Sound Blaster AWE64 Gold Readme File ==================================== This file contains additional information to supplement the manual. Please read all the sections before you proceed with the installation. This file contains the following sections: 1. Installation 2. Uninstallation 3. DOS Environment settings 4. DOS Audio Driver Support under Windows 95 DOS Box 5. BLASTER settings under MS-DOS Mode 6. Full-Duplex Constraints 7. Online Documentation 8. SoundFont banks 9. Mapping instruments to multiple MIDI devices 10. Acknowledgments 1. INSTALLATION The full installation option requires about 21 MBytes of hard disk space for program files and an additional 2 MBytes for working space. You might need more if your drive is in compressed form. 2. UNINSTALLATION Before uninstalling the software package, ensure that all Sound Blaster applications are closed. Any Sound Blaster application that is running while uninstallation is in progress will not be deleted. Also, files that are added to the Sound Blaster directory after the initial software installation will not be deleted by the uninstallation process. You will have to manually delete these files after the uninstallation process is completed. Some of the SoundBlaster files in the Windows directory are shared by other applications. The uninstallation program will prompt you when it tries to delete these files. You should choose not to delete the files unless you are very sure that they are no longer used by Windows. 3. DOS ENVIRONMENT SETTINGS Some of the existing DOS programs require the presence of MIDI and SOUND environments in order for them to work. The Setup program will add the SET MIDI and SET SOUND lines at the beginning of the AUTOEXEC.BAT file. 4. DOS AUDIO DRIVER SUPPORT UNDER WINDOWS 95 DOS BOX Some of the DOS applications are developed with Creative's Sound Blaster Developer Kit. These applications require the low-level DOS device drivers to be loaded. To load these drivers, you need to add the following lines to the CONFIG.SYS file: DEVICE=C:\\DRV\CTSB16.SYS /UNIT=0 /BLASTER=A:220 I:5 D:1 H:5 /WIN95 DEVICE=C:\\DRV\CTMMSYS.SYS Remarks: a. is the sound directory where the audio software is located. b. The /BLASTER parameter specifies the Sound Blaster base I/O port address (A), interrupt request line (I), low 8-bit DMA channel (D) and high 16-bit DMA channel (H). c. The settings in the /BLASTER parameter must tally with the actual settings allocated by Windows 95. To find out the actual settings, go into Windows 95 DOS box, and type SET and press at the DOS prompt. You will see one of the lines displayed as: BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 H5 P330 T6 The values after A, I, D and H are the actual settings to be used for the /BLASTER parameter. To help you set up the DOS audio drivers, we have prepared a text file CONFIG.TXT in the sound directory. This text file contains the above two lines to specify the DOS audio drivers. The sound directory name in the text file will be updated by the installation program. All you need to do is update the /BLASTER parameter, then use a text editor to copy the two lines from the CONFIG.TXT file and paste them into the CONFIG.SYS file. 5. BLASTER settings under MS-DOS Mode Whenever you change your audio hardware configuration using Plug and Play configuration utility, the BLASTER environment settings under MS-DOS Mode will only be valid after you have rebooted the system. However, if you proceed to MS-DOS Mode without rebooting, you need to run CTCM.EXE (found in your Windows directory). This program makes the BLASTER environment setting tally with the actual hardware settings. 6. FULL-DUPLEX CONSTRAINTS Your audio card supports full-duplex recording and playback. However, to make full use of this feature, please make sure you observe the following constraints: a. Start only one session of simultaneous playback and recording. b. Use the same sampling rate for both operations. c. Preferably play back and record audio files which are in uncompressed wave format, that is, Pulse Code Modulation (PCM). d. Reduce the sampling rate for both operations if your audio playback or recording session is too slow. NOTE: The Full-Duplex and DirectSound capabilities are mutually exclusive. If you activate the full-duplex feature, the DirectSound capability cannot be enabled. And vice versa. 