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I have to replace my SBLive with an ISA SB16 due to my lack of free PCI slots... , since I now have a decent enough monitor to go back to a worthwhile dual-head setup. Anyway, how many PCI slots do newer computers have, and do they still come with at least 1 ISA slot? I have never looked inside anything newer than a 1.2 (or maybe 1.4) GHz PIV belonging to my uncle.

I'm quite confident that there are still mobos out there and in production that still have ISA slots on them, but newer PCs I think have gone away with ISA completely. This "new" one my mother gave me which I converted to a Linux server was bought a year ago, and it has all PCI slots (not withstanding the AGP slot).

They don't make ISA mobos any more. You can get 1 with up to 6 PCI slots I believe. Though with PCI-E you can get as many slots as you want (in theory. Till someone makes it though it remains a theory.)...

There are some decent cheap external USB soudncards out there if you look, ala newegg.com...

darthdavid wrote:They don't make ISA mobos any more. You can get 1 with up to 6 PCI slots I believe. Though with PCI-E you can get as many slots as you want (in theory. Till someone makes it though it remains a theory.)...

Supermicro produces P4 motherboards with ISA slots. PCIe is limited to how many lanes the chipset has and there are practical limitations on that.

Is there any reason to buy a fancy-pants soundcard? Has the soundcard industry progressed much (compared to videocards?). I'd rather just have an Audigy or similar SB16 compatible that runs games both new and old, than some obscure one that requires specific Windows drivers and doesn't work under DOS. Unless there's some needed "sound acceleration" that makes them worthwhile, but the most I've heard is soundcards that support EAX or wave-table synthesis...

Slartibartfast wrote:Is there any reason to buy a fancy-pants soundcard? Has the soundcard industry progressed much (compared to videocards?). I'd rather just have an Audigy or similar SB16 compatible that runs games both new and old, than some obscure one that requires specific Windows drivers and doesn't work under DOS. Unless there's some needed "sound acceleration" that makes them worthwhile, but the most I've heard is soundcards that support EAX or wave-table synthesis...

Some people want superior signal:noise ratios or better digital-to-analog converters (M-Audio's cards have a reputation for 'clean' sound, for example). Nvidia's SoundStorm has native Dolby Digital encoding support so you can pipe out all audio into DD and out to some stereo system or speakers. Still others do production work and need equipment with (good) ASIO drivers and multiple channels driven at the same time.

Wavetable synthesis varies -- it can be quite good or bad. Most people will not need it nowadays as MIDI for home use is increasinly rare. EAX is decent, but Aureal (a competitor that Creative bought out) had wavetracing technologies in the works that likely would have been better. Without real competition, the consumer sound card market has stagnated.

Ok but is there any particular reason to buy incompatible soundcards like SBLive? I think most if not all of those features can be worked into a card without losing compatibility with SB16...

Slartibartfast wrote:Ok but is there any particular reason to buy incompatible soundcards like SBLive? I think most if not all of those features can be worked into a card without losing compatibility with SB16...

Since when was the SBLive incompatible? It is wholly compatible with DirectSound ... like virtually every other sound card on the market.

Now, if you're referring to SB16 (the old ISA version) compatibility there are a variety of issues that cause problems trying to get it to work. First of all, you have to implement it and that takes time and money for probably nonexistant return on investment. Secondly, if you aren't Creative Labs you probably have to reverse-engineer support (which takes time and money for poor ROI again). Thirdly, the old ISA SB16 has high CPU utilization and poor sound quality so I'd replace it anyways unless you do a very large amount of DOS gaming.

Is there any reason to buy a fancy-pants soundcard? Has the soundcard industry progressed much (compared to videocards?). I'd rather just have an Audigy or similar SB16 compatible that runs games both new and old, than some obscure one that requires specific Windows drivers and doesn't work under DOS. Unless there's some needed "sound acceleration" that makes them worthwhile, but the most I've heard is soundcards that support EAX or wave-table synthesis...

They also off-load things from the proccesor which is the main benfit of those cards, hell even Augiy2 OEM version(The one without any bundle besides the drives for the card) can be had for less than $50 and is identical to the triple platinum edition $230 Augiy 2

I think the platinum has some additional weird-ass device to plug stuff into (goes into one of the 5 1/4 slots), but the card is the same one.

Slartibartfast wrote:I think the platinum has some additional weird-ass device to plug stuff into (goes into one of the 5 1/4 slots), but the card is the same one.

Yes, there is a breakout box which can be rather useful. There is also a different software bundle. The card might be subtly different, though (the OEM version might not have the header, for example)

If I ever have money, I think I'm getting an Audigy. It even has one firewire port and stuff, and I think I've read it's backwards-compatible.

Slartibartfast wrote:If I ever have money, I think I'm getting an Audigy. It even has one firewire port and stuff, and I think I've read it's backwards-compatible.

You keep talking abotu 'backwards compatibility,' but what do you mean by it?

I mean the ability to boot in DOS mode and have old games still recognize that I have a soundcard at all.