Gravis UltraSound For Sale?
category: offtopic [glöplog]
okay, I've also an old GUS Rev 2.4, no idea if it's still working. if anybody wants the card I would also donate an old voodoo2...
I'm interested! drop me an email emoaddict15 [at] gmail [dot] com
@moby: also send me an email!
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Picked up my clones in the Netherlands. I recall seeing similar gus clones in stores, dunno maybe Europe had more manufacturers.
Hot damn, that's a rev 0.1 Primax Soundstorm to the right.
Yeah it's my only GUS and it's a good one that makes my 486 whole like I had it as a teenager. So sorry, gonna pass on this one.
I do have a regular GUS I could trade with you a long with the turtle beach stuff? I also have an intel DX4 which is a 100mhz 486.
I might be interested in the DX4 + regular GUS? I still have an SB16 around anyway.
(why do you want a pimped out gus so badly anno 2014 anyway?)
I like these cards. They are fun for the 90s demos and iD and apogee titles sound so badass with them with ProPatches Lite 1.6.1 and TR909 samples. The MAX card has an onboard mixing codec that also added 2 voices at 48KHz instead of 44 and it also had its own special version of SBOS optimized for the codec and was based on IWSBOS code. No emulators as far as I know support the GUS MAX capablities. I am curious to try it, and it is the last pimped out GF1 card before the AMD cards came out.
tl;dr: catching up to shit I couldn't have in my childhood.
The DX4 I have to dig up, I recently put that in storage. If you use the DX4 your motherboard must support alternate voltage for it. See more at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DX4
tl;dr: catching up to shit I couldn't have in my childhood.
The DX4 I have to dig up, I recently put that in storage. If you use the DX4 your motherboard must support alternate voltage for it. See more at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DX4
I also have some 286 or 386 motherboard laying around. It turns on but I was unable to get anything to come on the screen. I thought maybe it requires an older type of video card that I don't have (that 15-16MB memory hole stuff that was a bit before my time). If someone wants that to fiddle with they can have it.
Does the GUS MAX stuff addons really make that many difference though? Any games/programs that really use it? I'd like to see proper full sbos/megaem compatibility in emulation just to let people experience their soundblaster/adlib emulation though.
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Think it's an Synergy ViperMAX and an Primax SoundStorm Wave SOUND-M16C
The one on the left looks like the regular Primax SoundStorm Wave as sold in the Netherlands. But I wouldn't be too surprised if the ViperMAX was just relabelled for the dutch market as-is.
@Harekiet: I'm unsure if it makes a difference because the MAX was less sold compared to a Classic or even a PnP. You're talking about by the time the MAX was out SB16s were cheap there was no real reason to buy a GUS MAX which essentially is a Classic with all the daughterboards and on-board mixer and it still had no ESS chip which was expected to be in gravis' next card.
It's all more of a curiosity with the MAX for me considering there's no real good usenet posts on the differences in sound quality or compatibility compared to a Classic. Either way, I mostly have my current box setup so it has an SB16 and Classic working in teh same machine and the SB16 runs from line out to the CD-IN on the Classic. I found running to Line-In uses part of the amplifier circuit and would really oversaturate the bass and sound like shit.
It's all more of a curiosity with the MAX for me considering there's no real good usenet posts on the differences in sound quality or compatibility compared to a Classic. Either way, I mostly have my current box setup so it has an SB16 and Classic working in teh same machine and the SB16 runs from line out to the CD-IN on the Classic. I found running to Line-In uses part of the amplifier circuit and would really oversaturate the bass and sound like shit.
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You're talking about by the time the MAX was out SB16s were cheap there was no real reason to buy a GUS MAX which essentially is a Classic with all the daughterboards and on-board mixer and it still had no ESS chip which was expected to be in gravis' next card.
Sorry, but you're wrong on multiple counts. The SB16 wasn't cheap at the time, especially for the lousy card that it was and the MAX had far more trouble competing with the AWE32. Also, the ViperMAX design wasn't what people were expecting to be the next card.
I got a bag just now from Sweex filled with old PC hardware including a GUS Ace :D
I was under the impression that around 94-95 the SB16 was cheaper compared to an AWE32 and wasn't too far away in price from a GUS MAX.
I also checked out a lot of usenet posts from the sound card advocacy group and it appeared to me that a lot of people were confused why the newer versions didn't have HARDWARE SB support. The SBOS and MegaEM solutions were nice ideas, but by the time the drivers got mature enough I think most people moved on or were ready to.
