Sound Blaster (DOS)

Re:Sound Blaster (DOS) by iforgotpassword on Sunday May 15, 2022 @01:53PM (#31389433)

It's a funny quirk of the history of home computing how enthusiasts usually dislike the sound blaster for being basically the crappiest hardware design you could somewhat get away with (ie with the original sound blaster, it was impossible to play digital samples without continuously having buffer underruns resulting in crackling), while the average gamer who grew up in the 90s or even 2000s has very fond memories of those cards. And I actually count myself to the latter camp, as like probably most people back then, just having digital sound at all was a miracle, and with those tiny desk speakers back then, it would've been hard to tell the difference anyways.

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Re:Sound Blaster (DOS) by bitwize on Sunday May 15, 2022 @02:41PM (#31389859)

Compared to the Amiga, Atari ST, or Macintosh, the PC had the charming rinky-dink-ness that the ZX Spectrum had compared to machines like the C64, up until about 1994 or so (later for the Mac).

It's kind of sad that no one but Apple wants to make serious quality custom equipment for home users anymore. The PC proved for everyone that "race to the bottom" is a valid business model.

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Re:Sound Blaster (DOS) by postalrat on Sunday May 15, 2022 @09:50PM (#31393028)

You do realize PCs and other computers cost much more than they do today. Adjusted for inflation $4000+.

The "race to the bottom" was out of necessity because many people couldn't afford paying so much money.

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Re:Sound Blaster (DOS) by pjmlp on Monday May 16, 2022 @02:13AM (#31394072)

Definitly, during those days buying a PC always meant at least being able to pay a 3 to 5 year credit, and given the rate PCs were changing, when one would be finally done with the credit, it was slowly the time to think about a new one, because buying parts alone would no longer be enough.

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Re:Sound Blaster (DOS) by justsomehnguy on Monday May 16, 2022 @02:12PM (#31401270)

Funny enough, "you need $2000 for a good PC" held from mid '90 up to the end of '00. After that you could assemble "good enough" for less and less each year.

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Re:Sound Blaster (DOS) by themodelplumber on Sunday May 15, 2022 @02:43PM (#31389874)

IIRC if you were into the music part of the demoscene you were also treated to lots of critiques of various cards. This was part of the reason I went for the PAS-16 rather than the Sound Blaster.

The GUS was also absolutely huge in that crowd because of the way it handled MIDI via wavetable. I remember reading reviews and scrounging up cash to buy a wavetable card, actually an OEM AWE 32 in a nondescript cardboard box from the basement of a computer store in Utah. The various features for working with the wavetable made it a lot of fun to play with.

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Re:Sound Blaster (DOS) by wiz21c on Sunday May 15, 2022 @02:44PM (#31389883)

Crackling ? IIRC one had to use DMA to make sure the buffer was properly filled... I don't remember having any "clicks" in the MODtracker file I was playing...

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Re:Sound Blaster (DOS) by rasz on Sunday May 15, 2022 @03:17PM (#31390171)

first SB didnt support autoinit https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?f=46&t=52806 "DMA Sound Blaster 1.x 'seamless' playback investigation".

Of course Creative screwed again with numerous bugs in SB16 https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?f=62&t=50071

* MPU-401 Hanging Note Bug.

* MPU-401 Stuttering with high sampling rates.

* Single-Cycle DMA Clicking (Non Vibra).

Not to mention poor engineering practices like leaving floating opamps resulting in noisy cards.

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Re:Sound Blaster (DOS) by ahefner on Sunday May 15, 2022 @09:33PM (#31392939)

It's a good companion to the PC itself, also being the about crappiest hardware design you could somewhat get away with (but very expandable..).

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