tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post3424090554845683185..comments2024-03-27T05:39:24.505-04:00Comments on Nerdly Pleasures: The Mysterious Covox PC Sound DevicesGreat Hierophanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04409413307024477304noreply@blogger.comBlogger14125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post-22849751111480583892022-01-12T13:19:57.801-05:002022-01-12T13:19:57.801-05:00An excellent blog post, that definitely filled a h...An excellent blog post, that definitely filled a hole in my knowledge about the card. Being able to see the ICs, it is essentially similar to a parallel port except in one respect, the Intersil chip. This appears to be an ADC of some kind which would digitize the speech, which the software would then read and try to compare to the stored voice sample. How well this worked in practice is anyone's guess until you find the disks, but you will never get anything out of the individual who showed you the disk listing. He is notorious in vintage computing circles and definitely believes it is better to receive than give.Great Hierophanthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04409413307024477304noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post-36346487119251685992022-01-11T01:56:40.285-05:002022-01-11T01:56:40.285-05:00Howdy! Even though I don't have the driver dis...Howdy! Even though I don't have the driver disks, I just got my COVOX Voice Master Key going as a COVOX Sound Thing. Also I have a better photo if you want to replace that potato-shot above!<br />https://modelrail.otenko.com/retro/covox-voice-master-keysteven.hhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14413492045799631386noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post-68925734222885798532018-04-26T19:57:58.448-04:002018-04-26T19:57:58.448-04:00"I do not know of any games supporting this d..."I do not know of any games supporting this device until 1990."<br />According to Mobygames, Last Half of Darkness was first released in 1989.<br />The copies I tried so far claimed to support PC Speaker, Covox Speech Thing and Sound Master II.<br />http://www.mobygames.com/company/wrf-studios<br /><br />Anyway, I just thought it was worth mentioning.<br />It's been a while since I played the EGA version..<br /><br />So perhaps it's better to double check. <br />Maybe it didn't support Speech Thing in the 1989 release yet.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post-42792965429234773482017-11-02T16:47:21.390-04:002017-11-02T16:47:21.390-04:00Thank you for that :)
Hopefully I will get the new...Thank you for that :)<br />Hopefully I will get the new the dual stereo-covox with DSS-Option as soon as it is fully designed. http://www.serdashop.com<br /><br />Greetings<br />Doc<br />Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08660400253183618615noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post-66332120375976934392017-11-02T16:43:16.408-04:002017-11-02T16:43:16.408-04:00I was the inventor of the Covox products. See wha...I was the inventor of the Covox products. See what I'm up to now: www.aerosynth.comBrad Stewarthttp://www.aerosynth.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post-18702775829505929382016-10-30T13:42:33.588-04:002016-10-30T13:42:33.588-04:00These Covox things do not work on Win98? I do not ...These Covox things do not work on Win98? I do not get them to work with iplay or glx.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08660400253183618615noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post-36666075303635649012016-08-02T07:19:48.394-04:002016-08-02T07:19:48.394-04:00Hi,
Covox developer here. I worked with a couple ...Hi,<br />Covox developer here. I worked with a couple of other guys and we designed all of those boards. I did all of the layouts in ORCAD and even pioneered a circuit board prototyping technique to make double sided boards using a copier and transparency film. This was published in Radio Electronics magazine. Covox was a lot of fun to work with and we had two other employees who were grandsons of the king of Afghanistan and a crack coder Nick who was one sharp cookie. Fun times !!Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06705973368052910433noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post-66617289260057357492016-02-23T12:34:16.658-05:002016-02-23T12:34:16.658-05:00Carlos,
I am not sure whether the auto detection ...Carlos,<br /><br />I am not sure whether the auto detection really works with the Plus as released. The game will "autodetect" the Plus if any Adlib or Sound Blaster card is emulated through DOSBox. An Adlib OPL2 chip can be detected when at the proper address by the triggering the timer registers on the chip. <br /><br />DOSBox's debugger reports writes to port 22F whenever a digital sound is played. The Sound Master 2 has its direct write port at that location, so Covox may have included it in the Plus for some measure of compatibility with the more expensive SM2. Thus it may be accessible by more than one I/O port. <br /><br />The 74HC373 latch on the Plus card would suggest that the DAC acts like a parallel port DAC. The latch can be read on a parallel port card, so that may serve as rudimentary detection but it is hardly infallible.Great Hierophanthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04409413307024477304noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post-87821152422985393902016-02-22T09:10:36.578-05:002016-02-22T09:10:36.578-05:00I recently acquired a Covox Sound Master Plus and ...I recently acquired a Covox Sound Master Plus and i can confirm Alone in the Dark works with both music and digitized sounds. Despite the port selection does not match the card slelecting the first one works just fine. I believe the program just ignores the port selected and auto detects the card.Carlos Teixeiranoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post-11949175582469159262015-07-11T11:31:45.516-04:002015-07-11T11:31:45.516-04:00I have recently acquired a COVOX Voice Master Key ...I have recently acquired a COVOX Voice Master Key (System II) which is an external device that connects to a PC via the parallel printer port. This one appears to be different than the photos I've seen in that mine has a 4" speaker mounted on top whereas the photos on the internet show a small speaker mounted on the front panel. Does anyone have any information as to why there are 2 configurations? Which one came first?<br /><br />I've been trying to test it. So far I've applied power and the two LEDs on the front panel light up and I can hear some background white noise from the speaker. I am looking for COVOX program disk for this device.<br /><br />So far I've found a copy of the v2.04 disk that was supplied with the PC bus card version of the Voice Master Key, but what I need is v2.04X which directs the I/O to the LPT port. I've searched the internet but cannot find a copy of that software.<br /><br />Here's a photo: http://home.comcast.net/~rakpix/VM_TN.jpgBobNJnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post-47190003896800592192015-05-17T07:55:37.942-04:002015-05-17T07:55:37.942-04:00I remember purchasing the "Who Framed Roger R...I remember purchasing the "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" game for DOS that came with one of these parallel port sound devices inside. It was a standard resistor based DAC inside, and I remember writing code in Turbo Pascal to drive it.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09926657973940874017noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post-644130633833439722014-10-05T17:18:11.936-04:002014-10-05T17:18:11.936-04:00I took these photos from various places around the...I took these photos from various places around the web, none are mine so I have no permission to give or withhold.Great Hierophanthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04409413307024477304noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post-12077714396103815232014-10-05T16:43:40.744-04:002014-10-05T16:43:40.744-04:00Hi, with your permission could i use that picture ...Hi, with your permission could i use that picture of the Covox sound blaster, i would credit you under the picture of course.<br />Btw does the disk itself contain the infamous lemmings demo or just the drivers?Jayhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04297544847181959099noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6993165553021868648.post-63576904739862549592014-09-15T21:54:03.978-04:002014-09-15T21:54:03.978-04:00Well, geez, there was some stuff in this post that...Well, geez, there was some stuff in this post that even I didn't know. Excellent work!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com