The GUS Max came out in 1994, the SoundBlaster 2.0 came out in 1991 and was a significantly more limited card than the GUS (no wave table synthesis, no 16-bit audio or stereo)

In 1994 the state-of-the-art SoundBlaster would have been the AWE32 and it was $399. You must be misremembering :)

Sound cards did not drop to anywhere near $20 until the very late 90's or early 00's and those $20 cards were bottom barrel stuff that would have been less advanced in many ways than the GUS Max even then.

"In 1994 the state-of-the-art SoundBlaster would have been the AWE32 and it was $399."

Now I remember why I was never able to save any money in my late teens...

Mmm. I guess my memory is bad. I really thought the GUS came before the SoundBlaster, but maybe I didn't have a GUS Max but a GUS.

I don't remember when the AWE32 came out, but I had gotten one in 96

Too bad it died after a couple of years, seems to be a design flaw

> But things were going so fast that maybe one/two years later the Soundblaster 2 came on the market.

I was profoundly disappointed to have to deal with this sort of nonsense when we "upgraded" from our Amiga 500.

Yeah! I still have my Gravis Ultrasound in a box somewhere.. The red PCB was so cool (16-year-old me thought) and I also remember having to modify my case to make it fit.

That card was so good for demoscene stuff..

I was also proud that it was Canadian-made (it sat alongside my Matrox video card)

The SoundBlaster 2.0 was in the $200 ballpark when it came out, not $20.

Then I think the GUS was around $400.

The only thing I remember I was amazed and sad at the same time when I heard the SB2. Halve the price twice the sound.

And ofcourse Dr. Sbaitso..

Someone patched Wolf3d to work with the Ultrasound. It was amazing...