This is the reference companion to my video on building AirMeter – an open-source wireless mod that taps directly into the multiplexed LCD glass of a DTM0660-based multimeter and streams the live reading to a web dashboard, OBS overlay, or anywhere else, with access to UART and no proprietary apps, Bluetooth or locked WiFi protocols.
The video covers the full reasoning and…
We’ve all seen the classic text splash screens on vintage VGA cards – showing the model, BIOS version, and memory count. But what if we could replace that boring text with a full-color, 256-color image?
Recently, while working with an S3 Trio 3D, I noticed something interesting about the BIOS chips. This discovery sent me down a rabbit hole involving Hex editors, Ghidra, and…
If you’ve spent any time with vintage S3 graphics cards – be it the Trio 3D, Trio64, or Virge – you’ve likely noticed a common quirk: the blacks just aren’t black. On a modern LCD or a high-end CRT, the background often appears as a washed-out, dark gray.
I recently rescued anS3 Trio 3D 2Xfrom a scrapyard and decided it was time to move past the “just…
I am not here to insult your Socket 3 motherboard – if you are the owner of this specific model and love it: The PCChips M915i. I recently had this board in for “repair”, even though it is supposed to be “new old stock” (NOS). Luckily, nothing was at fault! All it needed was FPM memory instead of EDO. My suspicion is that the owner tried to run the board with EDO…
Now, there are four memory boards for the AWE64 – all available to the community! Schematics, Gerber files, PAL/GAL equations and the Bill of Material for each board will make it easy for anyone possessing the proper skills to make one of these memory boards for the Sound Blaster AWE64. OK, the MIDI FORGE Symphony (YouTube) is not yet available due to licensing issues with Creative…
Hey everyone, this AWEsome journey of AWE64 memory expansion boards isn’t over with the introduction of the MIDI FORGE Symphony – it was simply STARTING! And I can tell you, the MIDI FORGE Rhapsody won’t be the last chapter of this book! I’m really excited to share the latest addition to the AWE64 memory upgrade – the MIDI FORGE Rhapsody, a sleek, modernized 28MB memory…
Do you own an AWE64 sound card, but don’t have enough memory for loading larger sound fonts? This is especially true for the Value edition that came with a measly 512KB of onboard memory. It is almost as if Creative wanted to make sure that sound fonts was a feature reserved for their premium product: The AWE64 Gold.
AWE64 Value: 512KB of onboard memory
With 512KB onboard memory, you…
If you’re anything like me, you probably didn’t think much about the Wave Table header on those old-school sound cards. But I always wondered about that “General MIDI” option in games. Every time I picked it, the MIDI music just wouldn’t play. It wasn’t until recently that I finally cracked the code on what General MIDI is and how to make it work. Spoiler alert: you need a Wave…
If you’re a retro computing enthusiast or MIDI musician, you know the Sound Blaster AWE64 Gold and Value cards are legendary for their EMU8K synthesizer and SoundFont capabilities. Back in the ‘90s, these ISA soundcards brought DOS games like Doom and Duke Nukem 3D to life with rich MIDI soundtracks, and they’re still a staple for vintage music production. But to truly unlock their…
The Hanging Note Bug on the Sound Blaster 16 is a frustrating issue that disrupts MIDI playback in games like Hexen and Doom, causing notes to stick and loop endlessly. Specific to DSP chip versions 4.11, 4.12, and 4.13 [1], the bug stems from faulty firmware that mishandles certain MIDI commands, resulting in persistent audio glitches. While the Sound Blaster 16 has other issues, this particular…