Ultrasound Daily Digest Thu, 15 Apr 1993 Volume 3 : Issue 15 Today's Topics: [Gus] List of working motherboards Advanced Gravis MultiMedia CD Rom package Review archive.epas Cakewalk or similar Prgm CSound Drum Patches with WinJammer 2.24 Gravis Hardware question GUS Patches invalid sboslib.sbs error message Source codes for Ultrasound Ultima 7 Ultrasound Daily Digest V3 #14 Ultrasound FTP Sites - New files validated - April 12, 93 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. *** HEY!!! *** Before you ask a question, *** READ THE FAQ ***. It's available on the request server and the ftp sites, or check the newsgroup archives. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1993 17:08:31 GMT From: mer6g@fuggles.acc.Virginia.EDU (Marc Rouleau) Subject: Re: [Gus] List of working motherboards Message-ID: ReprintFrom: comp.sys.ibm.pc.soundcard Last week I asked people with motherboards which support all of the Gravis Ultrasound's features to write me. Thanks to all who did so. I'd like to refocus and continue this study. I think it was unwise of me to ask specifically about working motherboards. Knowing about the ones that don't work is just as important if you're shopping for a new computer or a replacement. So let's try again with only three brief questions: 1. Describe your motherboard. 2. Can you use 16-bit DMA? 3. Any other problems? I'm not sure how to interpret all of the responses I have received in this context. I'll attempt the beginning of a table right here and include the responses at the end of this article. The first entry is my own; the others were extracted from my email. Please email me with your contributions to this list. -- Marc Rouleau 1. 486-33, OPTI ?/?/82C206Q, 1/93 2. No 3. Windows crashes after doing too much sound-oriented stuff. DOS stuff works fine: sbos, playmidi, gusmod, p669gu0, etc. 1. 386-25/33/40, OPTI 82C391/82C392/82C206 2. Yes 3. No reported problems 1. Micronics 386, 2/91 (Gateway 2000) 2. ? 3. No reported problems 1. DTK 486-33dx, Symphony, 8/92 2. ? 3. No reported problems 1. 486-50 VLB, Bioteq 2. ? 3. Didn't work 1. 386-40, Bioteq 2. ? 3. No reported problems 1. 486-50 VLB, UMC 2. ? 3. No reported problems 1. 486DLC (Cyrix), Opti 391 motherboard, 12/92 (HI-TECH) 2. No 3. No reported problems 1. 286-20, C&T NEAT 82C212B/82C206/? 2. Yes 3. No reported problems *************************************************************** From: f92-hst@nada.kth.se Works great with my MB... > - Processor(s) supported 386-25/33/40 > - Chipset description OPTi 82c391, 82c392, 82c206 > - Brand name PAT38PX > - Source > - Date purchased > - Cost Don't have a clue. > - Anything else of interest This is the infamous "82c206" chip which supposedly won't work with 16-bit DMA's. However, I use both a SCSI card and the GUS with 16-bit DMA:s and it works fine. *************************************************************** From: "Matthew E. Bernold" My motherboard works fine with the GUS. Here's the specs that I know right off hand. 386 processor. 8 SIMM slots (max 1meg SIMMs though). Made by Micronics, shipped with my Gateway 2000 system in February of 1991. Phoenix BIOS. Don't know what chipset it is though. *************************************************************** From: ttrusk@post.its.mcw.edu In answer to your post on c.s.i.p.s.: I have a 486dx-33 with 4Mb of non-parity memory (3-chip SIMMS). The Symphony chipset is on the motherboard. (I don't remember the specifics, but next time I open the box I'll get them for you.) The brand is KLH (they went out of the computer business last winter), but all the parts (including BIOS) suggest a DTK product. I bought the system in August of 1992 for $2000. The GUS installed with no problems whatsoever. All the software seems to work fine as long as I follow the advice I see in the DIGEST. Windows does not crash (even with SMARTDRV 4.1). XWING experiences NO slowdowns as long as music is turned off. Links386 works with -x2 on SBOS 2.04. All in all, a (thankfully) uneventful installation. Hope this is helpful. *************************************************************** From: Wake of the Flood My old chipset didn't work - Bioteq chipset on a 486-50 Vesa LB. But it did work on a Bioteq chipset on a 386-40! I got a 486-50 UMC chipset Vesa LB and GUS works fine. I am, however, returning it to the store. Pain in the neck. Hope you find the info useful in your report which will save the Gravis folks a big headache. *************************************************************** From: Dennis Ernst > - Processor(s) supported 486DLC (Cylix) > - Chipset description OPTI (OPTI 391 Motherboard) > - Brand name HI-TECH > - Source HI-TECH > - Date purchased 12/20/92 > - Cost ~ $1300 > - Anything else of interest 16 bit DMA hangs the machine, everything else seems to be ok *************************************************************** From: David Vu The GUS works fine under DOS for me. I don't use Windows :) Using 16 bit DMA too! My system's specs: AT clone DOS 5.0 286 - 20 MHz Chips & Tech NEAT chipset, I think it's 82C212B, 82C206, and another one, which I can't remember. I personally think any PC with a Chips&Tech chipset should drive the GUS well. