The CMI8738 was (and apparently, still is) a great budget PCI sound chip! I used one for a long time because it had bit-perfect SPDIF output unlike the Sound Blaster Live I used before it.
@alextirrellRI
Жыл бұрын
I imagine that avoiding the card's DAC probably made it sound better as well.
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
@@alextirrellRI For sure. The noise floor on the analog outputs of a Live are much cleaner than this thing. Although I'm sure there are some CMI8738 boards that are built much better than this one.
Жыл бұрын
C-Media Master race >:V/
@jbinary82
Жыл бұрын
Nice one! I got ESS Solo1 for such purpose and it really rocks. If I could say something to criticize it would be the IRQ/Address selection which has the classic Plug and Pray which forces you to tweak bios settings.
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
I'll have to look into those as well thank you!
@theALFEST
Жыл бұрын
OPL3 compatible FM-synth is not software emulated, it is integrated.
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
Yes, you're correct. Good point.
@Lawnie10
Жыл бұрын
I demand a video of the Doom soundtrack but played through the $12 Ali Express card. Glorious stuff. Speaking of sound, your sound is improving! Keep up the good work!
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
Yeah after some experimentation I finally have an audio setup that seems to work consistently! Although the wavetable is pretty messed up for DOOM it sounds pretty decent in SB FM mode.
@SiD3WiNDR
4 ай бұрын
Overkill was one of the first games I (my parents) purchased (it was a shareware floppy in a store). I've never heard many other people talk about it so I'm happy to see it featured here! 🙂
@DOSStorm
4 ай бұрын
I'm actually working on another video that features Overkill as well! Great game that often gets overshadowed by Raptor and Tyrian.
@rebootretro
Жыл бұрын
I remember these "cut corner" cards being somewhat popular. I definitely remember some were C-Media, but I'm pretty sure other companies were using similar, if not the same, designs as well. Pretty cool!
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
I think some of the later Aural Vortex cards had a similar look, albeit with components that were much more high quality!
@JimLeonard
Жыл бұрын
It appears the card is only good for FM, since you were unable to get digitized sound effects (especially those with continuous auto-dma buffers, like Doom or Descent) working. Still, I guess $12 to get Adlib sound is good, although for $50+ you can get an old card on ebay that works better. Thanks for taking the time to make the video, you've saved me a lot of time. Keep up the good work!
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
Digital sound effects actually work fine for some games. Jill of the Jungle, Vinyl Goddess from Mars, One Must Fall, Monster Bash, and even Doom works fine in straight up Sound Blaster mode in my testing. It just seems to be hit or miss.
@enzito_sdf6978
4 күн бұрын
that DLS thing is kinda interesting though! some games like Final Fantasy 8 for PC support loading custom samples (DLS banks) for the MIDI soundtrack via something called DirectMusic. if you patch the game with samuel slight's ff8 dls soundfont it actually sounds pretty similar to the PS1 version. i'd say these cmedia thingies are pretty nifty for win9x and xp era games.
@peterjantzer4767
Жыл бұрын
"There is hardly anything in the world that someone cannot make a little worse and sell a little cheaper, and the people who consider price alone are that person's lawful prey." George P. Landow, Professor of English and the History of Art, Brown University.
@ReedHansen84
Жыл бұрын
Awesome to bring attention to an affordable modern alternative card. Not perfect, but for some, this may be a good starting point, or may just be enough.
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
My thoughts exactly!
@kenabi
Жыл бұрын
fair warning, they make this exact card with two different chips, the C-media one and what appears to be some sort of esoniq? they may have the same pinouts, but they do not have the same feature levels. the esoniq will do fine in windows, but the dos support is a .. well, better to stick with the cmedia one if you can, or as mentioned elsewhere, the ess solo-1, which trumps everything but an actual old sound card, a card with the PC/PCI or SB_LINK, or a compatible one with sbemu. and listings currently have the cmedia variant running around $9, shipped. though you have to hunt a bit for them.
@RacerX-
Жыл бұрын
Who'da thunk you could get something that didn't sound like screahing bats with a cheap sound card? Thanks for the review.
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
Its almost disappointing that it's not disgustingly terrible. Its cool that its a good ultra budget option though.
@pentiummmx2294
7 ай бұрын
the Yamaha DS-XG, ESS Solo-1, and Avance Logic ALS4000 were some other DOS compatible PCI cards the SB Live and some Audigy models and the ESS Maestro or Allegro and the Aureal Vortex had some sort of DOS compatibility too but the FM synth was more inferior
@DOSStorm
6 ай бұрын
Yeah PCI cards are usually shunned by most for DOS gaming. At the very least they are interesting though, and I will probably test more of them. I have a Yamaha XG sitting around somewhere.
@valkaielod
2 ай бұрын
Solo was the last useful card by ESS for DOS. Maestro and later are Windows cards, with some really crappy support for legacy. They have no FM part at all.
@jnharton
2 ай бұрын
@@DOSStorm I was reading about this and it sounds like some of the 'XG' branded chips are Yamaha YMF724, YMF744B. Shouldn't be too surprising that a lot of Yamaha's products are pretty good when you consider that electronic organs, pianos, and synthesizers are something they kinda specialize in.
