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Date: Sat, 13 Feb 93 00:07:03 MST
From: Ultrasound Digest Owner <[e-mail]>
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Subject: Ultrasound Daily Digest V2 #41
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Ultrasound Daily Digest     Sat, 13 Feb 93       Volume 2 : Issue  41

Today's Topics:
                          GUS for 32-bit OSs
                     Help! Grollier CD with GUS.
                        Opti chipset problems
       Questions about memory & Starcon 2 (answer if you can!)
                           SBTALKER and GUS
                           Star Control II
                   UltraMix Applet autoinstallation
                   UltraSound Mixer and a bus mouse
                      Winjammer/Cakewalk fiasco

    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: 12 Feb 93 12:01:32 EDT
From: Richard Wyckoff <[e-mail]>
Message-Id: <[e-mail]>
Subject: GUS for 32-bit OSs
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <[e-mail]>

> From: [e-mail] (Ron Christian x1545)
> Subject: A few questions
>
> The other question was prompted to a visit to a friend's house, where he
> is working on getting Windows NT to talk to a Sun.  My experience with the
> NT beta code has convinced me that I want to dump 3.1 as soon as possible...
> Is anyone working on an NT driver for the Gravis?

and...

>
> From: DEATH BEFORE DISCO <[e-mail]>
> Subject: Where are the OS/2 drivers???
>
> What is the situation on these drivers?? I was told by people at Forte
> (yes, Forte) that they were 'being worked on' back in December.

    The GUS does work under OS/2, so there's no stopping people from writing
32-bit GUS applications.  Of course, there's no PM driver, no MMPM/2
driver, no virtual mode driver, but that doesn't mean apps can't be written
before those drivers appear...I'm looking into using Renaissance's GUS info
file and GCC for OS/2 to write some simple things (text mode).  This summer,
or maybe spring break, I'm going to look into writing a sample editor for
Presentation Manager (inspired by Sound Designer II for the Mac, which, for
all its problems, still blows away any shareware editor I've seen, and the few
professional editors I've seen in stores look like junk, too, mainly because
the waveform window is *LIMITED SIZE*...i.e. you can't scale it).

    As for Windows NT (giggle, chuckle) all I can say is, I'm not going to
write for an OS that is still in beta and is going to require twice as much
hard disk space and RAM as I have.  If anyone else wants to, it's your time!

**              Richard Wyckoff - Catullus - .Sig radio edit               **
** [e-mail]  --  [e-mail]   **

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 12 Feb 93 22:07:28 CST
From: Albert Foo <[e-mail]>
Message-Id: <[e-mail]>
Subject: Help! Grollier CD with GUS.
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <[e-mail]>

My Grollier Encyclopedia CD won't play sound thru my GUS card
using SBOS.  Maybe I got my SBOS settings wrong.
My current ULTRASOUND settings:

        SET ULTRASND = 210,3,3,11,5
        SET BLASTER  = A210 I5 D1 T1

How can I make use of "sbosdrv.sys" with the correct settings
in the config.sys file?  Also, Grollier Encyclopedia setup
program installed a file "sndblk12.sys" in the config.sys file.
Even with both of these drivers in, there is still no sound
coming from my GUS card.

Any comments?

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 12 Feb 93 23:51 GMT
From: Stephen Poston <[e-mail]>
Message-Id: <[e-mail]>
Subject: Opti chipset problems
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <[e-mail]>

Hi there (new gravis owner),

I looks like i'm one of those who has a (major) problem with trying to get
the gravis card working. (I knew I may have a problem when i bought one).

I've a 386 25Mhz+cache machine i've had a couple of years now. The DMA
controller has the following number on it:

       F82C206
       9043            (batch number, I think)

other chips are Opti 82C381 33Mhz (9043EK732) and Opti 82C382 33Mhz
(9047KVA36).

I seem to have had no problems with other hardware i've added, (not like
adding low cost ide + vga cards, which have incompatabilities). I've an WD
ESDI controller (WD1007-SE2) and a GENOA 7900 VGA card + IBM serial cards.

It seems strange that the GUS does no like the DMA controller on some Opti
boards, when there are many other cards that use DMA transfer (SCSI, EDSI,
High speed IO cards and the like) that work OK.

So, can anyone from Gravis/Forte enlighten use on WHY a GUS does not work on
some the Opti boards.  Is it a problem with the Opti boards? or a problem
with the design of the GUS????

It seems a real pitty that it does not work properly on opti boards,
especially when the opti chip sets is one of the best around.

I look forward to it working some day on my machine, but i'd like to stick
with an opti chipset.

Also, It's great that GUS somes with 512K now (even though they are 70ns and
80ns. Probable the distrubution people put the 80 or 70ns on the card).  But
where's the cable that connects the GUS to my Hifi??  It would be great if
there was a 3.5mm to phono lead in the box that could plug into my hifi.

I look forward to my GUS working someday, but at the moment :-(

Steve

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 12 Feb 93 21:29:21 EST
From: [e-mail]
Message-Id: <[e-mail]>
Subject: Questions about memory & Starcon 2 (answer if you can!)
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <[e-mail]>

Hello folks,

    Well, I've some problems (yet again) with my GUS, and maybe you GUS
genuises can help. As usual, E-mail any responses, or post to the digest if
you think they are general enough for public display.

