Sound Blaster AWE32

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Sound Blaster AWE32 is an ISA sound card from Creative Technology. It is an add-on board for PCs. The Sound Blaster AWE32, introduced in March 1994, was nearly full-length ISA card, measuring 14 inches (356 mm) in length. It needed to be this large because of the number of features included (the most available at the time). At the time, manufacturing technology was incapable of integrating all of the functions into a smaller number of chips.

1 Overview
2 Sound quality problems
3 Sound Blaster 32
4 See also
5 External links

[edit] Overview

[edit] MIDI capability

AWE32 PnP Internet Enhanced with 8 MB RAM

The AWE32 included two distinct audio sections; one being the Creative digital audio section with their audio codec and optional CSP/ASP chip socket, and the second being the E-mu MIDI synthesizer section. The synthesizer section consisted of several sound processors, the most notable being the EMU8000 synthesizer chip and the EMU8011 effects processor. The two chips provided an advanced wavetable (Advanced WaveEffects a.k.a. AWE) solution that was very flexible and powerful, supporting 30-channel wavetable synthesis. The effects processor generated various effects (i.e. reverb and chorus) and environments on MIDI output, similar to the later EAX standard on Live! and newer cards. It can even add effects to the output from the Yamaha OPL-3's FM synthesis. One of the most stand-out features of AWE32 was its support for the then-burgeoning E-Mu SoundFont standard which allowed users to build custom wavetable sound sets using custom waveform samples. The card included software for building these custom Sound Fonts. All of Creative's subsequent cards, other than the Sound Blaster PCI64/128 series, supported SoundFonts.

On the initial release, Creative promoted the EMU8000 as a waveguide physical modelling synthesis engine, due to its ability to work with delay lines. The option was used mostly as an effect engine for chorus and flanging effects. Actual physical modeling instruments were a not popular on the AWE, although some support exists in the SoundFont format and their Vienna Soundfont Studio package.

The AWE32 didn't use its MPU-401 port to access the wavetable module—Creative decided to use a non-standard port. As with the Gravis Ultrasound, software designers had to write special AWE32 support into their programs. To support older software, the AWE32 still featured OPL-3 FM synthesis, and came with the AWEUTIL program which attempted to provide GM/MT-32/GS redirection to the native AWE hardware, however the compatibility wasn't great and it used a lot of precious DOS conventional memory. Disappointingly, if a game used DOS 32-bit protected mode through a non-DPMI compliant DOS extender, then the MPU-401 emulation could not function and the card could not produce wavetable MIDI unless directly supported by the software. This also affected the Creative Wave Blaster wavetable daughterboard header. AWE32's usage in Windows was simplified by the fact that Windows 3.1x had drivers which made the FM synthesizer appear like just another MIDI peripheral, on its own MIDI interface.

[edit] Digital sound effects

The Creative digital audio section was basically an entire Sound Blaster 16, and as such, was mostly compatible with Creative's earlier sound cards, including Sound Blaster Pro, Sound Blaster 2.0, and the original Sound Blaster. Its specifications included 16-bit 45 kHz AD/DA conversion with real-time on-board compression / decompression and the Yamaha OPL-3 FM synthesizer chip. AWE32 in general has superior recording and playback characteristics compared to the older SB16. However, compatibility was not always perfect and there were situations where various bugs could arise in games. Many of the AWE32 cards had codecs which supported bass, treble, and gain adjustments through Creative's included mixer software. There were many variants and revisions of the AWE32, however, and not all of them use the same digital audio chipset and features do vary. For example, the AWE32 boards that utilize the Vibra chip do not have bass and treble adjustments, but usually noticeably better signal-to-noise ratio.

[edit] Other onboard hardware

Also on AWE32 was a Panasonic/Sony/Mitsumi CD-ROM interface (for accessing old, non-ATAPI CD-ROM drives which were still in use at the time), 1 MB ROM for the default MIDI sound set, 512 KB built-in RAM for custom MIDI sound sets, and two 30-pin SIMM slots (with their own memory controller) for adding sample memory. Later AWE32 revisions received the newer ATAPI interface. The AWE32 supported up to 28 MB of additional SIMM memory; 32 MB could be added to the board, but the synthesizer couldn't address all of it.

[edit] Sound quality problems

AWE32 was criticized for its rather noisy analog output. Static, hiss, and pops were not uncommon from the circuitry onboard these cards. AWE32's name also confused many consumers initially because many believed the number 32 in the name to refer to its sampling bit depth, as in offering 32-bit audio support, when in reality the value 32 represented the polyphony of its MIDI synthesizers (30 wavetable synthesis voices + the 2 channel mix of the FM synthesizer).

[edit] Sound Blaster 32

Sound Blaster 32 IDE

The Sound Blaster 32 (SB32) was a value-oriented offering from Creative, announced on June 6, 1995, designed to fit below the AWE32 Value in the lineup. The SB32 lacked onboard RAM, Wave Blaster header, and CSP port. The boards also used the Vibra digital audio chip which lacked adjustments for bass, treble, and gain. The SB32 was fully equipped with the same MIDI capabilities (the same EMU8000/EMU8010 combination) as the AWE32, and in fact had the same 30-pin SIMM RAM expansion capability. The board was also fully compatible with the AWE32 option in software and even used the same Windows drivers. Once the SB32 was outfitted with 30-pin SIMMs, it was generally a transparent experience to the more expensive AWE32.