Hardware wavetable GENERAL MIDI sounds in MS-DOS retro gaming laptop: Dell Lattitude XPi CD

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Unlocking Affordable and Space-Saving Retro Gaming Bliss: DOS Gaming with the Dell Latitude XPi CD! 🕹️💻 Explore the world of pure DOS retro gaming laptop, complete with coveted hardware wavetable sounds. Join me as we delve into the performance, compatibility, and stability of the Dell XPi CD in this episode! 🎮✨ #RetroGaming #DOSGaming #msdos #retrogaming #msdoslaptop
00:00 Intro
01:00 About hardware wavetable
01:28 Sound card - ESS
01:49 XPi CD hardware introduction
02:46 Ports, RAM, Power,
03:30 HDD caddy, Compact flash compatibility
03:50 Keyboard, trackball
04:07 Powering UP and BIOS settings
04:25 Hardware video scaling
04:29 Conventional memory
04:41 CPU, Setmul tuning
05:00 3DBench results
Correction: 05:08 483-33 MHz (93-95 era), Pentium 60Mhz (96-98 era)
05:14 DOS games, Wing Commander, Test Drive 3, Ultima 7,...
06:23 ESSCFG dos sound card config utility
06:50 ESFM Soundblaster game audio, Pinball, Doom
06:50 Wavetable General Midi game audio, Doom, Space Quest, Gabriel Knight, Lost Vikings
09:29 Windows 98 and file transfers
09:56 Conclusions, score rating
Download DOS audio driver:
archive.org/details/dell-xpi-...
Support my journey to acquire vintage treasures, allowing me to delve into their unique qualities and share the experience with the community.
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archive.org/search?query=msdo...
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Опубликовано:

4 июл 2024

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Комментарии : 28

@andrewdupuis1151 2 месяца назад

Good old dos days

@stephensalex 7 месяцев назад

Now I want to own one of these.

@retrobecanes 7 месяцев назад

Grab one while you still can, prices keep going up

@jasonnovak2121 7 месяцев назад

This looks like a pretty interesting machine, I just picked one up. Looking at the current listings some have questionable screens or don't come with power adapter which seems fairly uncommon. I have a really nice Toshiba Tecra 550cdt too, with s3 virge video and yamaha opl3 sound. Some librettos too.

@retrobecanes 7 месяцев назад

Indeed most of them don’t have the power adaptor. I got my adaptor for $18. It appears (at least from pictures) that an adaptor for the Inspiron 8xxx series might work too. I love Toshibas, their overall compatibility is great and parts are still fairly abundant. Thanks for stopping by !

@jasonnovak2121 7 месяцев назад

A heads up to anyone else looking for adapters, I only see two people selling them atm and they both show Dell 81407, but the cheaper one is 18v / 3a vs the other is 18.5v 3.8a. Maybe the description is wrong, but the pictures are too bad to read the label

@3lectr1c 5 месяцев назад

@@retrobecanes These Dell adapters are a massive pain. There were three different chargers that used this style of connector. Each looks like it may work with the others, but the keying on each is different. The most common are the ones for the Latitude C-Series, Inspiron 8xxx, and a number of others. Those will NOT work on the XPi. They're a different voltage and the keying is different. There were a few model numbers for the C Series chargers. PA-2 is one, PA-6 is a newer revision. The second style is the one for the Latitude LM (and would also work on the WinBook LM which is the same laptop, both made by Compal). That one has a model number of TSA 8, with a part number of 99500. Finally, there's the version for the XPi series. Those are rated for 18.5V 3.8A and have a bulbous circular design on the connector grip, with a catch on it so you can clip it onto the cable for storage. The model number for those supplies is 81407 as mentioned by the above commenter. To further complicate things, the Latitude LS, L400 and the Inspiron variants of those two models (2000 and 2100) used a different proprietary charger. This one at least looks different from the three above. I don't have the model number for that one on hand.

@retrobecanes 5 месяцев назад

Don't despair. The official XPi-CD adaptor is the PA-1 (18.5v - 3.8A, 70W). It's possible to repurpose HP adaptors with the correct connector plug, but you will need a crimp tool and some basic soldering skills. The HP has a few models that supply 18.5V that are easily available for around $13+shipping. - HP61350-001(18.5V, 4.9A, 90W) - HP325112-201 (18.5V, 4.9A, 90W) - HP371790-11(18.5V, 3.5A, 65W) although this one is 5W short, but I it shouldn't matter if the batteries are dead and you don't use the laptop for 3D rendering all the time. You can buy the plug from Digikey, for $4 each. It's a Hirose RP34 (www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/hirose-electric-co-ltd/RP34-8SP-3SC-71/1035221) + 3x female pin connectors RP34-SC-212 The plug holes are numbered. Facing it, they look like this: [1] (-ve)top hole [3] (+ve)lower left [2](unused) lower right Good luck! I may make a video if there's lots of demand.