@carloporfiri6334
Жыл бұрын
Well done !
@aaroncheah2088
Жыл бұрын
Another option is the ESS Solo-1 also on AliExpress. Better DOS support.
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
Others have mentioned this as well....I'll look into it. I have some ESS cards I'm not sure if I have a Solo-1 though.
@brendanstone3073
Жыл бұрын
This C-Media card is really great for the price, and I'm interested in learning more. Can you provide a link for that Solo-1? I wasn't able to find that in a search.
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
@@brendanstone3073 I couldn't find it either. I do see a few people mention it though so maybe it was a limited stock thing that sold out?
@neppy-chan9297
Жыл бұрын
Pretty decent option it looks like, especially for the price. Might have to try one of these out.
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
For the price its hard to go wrong even if it isn't perfect.
@Jack7277
Жыл бұрын
I had this soundchip onboard on my chaintech 7aja2/100 back in 2001
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
It looks like this chip was used on lots of boards around that time. They must have made a boatload of them to still be pouring into new cheap add-in cards over 20 years later.
@michaelsworkshop9031
Жыл бұрын
we need the armpit audio for comparison
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
Yeah I really should have done my due diligence there.
@Inject0r
Жыл бұрын
Ah nice! I’ve just received a PCIe CMI8738. Just to experiment in getting it to work under Windows 98 and DOS. Windows 98 has been a succes thus far. DOS however, that’s a whole other story. Thanks for this awesome content!
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
Thanks for watching! That is quite interesting you were able to get PCI-E working in Windows 98. How difficult was that to get working?
@dangerza
Жыл бұрын
I had a different CMI8738 card back in 2002 and even then it was really cheap. However I'm not sure what I did back then, but I am pretty sure I did get sound to work with the games you said don't work. Have you tried the card in DOS and not within Windows 98? I never really played DOS games in Windows back then.
@GarthBeagle
Жыл бұрын
Wow that DOOM wavetable 😩
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
It will definitely haunt my dreams for the coming weeks.
@galacticusX
Ай бұрын
Do you know if the gameport connects with external MIDI like MT32?
@the_kombinator
Жыл бұрын
I get all my small electronics for my kids powerwheels on Aliexpress. They're occasionally crappy quality and you gotta wait forever, but the price is always right. Soundcard though?
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
Aliexpress is an interesting place. At least pricing seems to be good unlike Wish most of the time. As for buying Soundcards on there...This definitely isn't the worst card I've ever tested.
@corgiverse9550
Жыл бұрын
I just bought a board with this built in. Should I use it or should I use an MWave modem? :P
@NightSprinter
8 ай бұрын
Is it me, or does Vinyl Goddesses feel like a spiritual successor to GODS by the Bitmap Bros?
@DOSStorm
8 ай бұрын
Actually it was originally going to be the sequel to Jill of the Jungle. However, Epic wasn't satisfied with the quality of it, so it was renamed(story and sprites were changed as well I assume) and was released with a different publisher.
@NightSprinter
8 ай бұрын
@@DOSStorm Interesting! I thought of GODS, due to the fact Vinyl has a weapon like in that game.
@DOSStorm
8 ай бұрын
@@NightSprinter It could very well be inspired by that game as well, I've never played Gods so I can't say for sure.
@CYON4D
Жыл бұрын
Turned out to be much better than I expected.
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
I know right? It's surprisingly usable.
@esc2dos
Жыл бұрын
Pretty impressive considering there are only a few components on the board.
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
I agree, all things considered it should be way more of a disaster.
@esc2dos
Жыл бұрын
@@DOSStorm I've had to re-evaluate my ct1600 snobbery after having a good listen to a few other chips with decent OPL3 like the ESS and the Aztech. Your video on the Crystal CX4235 got me curious. Btw, really enjoy your humour. Peace
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
@@esc2dos That is nice of you to say, thank you!
@jondonnelly4831
Жыл бұрын
It is real dosmode or just dos inside windows?
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
Yep. It has DOS drivers as well! I used these: archive.org/details/C-Media-PCI-Audio-Drivers-2.73 That archive has DOS, Windows 9X, and 2000 drivers. It even as a DOS based mixing utility for changing digital/FM levels.
@pc-sound-legacy
Жыл бұрын
I've also never seen such a "gameport"🤣 PCB looks like 💩, too. But the CMI does its job, so I think the card is worth its money if you're on limited budget. Anyway, a 2nd hand card with the ESS Solo-1 can be found for small money, too - and will win any comparison I guess.
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
The gameport is hilarious. This is definitely not super high quality product, but its fairly effective for what it is.
@memadmax69
Жыл бұрын
Theres something wrong with the IRQ setup in wavetable mode.
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
You think I configured it wrong or that its just broken? I just thought it was implemented in an incomplete manner.
@memadmax69
Жыл бұрын
@@DOSStorm I had a somewhat lengthy reply for you but its gone. Is this comment still here?
@DOSStorm
Жыл бұрын
@@memadmax69 Yeah I'm not sure. Did it have a link in it? KZitem sometimes auto removes comments with links.
@FulgoreMKCL
11 ай бұрын
You know if the game port works?
@DOSStorm
11 ай бұрын
It was detected by windows as working...I don't remember if I actually used it though.
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