    First of all, when I play SC2 I get two different problems with the
music. In the full game, there seems to be some overlaid static in the music,
especially in hyperspace. It gets worse the longer I play the game. I am
pretty sure the music files are OK - I ran SBOS (gasp!) and played the game,
and it sounded as good as any SoundBlaster (snicker). Second, in SuperMelee,
the sound effects seem to get swapped in the middle of the game. That is, the
special sound for the Syreen, for example, sounds half like the Syreen sound
and half like the Druuge scream, or when the Pkunk fire it sounds half like
Pkunk and half like Earthling.

    I have several device drivers loaded high, so it's possible that
memory is clogged up. I booted from a clean floppy but, even with no device
drivers loaded, it sounds the same. Do I need to upgrade the memory on the
card (currently it's 256K)? I've heard complaints from people with 1 meg
GUSes, but I've also read that playing a 669 file before running the game
seems to eliminate whatever problems were there. Any suggestions?

    Second topic - memory. OK, here's the deal. I have an ATI VGA Wonder
XL with 1 meg of memory, but I hardly ever use the full 1024x768x256 mode.
Thus, I can afford to remove half a meg of DRAM, which I'd like to put on
the GUS. The ATI manual recommends the following chip types for upgrades:

    Texas Instrument TMS44C256-80
    NEC UPD424256-70 or UPD424256-80
    Toshiba TC514256-70 or TC514256-70

    Are the chips on the VGA board I have compatible with the GUS? If
so, is it possible to cannibalize half a meg from my VGA card and put it onto
my GUS, giving me 768K on the GUS and 512K on the VGA card? In other words,
can the GUS take 768K with these memory chips, or will it just not work (or
will the incompatible chips fry the GUS)?

                        Thanks in advance,

                        Evan H. Bynum
                        [e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 12 Feb 93 13:33:06 EST
From: [e-mail] (Brian Beatty)
Message-Id: <[e-mail]>
Subject: SBTALKER and GUS
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <[e-mail]>

Is it possible toget the sbtalker that comes with Sound Balster to
work with Gravis or a program that will simulate the speech on programs
like KQ6.

thanks
Brian Beatty

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 12 Feb 1993 00:33:16 -0800 (PST)
From: I/We are Gaia <[e-mail]>
Message-Id: <[e-mail]>
Subject: Star Control II
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <[e-mail]>

I remember seeing a program to do this, but don't know where to get it.
How do you get the mods out of the game so you can play them??  I would
love to be able to do this, alot of the music is just awesome!!  I also
had problems with my 1 meg gus, but as discovered by many, 669 seems to
get rid of the problems.  I did try a 16 bit dma but that didn't help
either..  Has accolade figured anything out yet??  Anyway, if a kind soul
could direct me to a place where I could acquire this program for getting
the music, I would appreciate it..  I saw the mod files up somewhere but I
guess they were taken down on account of copyrights and all that..  Just
as a side note, has anyone finished the game??  How far have you gotten.
Got any secrets that I would like to have??  I was able to get the bomb
and the dynarri.  But can't figure anything else out..

[e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 12 Feb 1993 22:09:44 -0600 (CST)
From: James Corbett Holcomb <[e-mail]>
Message-Id: <[e-mail]>
Subject: UltraMix Applet autoinstallation
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <[e-mail]>

When listening to my GUS through headphones at night, I like to use the
UltraMix applet to control the WAV and MIDI sound levels.  How can I get
Windows to autoload this applet and set the volume to a predefined level?

James

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 12 Feb 93 10:01:51 EST
From: [e-mail]
Message-Id: <[e-mail]>
Subject: UltraSound Mixer and a bus mouse
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <[e-mail]>

I was wondering if someone could offer me advice about how to get the volume
control to work in this GUS Mixer applet for Windoze.  I've tried, I believe,
all the hardware things that people have mentioned here (8/16 bit DMA, differen
t IRQs, all the Windows drivers stuff mentioned in the FAQ, memory parity
stuff).  Does anyone have any ideas?

Secondly, I've had enormous troubles with my GUS and I think the root of my
anguish seems to be a bus mouse as opposed to a serial mouse.  My mouse is
plugged into my ATI VGA Wonder 512K video card and takes up IRQ 5 when
loaded.  I've heard that serial mice take IRQ 4.  Does anyone have a similar
problem?  I think my Windoze problems can be attributed to this bus mouse
stuff, but I'd like to confirm that with anyone with a similar setup.  BTW,
I have  a 486DX 33 non-OPTI chipset, with 2 local bus slots.

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 12 Feb 1993 11:12:57 -0600
From: [e-mail] (Ken Goach)
Message-Id: <[e-mail]>
Subject: Winjammer/Cakewalk fiasco
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <[e-mail]>

>
>   If files play correctly under WinJammer, then they should play under

I'll not comment on patch caching...

>Cakewalk, which is a much better package (IMHO).

Of course it's got more bells and whistles. It's also four times
as expensive.

>I refuse to use WinJammer
>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.
It's also your right to register Winjammer. For a measly $50.00
you can register it, get rid of the delays, and get all future
updates. Dan McKee will even customize it - look what he did
for GUS support (but we've already been through that).

Then again, if you're just looking for a player, go ahead
and use the Cakewalk demo. But for me, $50.00 for Winjammer
is much better than over $200 for Cakewalk Pro. I need a
way to save MIDI files, and money talks.  I'll live
without some of the added function for a while. I'm sure as
hell NOT going to wait til May for patch caching.

Ken

------------------------------

End of Ultrasound Daily Digest V2 #41
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