@nitrax8629 7 месяцев назад

Great video, sadly the non-CD version of this laptop doesn't have the hardware wavetable. Other options worth considering include the Compaq Armada 77xx series, which have a more compatible GPU for certain problematic DOS games plus the same sound setup as the XPi CD, and if you need a faster model for the later games the Armada 7800 which has a Pentium II but a similar sound setup.

@retrobecanes 7 месяцев назад

Thanks for your comment. I agree, this laptop has its quirks. I just got my hands on a 7790 and I do have a 7800. I'll review them soon. Cheers!

@pentiummmx2294 4 месяца назад

i have been having issues with old laptops, like from bad screens to brittle plastics to motherboards dying due to the battery leaking. I had a Latitude LM which seemed to completely disintegrate in my hands and a Toshiba Satellite Pro 440CDT that was completely dead and a IBM Thinkpad 760EL with a faulty screen and keyboard but it seems to turn on to some error but it seems to boot up to windows 98 if i have a external screen and keyboard hooked to it.

@retrobecanes 4 месяца назад

Hello, same here. Sometimes it takes up to five donor units combined to get one working laptop. It takes patience and dedication scouring market places, thrift stores and recycling centers. Is it frustrating? Yes, many times. Is it worth it? For me, absolutely :) . Thank you for watching and taking the time to comment!

@pentiummmx2294 2 месяца назад

@@retrobecanes yeah, in the middle of restoring a 760ED, i hate the mwave, but working keyboard, and plastics are a bit beat up, screen is good though.

@jasonnovak2121 7 месяцев назад

Which drivers did you use for the sound? I tried the official Dell driver in Windows 95 and it's detected and I can install, but won't start. I got it to work in Windows 98 using a trick in an old post in the Dell forums, but in either case when I try to use it in DOS it doesn't detect any cards, I've tried multiple drivers for the internet archive and vogons, if you could point me what worked for you. I'm starting to wonder if maybe have some damage

@retrobecanes 7 месяцев назад

Hello, getting the sound to work is indeed a bit tricky. The DELL drivers work for tweaking settings in Windows, however they don't work in DOS. The ESSCFG that worked for me is v1.9 and my 2 units are locked to IRQ 5. I'm travelling until the end of the month and I'm not entirely sure from where I found it. I'll confirm when I get back, meanwhile give this one a shot and let us know: vetusware.com/output/zxzlfxse/ess_isa_cards_dos_win31.rar

@jasonnovak2121 6 месяцев назад

Thanks, still seem to be getting stuck, it shows v5.1. I tried another and doesn't show a version, but both say "unable to find ess1868 card". In Win95 it doesn't find the card, I give the dell drivers, and doesn't work / error 10. In Windows 98 it does detect both a 1868 / 1888 natively, though with errors. If I remove them and re-detect it installs the WDM driver and I have sound in Windows. If it wasn't for that I'd think the sound card was dead. If I reboot to DOS from Windows it just hands. I tried booting from a MSDOS boot disk to be sure and doesn't detect. I notice we have different BIOS versions, otherwise unless may card is partially fried, or I just don't have the right driver out of the couple I've tried seem kind of stuck. I would understand Windows 98 not working, since not officially supported, but no clue why Windows 95 doesn't either with official Dell 95 driver from their site. @@retrobecanes

@retrobecanes 6 месяцев назад

Strange indeed. Could be the combination of the bios version as you pointed out. But first let's ensure the sound card is not fried. Try getting sound by using the Dell diagnostic utilities: dl.dell.com/diags/diag381a.exe

@jasonnovak2121 6 месяцев назад

Thanks, I did run the dell utility and it did detect an ess1887 / irq5/ dm00. I double-checked WIndows 98 - the only place I'm able to get the card working with some messing around, and it does show dma 1. I also notice when I run setvol it does find the card, but any version of esscfg I've tried says it can't find the card. @@retrobecanes

@retrobecanes 6 месяцев назад

It's good news that the dell utility finds the sound card. Try this: 1. Start Windows 98, 2. Perform a soft reboot (Start->Restart, not restart to DOS) 3. Run ESSCFG, 4. Set IRQ to 5 (don't try any other IRQ, it will mess it up). 6. At this point you can read the other settings such as the MIDI port. 7. Quit ESSCFG, 7. Ensure BLASTER variable is set (ESSCFG does it automatically for me when I exit) 8. Setup your games to the corresponding IRQ, DMA, MIDI. @@jasonnovak2121