I'm sorry. If memory serves, the XP driver only covers SB16/AWE cards.
8-bit Sound Blasters were likely considered obsolete in the XP days.
By comparison, SB16 compatible motherboards were still around, though.

Edit: On the bright side, XP is the last Windows to support ISA PnP, Game Port, MPU-401 and DirectMusic/DirectSound 3D.

On the bright side, XP is the last Windows to support ISA PnP, Game Port, MPU-401 and DirectMusic/DirectSound 3D.

Eh, actually Windows 2003 Server.

AlessandroB wrote on 2020-09-04, 08:40:

I have a system that can only expand with ISA slots to be able to mount a sound card.

If your motherboard has ISA slots, and you want to play DOS games on it you're better off using Windows98 SE than XP or anything newer than that.

While ISA cards might work under WinXP, the only benefit they would give you is if you used them as a DOSBox pass through. Attempting to run DOS games natively under XP is a bad idea.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2020-09-04, 11:00:

AlessandroB wrote on 2020-09-04, 08:40:

I have a system that can only expand with ISA slots to be able to mount a sound card.

If your motherboard has ISA slots, and you want to play DOS games on it you're better off using Windows98 SE than XP or anything newer than that.

While ISA cards might work under WinXP, the only benefit they would give you is if you used them as a DOSBox pass through. Attempting to run DOS games natively under XP is a bad idea.

No, i want to play XP native games on XP using a real sound card, my cpu board maximum is K6III 400Mhz with onboard c&t69000 and some isa card that i have for sound. While the cpu i think is enough for some xp games like age of empire, i am not sure if my isa sound cards support for example games like age of empire and similar games which are native to winXP.

Hi again! If you're running DOS games under XP, any sound card will do.
XP's NTVDM emulates an SB 2.0 sound card by default.

If you want more just install VDMSound.
It gives you a SB16 and OPL3 FM in DOS games, among other things.

If you're going to dual-boot with MS-DOS or FreeDOS to play DOS games, too, any Creative SB16/AWE model will do.

Just check if Plug&Play models are easier to get going on XP.. It think that's the case, but I'm not sure.

Or just get a SB32 (a simplified AWE32).
It will do okay in XP. Used it years ago myself on an XP rig. 🙂

Jo22 wrote on 2020-09-04, 22:34:

Hi again! If you're running DOS games under XP, any sound card will do. XP's NTVDM emulates an SB 2.0 sound card by default. […]
Show full quote

Hi again! If you're running DOS games under XP, any sound card will do.
XP's NTVDM emulates an SB 2.0 sound card by default.

If you want more just install VDMSound.
It gives you a SB16 and OPL3 FM in DOS games, among other things.

If you're going to dual-boot with MS-DOS or FreeDOS to play DOS games, too, any Creative SB16/AWE model will do.

Just check if Plug&Play models are easier to get going on XP.. It think that's the case, but I'm not sure.

Or just get a SB32 (a simplified AWE32).
It will do okay in XP. Used it years ago myself on an XP rig. 🙂

not dos games, forget dos, i mean native windows games

AlessandroB wrote on 2020-09-04, 23:09:

Jo22 wrote on 2020-09-04, 22:34:

Hi again! If you're running DOS games under XP, any sound card will do. XP's NTVDM emulates an SB 2.0 sound card by default. […]
Show full quote

Hi again! If you're running DOS games under XP, any sound card will do.
XP's NTVDM emulates an SB 2.0 sound card by default.

If you want more just install VDMSound.
It gives you a SB16 and OPL3 FM in DOS games, among other things.

If you're going to dual-boot with MS-DOS or FreeDOS to play DOS games, too, any Creative SB16/AWE model will do.

Just check if Plug&Play models are easier to get going on XP.. It think that's the case, but I'm not sure.

Or just get a SB32 (a simplified AWE32).
It will do okay in XP. Used it years ago myself on an XP rig. 🙂

not dos games, forget dos, i mean native windows games

If you are not going to be using DOS, there is absolutely no point in using an ISA sound card . If you happen to have an ISA sound card that works with Windows XP, there is no harm in using it, though . However, the better Windows-oriented PCI sound cards like the Sound Blaster Live!, Audigy and X-FI (not their hobbled variants, check before you buy) and Aureal Vortex family cards will give you hardware-accelerated positional audio in games that support it, if this is of interest to you .

darry wrote on 2020-09-04, 23:19:

AlessandroB wrote on 2020-09-04, 23:09:

Jo22 wrote on 2020-09-04, 22:34:

Hi again! If you're running DOS games under XP, any sound card will do. XP's NTVDM emulates an SB 2.0 sound card by default. […]
Show full quote

Hi again! If you're running DOS games under XP, any sound card will do.
XP's NTVDM emulates an SB 2.0 sound card by default.

If you want more just install VDMSound.
It gives you a SB16 and OPL3 FM in DOS games, among other things.

