Ultrasound Daily Digest     Sun, 14 Mar 93       Volume 2 : Issue  69 

Today's Topics:
							   digest.
						  GUS and keyboards
					  GUS joystick and midi port
				 Is there a database of SBOS switches
			   Modification to previous report on SBOS
					  Patch switching in Windows
				  Why not ship with 1 meg on board?

	Information about the UltraSound Daily Digest (such as
mail addresses, request servers, ftp sites, etc., etc.) can be found
at the end of the Digest.

	*** HEY!!! *** 

	Before you ask a question, *** READ THE FAQ ***.  It's
available on the request server and the ftp sites, or check the
newsgroup archives.

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Date: Sat, 13 Mar 93 21:39:03 CST
From: Michael J Stumpf <mjs7529@tamsun.tamu.edu>
Message-Id: <9303140339.AA05357@tamsun.tamu.edu>
Subject: digest.
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <ultrasound@dsd.es.com>

Suggestion:  Maybe we should keep a semi-current archive of digests
in the ultrasound archive.. I delete most of mine, and would like to be
able to ftp one when necessary and grep for what I need rather than having
to keep them all around.

thanks,

mike

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Date: 13 Mar 1993 11:53:47 -0400 (EDT)
From: "KEVIN HOLLY....SSC BURKE SCIENCE LAB" <HOLLYK@SSCvax.CIS.McMaster.CA>
Message-Id: <01GVRAGP5W209EE4X5@SSCVAX.CIS.MCMASTER.CA>
Subject: GUS and keyboards
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <ultrasound@dsd.es.com>

Has anyone out there had any extensive experience hooking a keyboard up to the
GUS? I was wondering how well the GUS performs as a synth. Obviously you can't
expect a $200 card (or $169 if you were lucky like me :-) ) to perform like a
$1000 synth but what CAN we do with this thing? Does it respond to key velocity
or aftertouch (I know, I know, I'm pushing my luck right?)
What about compatability of formats from other samplers?
Everything I've seen here has been mostly dealing with software playing files.
If anyone could clarify the capabilities of the GUS when hooked to a controller
it would be greatly appreciated.

Kevin Holly

hollyk@sscvax.cis.mcmaster.ca

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Date: Sat, 13 Mar 93 10:35:10 CST
From: eason@ncrnd3.StPaul.NCR.COM (Dale Eason)
Message-Id: <9303131635.AA24905@ncrnd3.StPaul.NCR.COM>
Subject: GUS joystick and midi port
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <ultrasound@dsd.es.com>

The pin outs for the joystick on the gus are the same as any joystick connector.
Therefore if you wire up your auxiliary connector to each and every pin on the 
input side you will be OK.  The joystick does not use the pins that
are used by MIDI (except the 5v pin).

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 13 Mar 1993 03:07:59 -0500 (EST)
From: djh@neptune.att.com
Message-Id: <9303131214.AA00287@orca.es.com>
Subject: Is there a database of SBOS switches
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <ultrasound@dsd.es.com>

Since I don't have a GUS, I don't know if this question
is easily answered by just looking at the enclosed software.

Seeing so many messages about what switches to use with
sbos for all the programs out there, I was wondering if
there is a database from Gravis that lists names of 
programs and what switches to use.  For instance, the
file might have something like

wolf3d.exe          -arg1 -arg2
uw2.exe             -arg99

Then, when sbos was invoked, it could be run with the name
of the game as an argument to an option, e.g., sbos -g wolf3d.
This way, you don't have to remember the switches, and they
are all centralized.  Of course, the user should be able to
edit this file and add or change items.

Related to this, I was wondering if a program always uses the
same switches no matter what system a user has (not the
interrupts, just the -x arguments, etc.), or do the switches
depend on the model of their machine, etc.

What I was really wondering, was whether or not it would ever
be _possible_ to eliminate the switches altogether, and if not,
why not.

