUS Standard Mode Windows 3.1 Driver. My 286 must be able to play something through the GUS in Windows... surely it can with a little help from Gravis. Spanks, Steven Junacko -csc9242546g@lust.latrobe.edu.au ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 1993 09:27:02 -0500 (EST) From: lingy@rpi.edu (Dan Ling) Message-Id: <9302111427.AA06828@client.its.rpi.edu> Subject: IRQ Lines To: Ultrasound Daily Digest Hi there, Could anyone tell me the listing of the IRQs on an AT Bus? I am having IRQ conflicts right now. Too many cards 8( I have 7 cards in my computer. 2 comm, 1 parallel, 1 SB Pro, 1 SCSI-2 controller, 1 Graphics card, 1 multi-port board, one copy card, one ESDI controller plus a monochrome graphics card on the EISA machine. Dan p/s With the GUS it will be 8 cards. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 1993 17:27:53 -0500 (EST) From: treason@gnu.ai.mit.edu Message-Id: <9302112228.AA09956@spiff.gnu.ai.mit.edu> Subject: Midi Percussion patches To: Ultrasound Daily Digest My ultrasound came with te melodic patches for midi, but NO percussion patches. I personally would much rather have the percussion patches ver the melodic ones. When I got patch manager 1.02 it showed only melodic instruments, did the original pathc manager come with the percussion patches, and if not, where can I find such entities? Treason@gnu ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 93 11:06:28 EST From: pccmoddan@aol.com Message-Id: <9302111106.tn48008@aol.com> Subject: MOD2MIDI To: Ultrasound Daily Digest Could someone please mail a uuencoded copy of MOD2MIDI to moddan@bowker.com if this program does exist. I am very interested in it. - Dan Nicholson, PCkS Associates (908)964-8066 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 93 8:59:39 MST From: Stuart Yoshida Message-Id: <9302111559.AA10326@elektra.fc.hp.com> Subject: More DSP... To: Ultrasound Daily Digest First off, I want to say that I was sloppy in my article concerning DSP's. I agree with Gord Wait (jericho!gord@uunet.UU.NET) that an A-to-D converter does not a DSP make. Something must be done to the data, otherwise there isn't any "processing" going on (which is why DSP stands for Digital Signal PROCESSOR/PROCESSING). In the examples I gave, a DSP could be present ONLY if there was more done to the input signal than just converting it from analog-to-digital. If digital mixing is done, then a DSP is most likely present (the data is being processed). The Turtle Beach Multisound has a DSP (regardless of whether it has effects processing capabilities) because it can take a wave sample and synthesize different pitches. But it does not necessarily have a DSP just because it can do 16-bit recording. Sorry for any confusion I caused! -- Stuart Yoshida Internet: yoshida@elektra.fc.hp.com Voice: (303) 229-2324 -- Stuart Yoshida Internet: yoshida@elektra.fc.hp.com Voice: (303) 229-2324 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 93 09:54:25 PST From: jericho!gord@uunet.UU.NET (Gord Wait S-MOS Systems Vancouver Design Center) Message-Id: <9302111754.AA28047@ jericho> Subject: Piano patch seems short to me too To: Ultrasound Daily Digest John Riedl says: >1) The GUS piano patches seem too short to me. Esepcially on the bass >notes the sound dies away a lot faster than it does on my piano. Do >others notice this? Is there a fix? I agree totally. I hope that the new general midi patch set will help solve this one. I have also found that some of the instruments are not quite in tune with others. None of the midi demo songs seem to cause the bad combinations to play together. I hope this will be fixed in the new patch set as well... Gord ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 1993 12:56:33 -0500 (EST) From: "Edmund E. Tsai" Message-Id: Subject: Samples and wav2pat.exe To: Ultrasound Daily Digest Something is wrong with this program because it seems to cut off part of the samples when coverting. For instance I try to take a drum sound out of a MOD file and convert it into a drum patch but the attack of the sound always gets cut off. Anybody have the same problem? Right now I am able to use the gus as a limited sampler, but what is really need is sampler software for the card! That would really sell. Ed ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 93 3:41:24 EST From: jjlucsy@major.cs.mtu.edu (Lucsy) Message-Id: <9302110841.AA17834@major.cs.mtu.edu> Subject: SBOS To: Ultrasound Daily Digest Would anyone happen to know why I can't get SBOS to work at all on my machine? It's not a IRQ/DMA conflict, and no I don't have an OPTi chipset. ANY ideas? Does ANYONE ELSE have this problem? Thanks for any info. -- Joel Lucsy | "Ha, ho, hee, dodge, turn, parry, spin, JJLUCSY@MAJOR.CS.MTU.EDU | thrust... (BOINNNG!)" - Daffy Duck ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 93 08:55:40 EST From: cjw@oclc.org (Craig J. Wright) Message-Id: <9302111355.AA00253@next30-07> Subject: The GUS SDK To: Ultrasound Daily Digest How does one obtain a copy of the SDK for the GUS? How much does it cost? --- Craig J. Wright -- MC 265 OCLC Online Computer Library Center, Inc. 6565 Frantz Road Dublin, Oh 43017-3395 Voice: (614) 764-6114 Fax: (614) 764-6096 Internet: cjw@oclc.org UUCP: ...colnet!fssun09!cjw Compuserve: 70127,3313 Fidonet: 1:226/120.0 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 1993 13:52 MST From: Bryan Brown Message-Id: <9C6E84F64002D759@CC.UTAH.EDU> Subject: Ultima Underworld To: Ultrasound Daily Digest You are not alone in haveing Ultima Underworld make an irritating buzzing noise instead of water. None of the SBOS releases (and beta versions) have worked for that so far. I've learned to just live with it. It's wierd 'cause all the other noises seem to be fine, I've never played it with only