Missing Sound on Crystal Card

Discuss Chaos Strikes Back for Windows and Linux, an unofficial port of Chaos Strikes Back to PC by Paul Stevens, as well as CSBuild, an associated dungeon editor.

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Paul Stevens
CSBwin Guru
Posts: 4318
Joined: Sun Apr 08, 2001 6:00 pm
Location: Madison, Wisconsin, USA

Missing Sound on Crystal Card

Post by Paul Stevens »

Steve wrote-----

I have just downloaded CSBwin and it works great except that I have no sound, any suggestions.
==========================================
What version of Windows????

I have never heard this problem before. CSBwin
uses the MOST basic system calls to produce the
sounds. They should work on any system that
can play .wav files. But it is conceivable that I
have made some error in building the headers. If
nobody has any ideas then we will have to do some
rather difficult remote debugging.

PAul
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Paul Stevens
CSBwin Guru
Posts: 4318
Joined: Sun Apr 08, 2001 6:00 pm
Location: Madison, Wisconsin, USA

Re: Missing Sound on Crystal Card

Post by Paul Stevens »

CSBwin was built on an IBM Thinkpad laptop computer
with a Crystal PnP Audio System CODEC. Sounds like
what you have. That system is running Windows 95.

On rare occasions it has failed to produce sound. Perhaps
four times over the two years of daily development. But
then it produces no sounds for **ANY** program, including
the Windows sound setup. It always got better after a
shutdown - power-off - power-on sequence. I never figured
out what triggered the malfunction.

PAul
Steve

Re: Missing Sound on Crystal Card

Post by Steve »

I tried to shut down my computer and restart everything and I still have no sound, any other suggestions.

Steve..
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Paul Stevens
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Posts: 4318
Joined: Sun Apr 08, 2001 6:00 pm
Location: Madison, Wisconsin, USA

Re: Missing Sound on Crystal Card

Post by Paul Stevens »

You still have not told me what version of Windows
you are using. I can only test 95 and 98 here at home.
I have access to others with more difficulty.

I suppose we need to debug. First, you **MUST**
assure me that your machine can play .WAV files.
Will you please start up whatever player you have,
play a .WAV file and tell me that it works.

Then I will send you a modified CSBwin that plays .WAV
files instead of the internal sounds to be sure that
the code is behaving properly up to that point. Then
we will decide what to do next depending on the outcome.

PAul
Steve

Re: Missing Sound on Crystal Card

Post by Steve »

I have windows 98 and .wav files work just fine.
Thanks for all this help, Steve..
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Paul Stevens
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Posts: 4318
Joined: Sun Apr 08, 2001 6:00 pm
Location: Madison, Wisconsin, USA

Re: Missing Sound on Crystal Card

Post by Paul Stevens »

Another thing....what version of CSBwin are you using?

I put a CSBtest.rar at

webpages.charter.net/pstevens1

It consists of four files:
1- CSBtest.exe
2- graphics.dat
3- csbgame.dat
4- test.wav

Put the four files in a single directory and run
CSBtest.exe. Each time a sound is to be played
it displays a message box, waits for an answer, and
then plays the test.wav file.

If it does not work, let me know how it fails and make
sure that **YOU** can play the wav file with your player.

If it does work then I will make another test version
that copies the .wav file to an internal buffer and
then plays it from there. That will be about one step
away from what CSBwin does with all the sounds.
Steve

Re: Missing Sound on Crystal Card

Post by Steve »

Paul,

I am at the door and I get that wonderful set of vangelis chords playing over and over again as the door opens.

Steve
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Paul Stevens
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Posts: 4318
Joined: Sun Apr 08, 2001 6:00 pm
Location: Madison, Wisconsin, USA

Re: Missing Sound on Crystal Card

Post by Paul Stevens »

Great! That is good news.

But you forgot to tell me what version of CSBwin
does not work for you.

I put a new debug version at:
webpages.charter.net/pstevens1
I only included the executable so the
RAR file is only 250k. Use the other three
files that you already have.

This one reads the file into an internal buffer
and plays it from there almost like the game
engine normally does. The big differences
are that the game uses 8-bit instead of 16-bit,
is mono rather than stereo, and has a much slower
sample rate.

If this version works then we are faced with what
will probably be a tedious trial-and-error approach
to find what your system does not like.
Steve

Re: Missing Sound on Crystal Card

Post by Steve »

Paul,

It is CSBWindowsLinux94 I just got it from the link on this site.

Steve
Steve

Re: Missing Sound on Crystal Card

Post by Steve »

Is 073 the version I need.
Steve
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Paul Stevens
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Joined: Sun Apr 08, 2001 6:00 pm
Location: Madison, Wisconsin, USA

Re: Missing Sound on Crystal Card

Post by Paul Stevens »

CSBWindowsLinux94 is exactly right.
Steve

Re: Missing Sound on Crystal Card

Post by Steve »

On that website which file do I need do I update with CSBtest or use CSB073
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Paul Stevens
CSBwin Guru
Posts: 4318
Joined: Sun Apr 08, 2001 6:00 pm
Location: Madison, Wisconsin, USA

Re: Missing Sound on Crystal Card

Post by Paul Stevens »

CSBtest.
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