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 13 Apr 93 02:30:10 GMT From: frandsen%milo@plains.nodak.edu (Bill Frandsen) Subject: Advanced Gravis MultiMedia CD Rom package Review Message-ID: <1993Apr13.023010.21644@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu> ReprintFrom: alt.cd-rom,comp.sys.ibm.pc.soundcard Hello. A few weeks ago someone asked if anyone had seen/tried the Advanecd Gravis Multi-Media CD Rom package they saw at their local "superstore" (BestBuy). Well...here's my review: Good Points: ------------ 1. Inexpensive! $379 on sale from $399 during a "Everything's on Sale" Weekend. 2. Came with Software Toolworks MM Encyclopedia. 3. Came with SelectWare Demo CD of products for DOS, Windows, OS/2, MM, more.. Bad Points: ----------- 1. SBOS Crashes when shelling to DOS in Windows. (No morre sound after that or a EMM386 error=REBOOT) 2. Gravis's SB emulation was poor. 3. CHEESY way daughterboard attached to Gravis board. 4. Corrupted FAT and files due to sampling with Graivs + Dos 6's DBLSPACE. Well, thats the summary. Here is the nitty-gritty: As I mentioned, it was inexpensive. Even at $399, I thought, "HEY! A complete package, with 2 ROMS, a 16 bit sound card, one slot, CADDYLESS, what more could I want/need......Alot I found out" First the drive, since that was the reason I bought it: It's a CM205 LMSI (Laser Magnetic Storage Incorporate), a subsidiary of Phillips, sub of Phillips NA, sub of Phillips Europe. This drivve is the same one sold by Insight called the "Talon" I *THINK*. It claimed on the Gravis Box: <375 ms access speed, 154k/sec Mode 1, 174K/s Mode 2. But oddly enough the specs in the LMSI manual stated 400 ms AVG access speed, no greater than 600 ms latency. It was nice that the drive was caddyless. It however, was not as nice as your home CD player. There was a tray that you had to physically TUG out, drop the disk in, and SHOVE back in until it clicked (Locked). It would return out about 1/2 an inch. To Stop the disk and eject, you SHOVED it back in, it clicked, and then TUG it all the way out. All the time it felt like you were going against a gear (sorta like your home CD player if your tray door is closing, and you try to pull it open manually). About 50% of the time, I did not get the disk seated and the drive would not recognize a disk was inserted. I had to unlatch it, and reseat it and try again. On the front was a headphone jack, a volume control (and switch, that if you pushed in the control, and had an audio CD in, it would start plaing track 1, and each push would skip to the next track). It also had a gree LED that indicated the reading of the disk (either Audio/ROM). On the back: A Proprietary 20+ pin ribbon cable, a 4 pin Audio-Out and a proprietary location to connect for digital sub-code out (not used), and of course a standard 4 pin power jack. The Software for the CD Rom: A driver loaded in CONFIG.SYS, and MSCDEX 2.21. I just got DOS 6, which has MSCDEX 2.22, which could be loaded into UMB's, and worked fine. The manual didn't state anything about PHOTO-CD, but the readme on the disk stated "Is now PHOTO-CD compatible, contact Eastman/Kodak for software". It didn't state Singe or multi-session, and I didn't get a chance to try. The Controller: The long awaited LMSI daughter board for the Gravis sound card. It consisted of a NEC? Chip, I think a 74S something and a few resistors and capacitors. It connected to the Gravis directly above the 8 bit part of the expansion slot connectors via a long row of "jumpers" (like most daughterboards). Problem was, the Capacitors on the Gravis, and the chips on the LMSI controller tochehed each other (in fact two flat chips were sandwiched together!). And this only allowed the pins to connect about 1/8 of the 1/4 inch given, and therefore, if I bumped the case, or through heat expansion, the board came