a SoundBlaster so I don't know how similar the sounds are but other than the swimming noises I have no complaints with it. If anyone out there gets real swimming noises please let us know how you do it. ******************************************** * * * Through the darkness of future past * Bryan Brown * The Magician longs to see. * Bryan@gse.utah.edu * One chants out between two worlds; * * Fire walk with me. * * -Mike, ^Twin Peaks^ * ******************************************** ------------------------------ Date: 12 Feb 1993 15:24:44 +1000 From: CSC9242546G@lust.latrobe.edu.au Message-Id: <01GUN05U45WI8Y4XMN@lust.latrobe.edu.au> Subject: USS8/Playfile recording background noises To: Ultrasound Daily Digest HI- I've been recording 'clean' signals from my CD player straight into my GUS. My GUS is version 2.4 with 256kb RAM in a 16bit slot in a 16Mhz 286 computer. I find the recording to have static in places where there is little noise. BTW - I was recording Gimme Shelter by the Rolling Stones as well as some instrumental dulcimer (DDD recording). To cure it I tried the following (as mentioned in previous digests): * Clean boot the computer with very few software drivers * Set up a 1.2 mb RAMDRIVE to record onto * Changing to various different 8 and 16 bit DMA channels. * Proceed to record from a CD source at 44.1 kHz onto ramdisk And again I get this annoying background noises. It would be greatly appreciated if somebody could help me. Thanks. Steven Junacko -csc9242546g@lust.latrobe.edu.au ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 93 10:36:52 -0500 From: dauria@cs.bu.edu (David DAuria) Message-Id: <9302111536.AA27670@csa.bu.edu> Subject: Will it emulate anything else? To: Ultrasound Daily Digest Just curious, but will gravis or anybody else release drivers so the ultrasound can emulate other cards?(like a roland or SB pro?) I know it may be a bit early since the soundblaster emulation could be better than what it is. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 1993 10:23:19 -0500 (EST) From: Morgan Stair Message-Id: Subject: Winjammer To: Ultrasound Daily Digest On 10 Feb 1993 STU_JABIRCHE@VAX1.ACS.JMU.EDU wrote: > it's quite perfected yet. There are some files that I can load in with > patch manager and then go to Cakewalk to hear, but Winjammer says it cannot > load in all of the patches. The files play with media player, Cakewalk, > playmidi, and the SB jukebox programs, but Winjammer almost always ditches the > percussion when loading in longer files. For my money, I'll stick with the > inconvenience of using pmanager with Cakewalk rather than registering > Winjammer. > -=Marc=- Ahh... That explains it! I was having the same problems and thought something was screwed up. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 1993 03:55:00 -0500 (EST) From: Kevin Wengcheong Cheng Message-Id: <0fSVFYy00UhW80xkZT@andrew.cmu.edu> Subject: X-Wing demo and SBOS To: Ultrasound Daily Digest The X-Wing demo apparently only works with SBOS 1.22 and previous versions. I can't get it to work with SBOS 1.23b. Thanks for the replies, the music is great! The sound effects are a bit soft compared to the music and I haven't yet figured out how to get the digitized voices but it should just require a little more fiddling around... Wish it was at least a partially playable demo though... probably asking for too much, huh? / Message-Id: Subject: X-Wing Demo working To: Ultrasound Daily Digest Hi, I got the X-Wing demo that can be obtained from wuarchive.wustl.edu in the pub/MSDOS_UPLOADS/demo directory. I saw a previous poster saying they couldn't get it working. I am using sbos v1.22 and used sbos -o1 option. then just run the xblast.bat and everything is cool. The demo is actually pretty good, but then again that says nothing for the game. BTW I am using 1M gus, QEMM on a 386-40 w/ 4M ram (if u r interested) BTW2 the demo readme says that you need at least a 386-25 to run the demo, and with the sbos running you may even need more. (I noticed it was a bit jerky when using sbos) All the more need for native gus supported games! Oh well, happy GUS'ing Adam Cowen cowen@ee.ualberta.ca ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Feb 1993 03:43:10 GMT From: c60c-2lu@web-2a.berkeley.edu (Donald K. Wong) Message-Id: <1993Feb11.034310.21234@pasteur.Berkeley.EDU> Subject: XWing w/ GUS To: Ultrasound Daily Digest In article <1993Feb11.022233.18721@rat.csc.calpoly.edu> kjohnson@polyslo.csc.calpoly.edu (Kurt Edward Johnson) writes: >In article <1993Feb11.005825.14349@pasteur.Berkeley.EDU> c60c-2lu@web-2a.berkeley.edu (Donald K. Wong) writes: >>I just got the XWing demo from wuarchive and did get it to work with SBOS, >>speech and everything. The thing is that the speech is very very soft and >>almost drowned out by the music. That's probably happening to everyone who >>says that they can't get the digitized voices to work. Listen very carefully >>and you should hear them. Anyway know how to make them louder or the music >>softer? >>-- >>Donald K. Wong >>Internet: c60c-2lu@web.berkeley.edu >> khwong@ocf.berkeley.edu > > What version of SBOS are you using? I tried it with 1.22 and it would lock >my computer right after copying th two config files. The demo works just fine >with the Adlib mode. It also works just fine with my Sound Blaster. I haven't >tried taking my SB out to see if that's the problem yet (I have both a GUS and >SB coexisting). > >Kurt I'm using SBOS v1.23 with no settings. And it's the .exe version, not the .sys version. If it matters any, I'm using QEMM v6.03 on a 386-33 equipped with a 1MB GUS. -- Donald K. Wong Internet: c60c-2lu@web.berkeley.edu khwong@ocf.berkeley.edu ------------------------------ End of Ultrasound Daily Digest V2 #40 ******************************