If you're going to dual-boot with MS-DOS or FreeDOS to play DOS games, too, any Creative SB16/AWE model will do.

Just check if Plug&Play models are easier to get going on XP.. It think that's the case, but I'm not sure.

Or just get a SB32 (a simplified AWE32).
It will do okay in XP. Used it years ago myself on an XP rig. 🙂

not dos games, forget dos, i mean native windows games

If you are not going to be using DOS, there is absolutely no point in using an ISA sound card . If you happen to have an ISA sound card that works with Windows XP, there is no harm in using it, though . However, the better Windows-oriented PCI sound cards like the Sound Blaster Live!, Audigy and X-FI (not their hobbled variants, check before you buy) and Aureal Vortex family cards will give you hardware-accelerated positional audio in games that support it, if this is of interest to you .

no we still don't understand each other. the system is primarily used for DOS games, and they work well. But I wanted to know if in games designed for windows (98 or XP) my ISA sound cards would work or I need to get a computer with pci slot to use pci sound cards. For example, games like Red Alert would work soundly from a sb16 tops would work with a live! ? And if so, what differences there would be apart from the use of more speakers with live music! and perhaps a lower cpu load for sound.

AlessandroB wrote on 2020-09-04, 23:40:

darry wrote on 2020-09-04, 23:19:

AlessandroB wrote on 2020-09-04, 23:09:

not dos games, forget dos, i mean native windows games

If you are not going to be using DOS, there is absolutely no point in using an ISA sound card . If you happen to have an ISA sound card that works with Windows XP, there is no harm in using it, though . However, the better Windows-oriented PCI sound cards like the Sound Blaster Live!, Audigy and X-FI (not their hobbled variants, check before you buy) and Aureal Vortex family cards will give you hardware-accelerated positional audio in games that support it, if this is of interest to you .

no we still don't understand each other. the system is primarily used for DOS games, and they work well. But I wanted to know if in games designed for windows (98 or XP) my ISA sound cards would work or I need to get a computer with pci slot to use pci sound cards. For example, games like Red Alert would work soundly from a sb16 tops would work with a live! ? And if so, what differences there would be apart from the use of more speakers with live music! and perhaps a lower cpu load for sound.

Ok, I think I understand more clearly .

As mentioned by others before my SB16 or AWE32 or AWE64 will be fine in XP and in DOS . The advantage of the PCI cards I mentioned is the added support for positional audio, like EAX https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_Audio_Extensions . You won't get that with an SB16 . Whether that is significant or not depends on your perception, so to speak . I don't care much for it personally .

Also, the board you have has both ISA and PCI slots, so there is nothing stopping you from using an ISA card and a PCI one .

Sorry, I somehow hallucinated your board had PCI slots .

"Using SBpro and SB16 ISA on WinXP and Win7, possible?"

AlessandroB wrote on 2020-09-04, 08:40:

I have a system that can only expand with ISA slots to be able to mount a sound card. I read that on windowsXP there are drivers for the Sound Blaster 16, are they also present for the Sound Blaster Pro? And on Windows 7 are there still drivers for these two isa cards?

but the most important thing is: even supposing that winXP and Win7 have the drivers for these two cards, will games started from Windows use these cards? What differences are there with the cheap PCI cards of the 2000s that were very popular in those years?

Tnks

Windows XP is fine with most 16bit Creative cards (SB16, AWE32, etc). Win7 will not run well if at all on your CPU.
You barely can run any DOS games from XP so suggest you create a dual boot situation using DOS 7 (from Win98se), make sure the primary partition with both DOS 7 and XP is less than 32Gb and any partition you want your DOS games in is also less than 32Gb. Been there and done it.

For SoundBlaster 16, there are drivers for Windows XP and are even included in the delivery. Windows 7 does not contain such a driver. Moreover, ISA PNP in Windows 7 is disabled by default (and as a result, the device is not recognized on the bus). However, Microsoft provides a solution to enable the legacy ISA bus for Windows Vista, and it works the same on Windows 7. After these modifications, the SoundBlaster 16 appears in the device list, but with an exclamation point (because there are no drivers in Windows Vista+). However, as you know, these drivers are in Windows XP!

https://web.archive.org/web/20080430041632/ht … ci/isa-bus.mspx

https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/w … w7itprohardware

There are quite a few cases when WDM drivers for PCI sound cards were successfully ported under Windows Vista, usually by modifying *.inf files of the driver and adding some libraries missing in the distribution. And it works. Both in Vista and Windows 7.

Based on the foregoing, it is logical to assume that for SoundBlaster 16, theoretically might exist a Windows 7 compatible driver (unofficial, modified), ported from Windows XP.

However, unfortunately, the search for a similar driver, at the moment, has not led to success.
And I would really like to have a working SoundBlaster 16 also under Windows 7...