-- 
Dave Heiland   djh@neptune.att.com

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Date: Sat, 13 Mar 93 14:37:30 PST
From: "Burns Fisher, VMS Engineering  13-Mar-1993 1726" <fisher@decwin.enet.dec.com>
Message-Id: <9303132237.AA13946@enet-gw.pa.dec.com>
Subject: Modification to previous report on SBOS
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <ultrasound@dsd.es.com>

I wish I could mail this to John Smith rather than have to use a public mailing
list like this, but it just does not work!

Anyway, I previously sent a report that essentially said that SBOS 1.4b3 was
a step backwards from 1.4b2, at least in playing Sierra's King's Quest 5, and
possibly SimEarth (which at one point did a weird parity error).

The good news is that I take that back.  I was confused on which versions I was
testing.  I have redone it, and 1.4b3 is (for me) essentially no different from
1.4b2.

The bad news is that my comments about a step backwards apply to the change
from 1.37b to 1.4b2.  1.37b did the music on KQ5 *much* better than ever before
or since.  1.4b2/3 seems to improve some sound effects a bit, like the
lightning noises as teh castle is stolen, but the music throughout is quite
bad, as noted before.  1.37 is much better on that game.

BTW, I was able to reproduce a parity error.  It happened when I (stupidly)
replaced 1.37b with 1.42b3 in the ultrasnd/sbos directory while 1.37b was
still loaded.  It did not like me to run a game in that situation.

I hope this is helpful.  Sorry for the previous misinformation.

Burns

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Date: Sat, 13 Mar 93 4:23:50 EST
From: Phat H Tran <ptran@sciborg.uwaterloo.ca>
Message-Id: <9303130923.AA00484@sciborg.uwaterloo.ca>
Subject: Patch switching in Windows
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <ultrasound@dsd.es.com>

> Date: Fri, 12 Mar 93 16:49:44 -0500
> From: cs012043@cs.brown.edu (Brendan Miller)
> Message-Id: <9303122149.AA15657@cslab0a.cs.brown.edu>
> Subject: Pats in Windows
> To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <ultrasound@dsd.es.com>
> 
> I've read the FAQ and there's no information on this in it. How do I change 
> the PAT files that are associated with particular numbers (ie replace 
> acpiano1 on 0 with oboe, for instance. I would like to be able to do this
> without restarting or exiting Windows. I've tried altering ultrasnd.ini, 
> changing the midimap configuration, and changing default.cfg and none of
> those have worked. How can I do this? Thank you.
> 

I don't think you can drastically change the patch mapping without 
editing ultrasnd.ini and restarting Windows.  MIDI Mapper lets you 
shuffle the existing patches as found in ultrasnd.ini upon startup, but
it doesn't let you assign a program number to a patch that wasn't in 
that file to begin with.  (If all you need to do is shuffle the GM
instruments around, go into MIDI Mapper, edit or create a new Patch Map,
and edit or create a new Setup that uses that Patch Map.  Then, use that
Setup as the default.  Media Player will fall under the influence of 
whatever changes you made in MIDI Mapper, but WinJammer appears not to
sway.)

Gravis/Forte:  What I would like to see implemented in the Windows MIDI
driver is a bank switching feature implemented as a sysex command.  The
default bank uses the patch assignment in ultrasnd.ini, while the custom
banks will use whatever .ini filename is passed through the sysex command.
This way, musicians can actually get to take advantage of the RAM.

Phat.

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Date: Sat, 13 Mar 1993 02:52:37 -0500 (EST)
From: djh@neptune.att.com
Message-Id: <9303131214.AA00284@orca.es.com>
Subject: Why not ship with 1 meg on board?
To: Ultrasound Daily Digest <ultrasound@dsd.es.com>

In the FAQ, it says that the GUS ships with 512K. 
If the board can hold 1M and "everyone" upgrades to 1M
from whatever they started with (256K, 512K), why not
just ship the boards with 1M and prevent some confusion
and trouble for the users.  Surely Gravis can purchase the
memory in bulk cheaper than users can, and adding 10 or
20 dollars to the cost won't harm sales any.
-- 
Dave Heiland   djh@neptune.att.com

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End of Ultrasound Daily Digest V2 #69
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