• Please review our updated Terms and Rules here

Soundcard, 386 & games question

J

Jedinovice

Member
Joined
Jan 9, 2007
Messages
21
Location
England, UK
Hi.

I'm using a 386 SX16 with Windows 3.0 and Word 1. My staple is wordprocessing - LOTS of wordprocessing. But I am getting married soon and can see the need to de-stress occasionally, take a break which involves less brain work! I have an Athlon XP for game play and media stuff, I more than suspect this will be dominated by my wife. She wants to write a book too!

So I want to play with some games on the 386. My preferred genre is RPG's.

Three questions:

1) Any recommendations for good games (not shoot-em ups) suitable for my machine?
2) Is there a speed degrader bit of S/W to allow of speed issues or older games? (I have a turbo button but 8MHz is still fasher than a 4.77Mhz 8088!)
3) What were the adlib sound card really like, the Yamaha 2419 chip type jobbies? Were they supported and were they awful?

Many thanks.
 
Jedinovice said:
2) Is there a speed degrader bit of S/W to allow of speed issues or older games? (I have a turbo button but 8MHz is still fasher than a 4.77Mhz 8088!)
Click to expand...

I used to use a program named GOSLOW.COM
When running it you would specify a number to control the amount of speed reduction:

C:\utils>goslow
APC - BYTE TOOLKIT GoSlow -- version 1.0
(C)1987 Strange Software Ltd. Freely copyable for personal use only.
Copyright, resale, distribution, modification and other rights reserved.
Usage: GOSLOW <1-65535> -- slow CPU down (1=a touch, 65535=comotose)
GOSLOW 0 -- back to normal speed
Warning: This program may not work effectively for all hardware and
software combinations. Use with care - you may need to reboot your
computer with Ctrl-Alt-Del if you slow it down too much.

C:\utils>
 
The music on most old (aka p75mhz and lower) dos games was adlib compatible. Adlib was basically just a fancy midi card which allowed you to have sythecised midi effects without much more overhead (sometimes less) than your beeper. Not really comparable to wav but it could be coaxed into making some pretty nice sound effects.
 
you have to try ultima 6! runs great on a 386. it's more or less playable even on my 8088. do a google search for the game, and you'll find it. it was released in 1990 i think. if you can't find it, PM me.

i spent whole evenings playing it when i was a kid, you really get immersed in the huge world you walk around in. best RPG ever, imo!

oh, marble madness is another awesome game but you'll definately need to use that slow-down program!
 
Last edited:
modem7 said:
I used to use a program named GOSLOW.COM
When running it you would specify a number to control the amount of speed reduction:

C:\utils>goslow
APC - BYTE TOOLKIT GoSlow -- version 1.0
(C)1987 Strange Software Ltd. Freely copyable for personal use only.
Copyright, resale, distribution, modification and other rights reserved.
Usage: GOSLOW <1-65535> -- slow CPU down (1=a touch, 65535=comotose)
GOSLOW 0 -- back to normal speed
Warning: This program may not work effectively for all hardware and
software combinations. Use with care - you may need to reboot your
computer with Ctrl-Alt-Del if you slow it down too much.

C:\utils>
Click to expand...


Sounds great. Er, where do I get this then? :)
 
Maybe Mo'Slo Basic will help you. The same provider also sells deluxe and business versions of their slow-down software for about $25/license.

I found another software called Turbo, but it may only work in Win32 environments, which is the opposite of what you need. I haven't tested it, so I can't vouch for any nasty stuff.

Maybe someone else can supply you with the original (?) goslow.com, which seems to be hard to find through Google.
 
Here's a program I wrote in 1988 that does (should do) what you're looking for. I forgot what game I was trying to slow down on my new blazin' hot 12MHz '286. Probably Bruce Lee.

This is a terminate-and-stay-resident program (wow, remember those?) that intercepts the clock interrupt and has the PC waste time in a NOP loop. It doesn't chain the clock vector, so if you load other TSR programs, make this the last one that you load.
Code: 
; SLOW.ASM by Jeff Meunier
; terminate and stay resident with clock interrupt revector
; loop and do nothing for given time

.model tiny
.code
	org 100h
start:
	jmp begin

tsr:    push cx
	pushf
	mov cx,06000h		; this is the delay count
count:	nop			; body of loop
	loop count		; loop cx times
	popf
	pop cx
	iret

begin:
	mov ah,25h		; function to revector an interrupt
	mov al,1Ch		; interrupt to revector
	mov dx,offset tsr  	; where to revector it
	int 21h 		; proceed with revector
	sti			; enable interrupts
	mov dx,offset begin	; end of new resident program
	int 27h 		; terminate and stay resident
end start
You may need to change the delay count from 06000h to something higher. Change it to 0FFFFh to max it out. Use tasm to assemble, type 'tasm slow.asm', then 'tlink /t slow.obj'. If it's still not slow enough, let me know: maybe I can put a couple integer divisions in the loop instead of a NOP.

I have attached the .COM file so you do not have to assemble and link this program.

Jeff
 

Attachments

  • SLOW.zip
    143 bytes · Views: 1
Unknown_K said:
I think programs that waste clock cycles also affect sound generation in games.
Click to expand...

Cycle wasting can mess up the more modern programs that use complex PCM (pulse code modulation) to generate sounds on the PC speaker, but it does not affect programs that generate 'standard' tones by programming the PIT (programmable interval timer).

http://fly.cc.fer.hr/GDM/articles/sndmus/speaker1.html

Cycle wasting shouldn't affect the Sound Blaster, either.
 
3) What were the adlib sound card really like, the Yamaha 2419 chip type jobbies? Were they supported and were they awful?
Click to expand...

The Adlib Music Synthesizer Card uses the Yamaha 3812 FM Operator Type L-II chip, not the Yamaha 2149 Programmable Sound Generator, which is based on waveform synthesis, an earlier sound technology. This was the standard, and while there were better options available like the Roland MT-32 Multi-Timbral Sound Module, they cost a lot more.

Adlib was basically just a fancy midi card which allowed you to have sythecised midi effects without much more overhead (sometimes less) than your beeper. Not really comparable to wav but it could be coaxed into making some pretty nice sound effects.
Click to expand...

The Adlib Music Synthesizer Card is not a midi device and has no hardware midi support. Creative Labs Sound Blaster cards up until the AWE series only had support for external midi devices. The YM3812 and its OPL3 successor the YMF-262 do not even have preset instruments burned into the chips like some other Yamaha chips. Software (which adds overhead) is needed to translate midi messages into data the chips can use.
 
Terry Yager said:
Any info on the ThunderBoard? I have one installed in my 5155, but no idea how it works (drivers, etc.)...

--T
Click to expand...

I owned one of those for years. It's a inexpensive Sound Blaster clone. So, the usual Sound Blaster stuff

SET BLASTER=A240 I5 D3 H6 P300 E640 T6

in the autoexec.bat file. i/o addr, irq, dma, think the rest can be chopped off for a TB.

http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/pub/windows/thunwin.zip

Win 3.1 drivers, I can't remember if it had DOS TSR drivers too.
 
Many thanks!

Many thanks!

:D

Many thanks for everyone's help. This is good. I will try goslow as soon as I reasonably can - probably the weekend.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top