Another reason I forgot about was that the GUS Classic's Win95 drivers took awhile to come out and people were also bitching about this. The GUS MAX had DirectSound support via the v1.2 beta driver. This was another curiosity in testing it out.
@okkie: congrats on your GUS Ace!
I also checked out a lot of usenet posts from the sound card advocacy group and it appeared to me that a lot of people were confused why the newer versions didn't have HARDWARE SB support. The SBOS and MegaEM solutions were nice ideas, but by the time the drivers got mature enough I think most people moved on or were ready to.
Another reason I forgot about was that the GUS Classic's Win95 drivers took awhile to come out and people were also bitching about this. The GUS MAX had DirectSound support via the v1.2 beta driver. This was another curiosity in testing it out.
@okkie: congrats on your GUS Ace!
i've always been a sound blaster man anyway, and yes i know "all" about hardware mixing :) (used to code on 386/486)
the MAX is nice (got mine for free too from a coworker) but it's a bit of a bitch to get to work in compatibility modes
the MAX is nice (got mine for free too from a coworker) but it's a bit of a bitch to get to work in compatibility modes
It's strong points for me personally seem to be the demos and the shareware titles that supported it. I haven't tried Star Control 2 as apparently that game really took full advantage of it's capabilities at the time.
I didn't have too many problems with SBOS with the games I wanted to play on it, but I was using the last versions of all the drivers and maybe a lot of bugs were fixed by that point. I never really played with Mega-Em as it's got some very specific criteria for it to even load.
I didn't have too many problems with SBOS with the games I wanted to play on it, but I was using the last versions of all the drivers and maybe a lot of bugs were fixed by that point. I never really played with Mega-Em as it's got some very specific criteria for it to even load.
for those who have MAX. do you simply remove the jumpers for the IRQ and DMA on the CD-ROM jumpers to disable that? I saw some older revisions have a CD-ROM disable jumper but the 2.1 revision did not.
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it appeared to me that a lot of people were confused why the newer versions didn't have HARDWARE SB support.
Partly because Gravis stated that things would "get better" and at the drop of a hint, people turn into idiots hoping their wildest dreams might come true.
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Quote:it appeared to me that a lot of people were confused why the newer versions didn't have HARDWARE SB support.
Partly because Gravis stated that things would "get better" and at the drop of a hint, people turn into idiots hoping their wildest dreams might come true.
I don't think this was too crazy. ViperMAX/Gus Extreme had an ESS chip on board for hardware SB compatibility. But, by the time that all rolled around it was way too late for anyone to really care.
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I don't think this was too crazy. ViperMAX/Gus Extreme had an ESS chip on board for hardware SB compatibility. But, by the time that all rolled around it was way too late for anyone to really care.
Here's what actually happened in 1995: while Gravis was yanking everybody's chain until the AMD Interwave deal went through, STB made a SBPro clone that used the GF-1 as a wavetable add-on. Added bonus: it was a GUS in DOS. That design became the GUS Extreme two years later -after AMD left the party in a hurry.
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Quote:I don't think this was too crazy. ViperMAX/Gus Extreme had an ESS chip on board for hardware SB compatibility. But, by the time that all rolled around it was way too late for anyone to really care.
Here's what actually happened in 1995: while Gravis was yanking everybody's chain until the AMD Interwave deal went through, STB made a SBPro clone that used the GF-1 as a wavetable add-on. Added bonus: it was a GUS in DOS. That design became the GUS Extreme two years later -after AMD left the party in a hurry.
Wow, what was the name of this STB card? Was it released in 1995? I never heard of these details before.
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Wow, what was the name of this STB card? Was it released in 1995? I never heard of these details before.
Not sure if I undestand Shifter correctly, but I think he is refrring to the ViperMAX with the 'STB' card. However, the ViperMAX was branded 'Synergy', I don't think STB had much to do with that.
STB made an InterWave-based card, but that does not seem to be what Shifter is referring to.
At any rate, Synergy ViperMAX is basically the same card as the GUS Extreme (except ViperMAX had 512KB, where GUS Extreme had 1MB on board).
I believe the ViperMAX is upgradable to the full 1MB though? It appears (according to wikipedia anyways) there was some cards that didn't even have sockets to upgrade to the full 1MB from OEMs! Not sure how you would use those cards for anything useful. lol.