loose multiple times. I could not make it stay together at all. The Gravis: Well, enough has been said about it, both good and bad. It had EXCELLENT sound in its native mode (Zone66, and the demos that came with it). It blew away the sound I remember from my Old Amiga. However, when it came to Soundblaster support, it was horrible. It came with the 1.2 manuals, and 2.04 disks. SBOS would load fine from DOS, then when I entered windows, about every other time when I shelled out to DOS, I'd get a 5 second delay before the prompt (or program to start), and a msg indicating SBOS interrupt error. I tried all the interupts to no avail. Sometimes it'd give me a EMM386 Error right from windows and have to reboot the system. After the error, no sound in DOS or Windows permanently. Sampling with Sound Recorder and the mixer in windows was good (60 seconds of 22Khz Mono).. but in DOS at any rate with it's USS8 program, I'd get clicking every few seconds. (I hear this is due to only 256 K of memory) But why didn't it do it in windows? Also, It only came with 256k of memory instead of the 512K I thought they were shipping "standard" now. The 2.04 disks had a date of 3-13 or something on them, so the package was only 1 month old (The CD Rom stated Jan 93 MFG) Also, after installing DBLSpace on the drive and sampling with USS8, I started to loose my device drivers in windows, it claimed "corrupted" files, I couldn't even reinstall them, I had to blow away dblspace and windows then reinstalled them. (Taking off Dblspace is another story.....but that's for comp.sys.ibm.pc.*) It also corrupted my DOS directory, etc.. Since I took off Ultrasound, and reinstalled dblspace...no problems. I returned the package for a refund, and will probably wait for better support from Gravis for SB, a better controller connection, and a faster drive (200ms/300k) in about a year I'll bet those will be down to the $400 for a package deal... Anyone else have a similar experience with this package? Bill ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1993 18:03:02 -0500 (EDT) From: adam@epas.utoronto.ca (Adam Iles) Subject: Re: archive.epas Message-ID: <9304142203.AA04342@epas.utoronto.ca> On Tue 13 Apr 1993, Morgan Stair wrote > I think the problem is that the name server for epas is screwed up or so > slow that it doesn't respond in time. It seems to be either one of the name servers between the root name server (anyone know which that is off hand?) and our nameserver. I cannot find any problems with our name server, and haven't messed around with it recently. > The address (128.100.160.36) always seems to work, however. This will work until the archive/machine is moved to a different IP address (not likely in the foreseeable future). > -Morgan I'd also like to warn you that over the next few days archive.epas may come down periodically between 9:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m. EDT. We're doing some testing of network software on that machine which involves swapping cards. It should be up continuously outside of those hours. -- Adam Iles -- EPAS Computing. adam@epas.utoronto.ca ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1993 13:24 AST From: CHRIS FORGERON Subject: Cakewalk or similar Prgm Message-ID: <01GX045CHSCK000SJX@HUSKY1.STMARYS.CA> Anyone know where I can obtain Cakewalk (FTP Site, ect) or a similar program so I can run Windows intensive software without Win-doze? Tnx ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1993 19:14:43 -0400 From: Scott D Palmer Subject: CSound Message-ID: <199304142314.AA20899@chopin.udel.edu> Hi, I was wondering if there any ports of CSound to MSDOS that are available. I thought that I saw someone saying that they were working on one, but I can't seem to find any info on them anymore. If anyone can point me in the right direction, I'd really appreciate it. ---------------- Scott Palmer palmer@chopin.udel.edu University of Delaware, CIS/MIS '92 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1993 11:27:40 -0500 From: Nathan Sandland Subject: Drum Patches with WinJammer 2.24 Message-ID: <199304141627.AA20215@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> I recently obtained WinJammer 2.24, and tried playing around with making and editing midi files, when I found that I can't figure out how to use patches from the percussion set of patches--only the melodic ones in making a midi file. Looking at pre-written midi files, I found that those tracks with percussion instruments had "none" listed in the patch