7. ONLINE DOCUMENTATION To help you get information on the applications in this package easily, we have compiled a set of online documentation which can be accessed from your audio card's program group. Just click the START button on your Windows 95 taskbar. Select "Programs", followed by "Sound Blaster AWE64 Gold" and then "User's Guide". 8. SoundFont banks There are three SoundFont banks shipped with AWE64. The GM35REVC.SF2 will be loaded as the default synthesizer bank. The following is a brief description of each file: GM35REVC.SF2 - Three and a half MB bank General MIDI bank. 4GMGSMT.SF2 - Four MB General MIDI bank with GS variation tones. 2GMGSMT.SF2 - Two MB General MIDI bank with GS variation tones. If you are playing any MIDI files that uses GS variation tones, you will have to load either the 2 or 4 MB banks as the synthesizer bank. 9. MAPPING INSTRUMENTS TO MULTIPLE MIDI DEVICES Instruments to be played from any channels in a MIDI file can be mapped to any available MIDI output devices on the Sound Blaster AWE64 card. Sound Blaster AWE64 comes with two components that help to make this possible. They are the Creative MIDI Instrument Mapper and Creative Virtual MIDI Driver. The mapper and driver, when used together, allow you to define mappings of how you would like the instrument to sound like. The mapping causes all note related MIDI events to be routed according to the configured mappings. You can map instruments in two different ways, by using the Creative MIDI Instrument Mapper or sending MIDI System Exclusive events. If you wish to experiment multiple MIDI device playback on any existing MIDI files, you may choose to use the Creative MIDI Instrument Mapper. Refer to the online documentation on how to configure mapping. On the other hand, if you are creating or editing a MIDI file from a MIDI sequencer, you can choose the second option which is to send System Exclusive events to the Virtual MIDI driver. The following events may be entered at the beginning of the MIDI tracks using your favourite sequencer. However, MIDI files with these System Exclusive events encoded must be sent to the Creative Virtual MIDI driver for the mappings to take effect. a. To direct (lock) all MIDI events to a particular MIDI device, use F0 00 20 21 01 00 xx F7 where xx stands for one of the following: 08 - AWE 0C - WaveSynth 10 - FM 14 - MIDI Out b. To undo (unlock) what has been done in (1), use F0 00 20 21 01 01 F7 c. To direct (lock) all MIDI events in a particular channel to another device, use F0 00 20 21 01 02 yy xx F7 where yy is the desired MIDI channel and xx stands for one of: 08 - AWE 0C - WaveSynth 10 - FM 14 - MIDI Out d. To undo (unlock) the channel mappings done in (3), use F0 00 20 21 01 03 yy F7 where yy is the MIDI channel number. e. To map individual instruments to a desired MIDI device, use F0 00 20 21 01 04 00 smb slb sp xx dmb dlb dp F7 where, smb - MIDI bank to be mapped from. Contains MSB part of the bank num. slb - MIDI bank to be mapped from. Contains LSB part of the bank num. sp - MIDI patch to be mapped from xx - Destination MIDI device (see above) dmb - MIDI bank to be mapped to the Destination MIDI device. Contains MSB part of the bank num. dlb - MIDI bank to be mapped to the Destination MIDI device. Contains LSB part of the bank num. dp - MIDI patch to be mapped to the Destination MIDI device smb and slb forms bank numbers that appears in your MIDI files. Most MIDI files use only bank 0, i.e. smb and slb sets to 0. dmb and dlb forms bank numbers that will be mapped to the destination MIDI device. For example, to map Bank 5 Patch 3 in a MIDI file to use Bank 0 Patch 3 of AWE device, the System Exclusive message will be F0 00 20 21 01 04 00 00 05 03 08 00 00 03 F7 f. To remove any mappings done in (5), use F0 00 20 21 01 05 00 sb sb sp F7 10. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS MS-DOS, Windows, and the Windows logo are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. All other products are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners. ********** E N D O F R E A D M E **********