pouët.net

I've hold onto my old PC hardware thinking that one day I'll build myself a proper retro PC, but realized today that I'm just tool old for that =). I'd like to donate these cards to someone who will put them into demoscene use. The GUS and Tseng cards have run Second Reality before it was released.

The freebies:
- Gravis Ultra Sound. Original from 1993, comes with manual
- Tseng ET4000 SVGA. Accept no substitutes
- Sound Blaster Awe 64 Gold from 1996, comes with manual
- ATI 3D Rage Pro AGP from 1998

Cards worked when I pulled them out in the 90s and they've been stored since. No guarantees that they actual work. Recipient pays for all shipping costs.

If you are interested, ping me at abyss@assembly.org.

I have a Sound Blaster 16 ASP (the one with the DSP chip) to donate

(that means size coding with free ADPCM 44Khz on chip decompression! ;) )

@abyss:
Mail sent.

@٩๏̯͡๏۶:
You're teasing me... :P Although I have a pretty big Gravis collection, a bunch of SBs also ended up here, but the ASP one is still missing... Then I could upgrade the Gravis collection to a PC sound card collection... So, I'm interested... :)

Another mail sent. :)

So it looks like these won't be needed for, say, ... running Assembly oldschool compos!? ;)

The next Assembly Oldschool Demo Compo will be "Amiga Only" so go figure... ;)

Mail sent - that 1993 GUS would help me a lot with my current project (re-issueing a GUS PnP based card with maximum features of the InterWave).
Read: http://guspnp.livejournal.com/

oh an et4000...that'd be kinda nice

Shockwav3: Nice project! Good luck.
And to all others: If you have more then 12 megs of ram together with a CL5428 it will fuck up your linear framebuffer. Jsyk.

Thanks for the emails. Right now Shockwav3 has the lead on the GUS given he has an actual project that would benefit from it immediately. I'll wait a couple of days to see if anything else pops up and then get in touch with everyone / start shipping.

Yzi, the oldschool compo rules require you bring the hardware to the party place. Yes the oldschool compo is Amiga only this year to celebrate Amiga's 30 years. Entries on other retro platforms are eligible for the real wild compo.

@Shockwave3: Holy sh... *DAT INTERWAVE REMAKE*

\o/

Damn it, I want a GUS as well, gotta save up the money for it some day =)

I could really use an AWE64 Gold for my music sequencing rig but I'm not sure if overseas shipping will be worth it. Sending email though.

What about a PCIe or USB GUS-clone with a pass-through from DOSBox?

Oh noo, someone else wanting the AWE64! :P
Well, I already sent the mail, but to give a rationale, as a tracker developer who also spends a whole lot of time on compatibillity with legacy trackers, there are a few AWE-specific trackers and tracker drivers I'd like to properly try out (e.g. the AWE driver for IT and of course the amazing Imago Orpheus). Currently I only have an AWE64 Value which offers no possibility to put in more RAM, so the well-known Astaris sounds like this...

Oh, just a note. Those of you wanting/using AWE64 but want more RAM. There's a module you can buy (he still makes them, bought one a year back or so) to let you fit standard simms on some models.

http://simmconn.tripod.com/faq.htm

He actually sent me the wrong model first so I do have a SPARE one for AWE64 Gold which I'm willing to give away if anyone needs it =)

@saga: as far as i remember the awe64 is the same as the awe32, just with some minor design improvements and the major drawback that it uses a proprietary memory module instead of standard SIMM for the E-mu 8000. so you might better watch out foran sb32 too/instead.

regarding sound quality: they´re all creative cards, nuff said.

T$: Well, the AWE32 is a monster of a card (so much for "minor improvements" :) which is not going to fit into the PC that the AWE64 is going into.
cloaked: Depending on how much RAM is on the card (and if I get it at all :), I will get back at your offer, thanks!

@bloodnok, why not stick with DOSBox in the first place then? It's not a mystery what it does and DOSBox does an incredible job at emulating (you can even use soundfonts/soundbanks specific to the GUS with it). It's not too hardware demanding to offload it from the software either. Thing is such an approach exists for AdLib cards (at least the hardware) - but didn't make it into the official version of DOSBox, nor various branches, even though the OPL2 has it's quirks which may not be 100% emulated.
It's more of a thing to bypass shortcomings of existing cards and the market - GUS cards usually go for 90€+ on eBay these days unless you're lucky - if you're unlucky expect to pay up to $250. My card will not only offer the maximum configuration for an InterWave based GUS card (okay, I've scraped the Atapi CD-ROM port, there's no SoundBlaster specific hardware [the InterWave can emulate a Soundblaster, using an unusual approach with often very unsatisfying results] and I didn't add a DSP or fader as some later clones did), but also will just cost around $40 if all works out.

a pci versio nof the interwave would be great :) wouldn´t work well regarding DMA though =(

I guess if there's still superhigh demand after this project, I could think about doing a PCI based FPGA version :P
We'll see ... just picked up 200 InterWave chips from the customs office.

@Saga Musix - you can grab the AWE64 if you want it. I already have three or four 512k cards and SIMMConns to match (I have a Gold-version SIMMConn lying in wait too just in case though.) My sequencing rig has one fully expanded to 32 (/28) MB.

Output quality on the value cards "seems good enough to me" but supposedly the Gold has better (20-bit) DACs. Any AWE64 will be *heaps* better than most AWE32/SB32 in my experience.

Incidentally regarding the SIMMConns - it was a little strange ordering stuff from a site that hasn't been updated since before the Euro existed :P - but the guy responds to emails quickly enough and I got my order within ~3-4 weeks. No complaints!

@Shockwav3 - if you were to make a **PCMCIA** Interwave that has MIDI in/out ports and works with Impulse Tracker under pure DOS while plugged into a cheap P4-era laptop, I will shower you in money and expensive cognac. I'm just saying.

Abyss: I was trying to say that this feels like a pretty strong statement or indication about PC as an oldskool platform in future compos. C64 will never die, Amiga is strong, Spectrum, Amstrad, even MSX have established scenes, but PC... nah.

Actually the "low cost" version of the InterWave (AM78C202KC according to the datasheet, AM78C200KC according to reality - basically a normal InterWave - PnP functionality) was meant for just that - it was only used on 1 particular ISA soundcard tho - if you can find some old stock of those and me not being sick of the GUS by then (why would I?) why not (no, this is not a project confirmation, but it's certainly not impossible).