column, and also all used channel 10 to play the percussion with. I looked through the help information supplied with WinJammer, and found no information about this. Does anyone know how I can specify a percussion instrument in a midi file created by WinJammer? Thanks! ____ /\ / \ o o / \/ | < / / \__/ / / ___ __|__ ___ Nathan Sandland / | / \/ | / / University of Illinois / \ | | /| | / n-sandland@uiuc.edu / \/\___/\_/ \__/ \___/ sandland@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1993 16:11:56 -0700 From: Eric N. Liao Subject: Gravis Hardware question Message-ID: <199304142311.AA13342@aerospace.aero.org> What's the fastest sampling rate the GF1 chip supports? With playfile, the maximum is 65535 Hz. Is this the hardware limit of the GF1 chip, or did Gravis just decide to use a 16-bit register to store sample rate, even though the Gravis can do better? I tried to make my own MIDI patch, but it didn't work. I think I did everythig right. Here's what I did. I sampled a piano with a microphone (the resulting .WAV was 8-bit 22KHz, and pretty noisy.) Then, I wrote my own C program that ripped out the patch header and "sample block" header from the ACPIANO.PAT file, and wrote the two headers & actual piano sample in the correct order, to a different file. I adjusted the "number of samples", "sample length" and the "flag byte" (I'm using the terminology of the new PATINFO program) with my C program. In the flag byte, I turned off looping, and changed another bit so my patch would be identified as an 8-bit patch. Then, I ran patinfo on my newly created custom "patch", and everything looked fine. All the important numbers were correct (I have no idea what vibrato, tremolo, etc. are for.) But when I tried to use it with a MIDI file, playmidi returned an error. I forgot what exactly it was, but I have 1024k on my GUS, so it's not related to memory. And, there wasa lot of discussion about "load patch error - 6", and I know it was NOT that. The only thing I could think of is that maybe playmidi can't handle 8-bit patches. Can anyone confirm this? All the GF1/Forte MIDI patches are 16-bit. I even tried the "-8" option to load my patch as 8-bit, but I still got the same error. I am modifying my program, so I can enter in the values I want changed. (The first version had certain values "hard-coded," and I didn't feel like using Norton Diskeditor and a hex calculator just to locate the patch header. I figure I'll save time in the long run if I just rewrite the C code that grafts a patch heaer and sample.) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1993 16:59:55 GMT From: adhir@wam.umd.edu (Al Dhir) Subject: Re: GUS Patches Message-ID: <1993Apr14.165955.12651@wam.umd.edu> ReprintFrom: comp.sys.ibm.pc.soundcard In article <1993Apr14.042006.13879@rose.com> francisco.perez@rose.com (francisco perez) writes: >Anyone know if there's a way to convert any of the v1.21 patches to the >v2.01 patches? GUS patches, that is. > >I don't know if it's just me, but the ACPIANO.PAT in the version 2 disks >don't seem to sound as good as the version 1.21's. What I want to do is >replace the v2 ACPIANO.PAT with the v1.21, but I heard that the headers >don't match. Any of you GUS techies know how to do this? >--- On a related note, I really miss the helicopter patch from the last set of disks...I lost it ever since installing the new set of disks. The patch on the original disks sounded like a big engine starting up with a satisfying growl...loved it! But the new one sounds like a real helicopter...which is OK, but I miss the old one. Is there any way I can keep both? Also, the new flute sound doesn't sound as good as the old one either. Comments? -- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Al Dhir Technical Consulting Staff Internet: adhir@cygnus.umd.edu University of Maryland, College Park Bitnet: adhir%cygnus.umd.edu@Interbit (301) 405-1500 * (301) 405-3014 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1993 11:52:21 EDT From: Marc Rouleau Subject: Re: invalid sboslib.sbs error message Message-ID: <9304141552.AA01482@orca.es.com> On Apr 12, 4:14pm, "Dave Bakken" wrote: > I installed the new five 2.01 disks Saturday, and they seem > to work wonderfully. Then I installed the SBOS 2.04 files > as directed, i.e., by unzipping them into my ultrasnd/sbos > directory. There's another part to the installation. It's described in the doc file that comes with sbos2.04. You have to copy the two executables -- I think they're called loadsbos.exe and sbosdrv.exe -- to the main ultrasnd directory. Also I suppose sbos.bat should go up there. Also, there's a bug in the sbos.bat file that's included with one of these distributions -- it presumes that you're using emm386 as a memory manager by doing "lh sbosdrv.exe". This will really mess things up if you use qemm or 386max. I have had trouble loading sbosdrv high with emm386 anyway, so I recommend taking the "lh " out regardless. Loading sbosdrv high with 386max works fine for me, btw. > P.S. As an aside, I found it interesting that the install program > modified my autoexec.bat file to call sbos.bat, even though I > later fire up windows. The new sbos disables itself automatically when you start Windows, so this should not be a problem for you. -- Marc Rouleau ------------------------------ Date: 14 Apr 93 9:49 -0700 From: Thomas Wong Subject: Source codes for Ultrasound Message-ID: <3404*twong@civil.ubc.ca> Seems like we are getting more and more developpers/programmers for the Ultrasound (HURRAY!). What I have done on the archive thus far is dump all the code in ..../ultrasound/util and the unix ones in .../util/unix. But these directories are really for finished products/programs so if there is really going to be a group of developpers forming here and we want to start collecting a library of routines for all to share and contribute to. I'll make a new directory called ..../source. And if this come to exist, do you want me to have subdirectories by language (c, basic, assembly) or by platform (pc, unix, os2...)? Thomas. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 14 Apr 93 14:47:42 CDT From: Michael J Stumpf Subject: Ultima 7 Message-ID: <9304141947.AA13733@tamsun.tamu.edu> To make ultima 7 work: You're probably using irq 7 in the autoexec... change the blaster variable to irq 5, and set the ultima 7 sound set up to irq 5. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 14 Apr 93 09:22:10 EDT From: mmetzger@Athena.MIT.EDU Subject: Re: Ultrasound Daily Digest V3 #14 Message-ID: <9304141322.AA20469@m66-080-15> Yeah , I cut off in the middle of a sentence because my mail program was being flaky, and I realized I had to be in class. Curious to know if the last sentence you saw was the last one I typed. Anyway, sorry about that, and I'd love to tell you more about how wonderful LISP is, But I've been programming in it since 10 'o the clock last night, continously. Worse yet, the program I was working with was itself a LISP interpreter. Apparently no one told MIT that CS students aren't supposed to do this sort of thing until they are seniors. Anyway my brain is fried, I haven't slept in 26 hours and probably won't get a chance for at least another 15 or so, and the only thing holding me together is my unshowered skin and a large cup of black coffee. I'll get back to you later when I'm feeling less zombyish. Bye Me ------------------------------ Date: 13 Apr 1993 04:54:03 GMT From: twong@civil.ubc.ca (Thomas Wong) Subject: Ultrasound FTP Sites - New files validated - April 12, 93 Message-ID: <1qdh1bINN7p8@iskut.ucs.ubc.ca> ReprintFrom: comp.sys.ibm.pc.soundcard GRAVIS ULTRASOUND FTP SITES NEWS ========================================================================== Ftp Site: archive.epas.utoronto.ca Directory: pub/pc/ultrasound wuarchive.wustl.edu systems/msdos/ultrasound ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Here are the files I validated today, April 12, 1993.... Subdirectory: ..../sound/midi/files chopin.lzh, rushstuf.zip, scdemos.zip (new), tomneat.zip, tomsdinr.zip, gusmid1m.zip (Gravis' new midi demo. Need install disk 2.02 and 1 meg GUS. Some of the best midis I've ever heard!) Subdirectory: ..../sound/midi/util cmf2mid.zip - SB's CMF to MIDI convertors version 1.0 Subdirectory: ..../util/dos gusdram.zip - Ultrasound DRAM tester from Forte (programmer for Gravis) gustest.exe - GUS Tester version 1.21 Subdirectory: ..../sound/voc/util gvoc15.zip - GVOC voc player version 1.5 Subdirectory: ..../sound/misc mmv110.zip - Module Menu 1.0 shell/menu interface for other players noismstr.zip - NoiseMaker 1.0 sample (wav,voc) editor for Windows Subdirectory: ..../misc wmd0022w.exe - Waffer! Multimedia Digest issue #22 for Windows Subdirectory: ..../game sc2_demo.zip - Star Control II demo, a must see for those with Ultrasound but haven't bought Star Control II yet, awesome sound Well, that's it for this time. Have fun GUSers!!! Thomas. ------------------------------ End of Ultrasound Daily Digest V3 #15 *************************************