Disney Sound Source

This is my overview of the Disney Sound Source external sound card. If anyone has this as well, please post a video response of you using it!

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Sound
• card
• wolfenstein
• 3d
• disney

[1337Shockwav3]

(last post for tonight): About the quality, practically it _can_ go even higher than the soundblaster [if you scrape the FIFO/buffer which caps the sound source at 7KHz (~38khz vs. 22khz)) BUT all sound has to be processed in software, causing a very high cpu load (considering PCs had 8-33Mhz back then) which even makes Wolf3d run slightly jerky on my DX2 (66MHz).

[lilmul123]

@1337Shockwav3 Yeah, as a computer engineer, I figured that it had to be done in software, and that that probably took up a good chunk of CPU time. Luckily, the CPU I have in this machine is a 133Mhz Pentium, so I didn't notice any slowdown.

[1337Shockwav3]

Also ... covox lemmings doesn't work with the Sound Source because of the mentioned buffer thing, as the sound source needs a special bit series to be activated sent through the parallel port, which lemmings doesn't send, considering it's made for simple covox plugs ... it works great with the thunderboard by Mediavision tho (which is an ISA based soundblaster clone with a few additional features.)

[lilmul123]

@1337Shockwav3 Interesting, that would explain why I couldn't get it to work. 

[1337Shockwav3]

One more thing about the little box ... I've done a little research on that, funnily enough it does not only contain resistors for voltage adaption + a DAC chip, but also a FIFO (basically an 8byte buffer) allowing software to detect if the sound source is connected or not ... which is kinda annoying nowadays, since it makes software written for the SS incompatible with Covox plugs and no one has really figured out yet how it works exactly.

[lilmul123]

@1337Shockwav3 Interesting tidbits. I've been thinking of cracking it open myself and checking it out. Maybe I'll check it out very soon.

[Robloxian182]

@bobjoe212x I'm just using an internal floppy drive and a USB Stick with DOS on it. I may get something that lets me use a soundblaster with PCI/USB/Serial (My current computer is the one being used as my DOS machine. The only thing that isn't maxed out on my PC is my RAM.....for now :D)

[bobjoe212x]

Sound Source just brought back audio for newer PCs, i'm building my own for my 2002 based laptop which has NO audio (besides MPXPlay) in DOS

[pHr33kAcHu]

This thing would be good if you only had the Adlib original and couldn't afford a Soundblaster.

[kingcrimson234]

needz moar death incarnate mode.

[MegaJacob97]

Duke Nukem 3d & simcity supported the disney sound source

[Scioneer]

A Kart Racing game known as Wacky Wheels supported the Sound Source.

[martinblank83]

wow das cool!

when i wasw a little boy my daddy would make me take my pj bottoms off and sit on the subwoofer whie he played wolfenstien 3d. he called it the anal blaster!

[1337Shockwav3]

@lilmul123 No need to ;)

bit . ly / hX5PbB