> One reason the x86 PC became the dominant game platform in the early 1990s was the availability of affordable sound cards like the AdLib and Sound Blaster.

Cause and effect are the wrong way round here.

Pretty much every other gaming platform had had multi-channel stereo sound since the mid-80s, so it’s unlikely this is a reason PCs came to dominate the market.

PCs eventually gained affordable sound cards because they were already dominant by that time. There was a market ready and waiting for Sound Blaster, et al.

Not just sound, many other ones have video chips that had a bunch of 2D acceleration features vs PC's plain old ass framebuffer where you needed to burn CPU cycles to move anything on.

Multi-media-wise PCs were behind for a relatively long time compared to other home computers.

I don't think it would be overstatement to say only reason PC won was coz of competition's mismanagement

I was about to react to that line too. It's impressively wrong on so many levels.

"affordable" - PC was the superior gaming platform from around 90 if you're generous, but it was never, ever, the more affordable option. IBM compatibles were horribly expensive. Yeah sure, the AdLib card wasn't terribly expensive in itself (about $130), but it gave sound capabilities of the same type, but much weaker than a Sega Megadrive (about $190 for the whole thing)

Sad to say, I don't think many people got converted to the FM sound by the AdLib card. Most games just used the general midi driver, and it wasn't great. A few games with a custom driver (KGB, Dune) showed that the hardware could do better, but it didn't catch on. It also didn't help that soundblaster's AdLib emulation, which probably far more people ever heard than an actual AdLib, was terrible.

Of course PC's were expensive, but most people at the time bought PC's for those fancy new word processors and spreadsheets. A small price increase for added sound capability is an easier sell than a dedicated gaming console which also competes with the family TV. Also, PC games were effectively free due to widespread piracy. IDK about the Soundblaster AdLib emulation, my first SB card had the same OPL-3 synth chip as was found on the original AdLib board so should sound about the same.

Yes, in other words, IBM compatibles became a gaming platform by chance because of its success in the business world, not because of the FM sound.

Piracy I think is a wash. Sure, it let us play more of the games that existed for the platform, but probably limited investment, in ports in particular.

Yes, in the beginning Sound Blaster cards had the same chip, but eventually they switched to a clone/emulation. But quite possibly it didn't matter much, since most general midi soundtracks made so poor use of the chipset.

I wouldn't underestimate the amount of PC enthousiasm generated by piracy in the late-80's and 90's, especially here in the EU where imported games were priced way above something kids could afford with pocket money.

Didn't know about the OPL3 clones, agree it didn't matter much since by that time CD-ROM became common and most games got digital soundtracks instead of MIDI/synth stuff.

Right but every single other platform that had writable media(tapes/floppies) had plenty of piracy too. Nobody bought PC over Amiga "coz it's easier to pirate games"

Nope, people bought a PC because it was good for learning/office and they were even subsidised here. Amiga had a reputation for being more a kind of fancy game machine in the EU.

If anything it would probably be the other way around, since all the major cracking groups started on Commodore computers.

As the only PC owner on my group of friends, it was always a joy when we got together for gaming parties/demoscene stuff, and I could hack away on their Amigas.

So yeah, the article has a bit of revisionism there.

Yamaha are actually still manufacturing FM sound chips for consumer appliances! This page lists one modern FM chip, the YMF825 (SD-1): https://device.yamaha.com/en/lsi/products/sound_generator/

I'm not sure where it's used in the wild, however some people have built hobby synthesisers around it. A comparison against the OPL can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BEgAx0jngKQ

The ymf825 seems to have been discontinued: https://www.switch-science.com/products/3399

I find it funny that yamaha thinks there'd be a market for embedded sound generators, outside of music enthusiasts.

Yeah, though the dev boards (the SD-1) are relatively hard to find - just recently got a hold of one. Tiny! The chip itself seems like it might be easier to procure.

This kind of musical chips sits at the slim frontier between the analog era and the CPU/DSP-based digital era [0]

It is the custom logic IC that generates the sound, but in the original cards, the (low-fi) DAC also contributed to its audio quality.

Of course, people use these eurorack modules for the DIY and tactile hands-on experience. I get that. However, sound-wise, a lot of the hardware geeks are still convinced that software does not (and/or will never) sound the same, even for "digital" chips like the YM3812/OPL [1] !

What is “the same” ? And to whom ? These are the nuances.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30735683

[1] https://www.discodsp.com/opl/

> This kind of musical chips sits at the slim frontier between the analog era and the CPU/DSP-based digital era...

Part of what made FM synthesis such a brilliant discovery was that it was actually possible to implement on contemporary computers. The kind of FM synthesis produced by Yamaha's early chips had such an impact on how modern music evolved. I can't help wonder if it would have been considered at all if contemporary DSP technology had allowed any kind of serious analog modeling. It's absolutely amazing that within the space of just over a decade we went from synths being built entirely out of discrete analog components, to FM synthesis on LSI chips, to DSP based synths.

I'm an FM junkie and own various pieces of gear based on old yamaha FM chips, as well as actual yamaha FM keyboards. I think the various emulations out there are actually pretty good, and I have to admit I'd probably have a tough time with blind A/B tests. Probably the most noticeable (and sought after) out of the "lo-fi" effects is the ladder distortion effect on the old Sega megadrive YM2612 chips. I own a MegaFM synth with one of those and I do love the sound. I'm not sure if most emulators actually try to emulate it, but the plogue chipsynth MD plugin does. The creator has a really cool video on it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLxTHYGLKY0.

> Probably the most noticeable (and sought after) out of the "lo-fi" effects is the ladder distortion effect...

My personal favourite artefact is the DX7 Mk1's trademark 'saturation'. I've never heard anyone conclusively pin down the exact source of the synth's characteristic distortion.

Plogue have done such an amazing job on their DX7 emulator. It definitely does a great job of emulating the synth's particular character.

And then there is music that used those chips quirks to the advantage, like how imperfect (IIRC) volume control in SID was used as crude DAC in some cases, but later better version of chip "broke" that "feature". Later people figured out other weird trick to get a DAC out of it even out of "fixed" chips by tactically resetting the waveform generators

And that one did contain actual analog multi-mode filter.

Here is also an eurorack module with this soundchip: https://modwiggler.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=2852523#p285252...

and also with the yfm262: https://modwiggler.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=175941

synthdiy also shows information: https://sdiy.info/wiki/Yamaha_YM3812 or https://sdiy.info/wiki/Yamaha_YMF262

The midibox also shows much information about the yamaha chips: http://www.ucapps.de/

Thanks for the glimpse into the past!

I just started getting into Eurorack and it always blows my mind how you can make crazy awesome electronic sound from very few components

Oh, no, escape, there is still time, save your wallet!