Sound Blaster pci128 (CT4700) in dos

[MusicToad]

Hello there,

I have a Sound Blaster PCI128 (CT4700 on the pc board). I am trying to get sound for DOS. I have managed to do this, however none of my old dos games nor Impulse Tracker find the sound card. It seems as if the sound card is installing on IRQ 10 / 11 or 12, I have played with my bios and thats how i have made it jump around from IRQ 10 to 12.

The sound driver (apinit.exe loads successfully and on IRQ 11).
I think the dos games and apps dont recognise IRQ 11 , they like IRQ 7 , but how

I dont know what else to try here. I have tried VDMSOUND and also normal XP managing the memory with the program. There is a problem with EMS memory , where I just dont have anything.
(I have tried the EMM=RAM entry in the config.nt file for windows XP , doesnt dam work)

This is why i am trying to do this in normal DOS mode (windows 98se boot files).

Can anybody assist here?

Thanks

 

[wolluf]

XP doesn't support sound for command prompt (which is what dos games run in in XP). There is (or was) 3rd party software you can buy to rectify this (can't remember where from - try googling if you're interested).

Does the last comment mean you're trying to run the games after booting from 98 boot floppy? If this is the case, you should be able to - just need the right settings in autoexec.bat & config.sys & the drivers available (on the hard drive) & correctly referenced in those 2 files of course (presume your machine is fat32 filestore). Are there instructions for dos with the soundcard drivers?

 

[MusicToad]

Hi,

Let me try to explain more. You see, I want to run DOS games and a so forth but they only seem to detect IRQ 5 or 7.

I have loaded my sound card successfully, so it says when my machine boots up. So I take its word for it.

But, the thing is that it loads on IRQ 11 and it seems that the DOS games dont understand IRQ 11.

Do you see what I am asking for now?
the program that i am using is APINIT.EXE on the boot up, and this is what says to me, ....initialized successfully... but on IRQ 11.

ALSO:
I have tried that program that you were talking about....the VDMSOUND...but it doesnt work , it seems that my EMS memory is not there, so the games will not load ...insuficient memory.

I have also tried to load emm and it doesnt work

Any ideas , please?

Thanks

 

[wolluf]

Can you just say HOW and WHERE you are trying to run these games please? (ie, within XP or by booting from a floppy).

You won't get sound if you're running within XP - unless you use a third party product. The one I was thinking of is here -

http://www.softsystem.co.uk/page4.html

(its not free - but you can try it before buying).

If you're booting from a floppy, its needs configuring as I mentioned in previous post (and if you've got a complete sert of drivers for sound card, including dos ones, there should be some instruction in the package how to set them up for dos)

 

[BadFrog]

Holy timewarp Batman!

Sounds like the old 640k barrier problem where you needed to load drivers into himem just to be able to play doom!

My curiosity lies in what dos games are worth going thru all that for???

"Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy"
Albert Einstein

 

[mainegeek]

MusicToad,
Why don't you setup an old rig with dos for your old games?

 

[felixc]

Many DOS games do not use the drivers that may come with a PCI sound card. They just want to see an ISA SoundBlaster with its fixed interrupt lines and DMA channels.

There are some programs that may redirect interrupts, like the one that wolluf mentions. Will it work in your particular setup? The only way is to try it.

These hardcoded IRQ and DMA lines, that were used so much with the DOS games, are partly responsible about why it took so long for Creative to bring PCI sound cards to market. Too many compatibility issues with older stuff, that would have ruined their reputation. Other companies made PCI cards first, and after a couple of years of letting the games evolve and these companies struggle and solve the compatibility issues, Creative bought them.

 

[ceh4702]

You might get this to work if you had an older motherboard or one with an older soundblaster16 PCI Card. The trick is to be able to force the soundcard to a specific IRQ. This may have to be done in the BIOS and you may have to do it without USB support. Some motherboards have options to reserve an IRQ for a specific PCI Slot.

You may be forced to use dual boot and use win98SE or earlier to get that game to work. WinXP does support Dual boot, but some motherboard do not have chipset drivers for Win95 and the newer ones may not even be supporting win98 since the support for it was dropped by Microsoft.

If you do not like my post feel free to point out your opinion or my errors.