Installing WinOS/2 support for Creative Labs Audio

By Colin Hildinger (September 8, 1996)

My apologies for not trying the steps below to make sure they worked before posting the first time. I created the WinOS2 portion of the page from memory (I guess it was foggy, since I haven't worked at Creative for well over a year), and I run protectonly=yes. This updated version should work, as I installed a new copy of OS/2 and WinOS2 to test them with.

This is how I got WinOS2 going on my machine

 * 1) Install latest MMPM/2 drivers for AWE32 (this is a prerequisite to getting sound anywhere else in OS/2)
 * 2) Install AWE32 installation disks from Creative Labs (make sure and select same Port, IRQ, and DMA settings as the MMPM/2 drivers use). Choose "proceed" if whenever given the option. You may get a "Script line 12" error. If so, select yes to proceed and yes to erase contents of the temporary install directory.
 * 3) Remove references to DOS drivers in config.sys and autoexec.bat
 * 4) Start WinOS2 Window (Program Manager). A program should create the AWE groups. If the sound drivers aren't installed, close WinOS2 and run install.exe from your sb16 directory. Select to set up Windows drivers and applications. Always select "proceed." These drivers may or may not work, depending on the version of the install disks you have.
 * 5) Update to the latest WinOS2 compatible drivers from file aweup.zip [1.5 meg] (see information below), I'm currently having trouble with this step, but will talk to my friends at CLI and find the solution. OK, solution found: install.exe from aweup must be run under real DOS. :-( You also (probably, though I can't test it) can't update newer drivers to the ones that work. If you're having trouble at this step, try downloading [874k] my \sb16 and sb16\windrv directory, which contains the proper drivers, and running the install.exe from the \sb16 directory. Select to set up Windows drivers and applications. Always select "proceed." It may give you errors when you start a WinOS2 session unless you remove winsetup.exe from the run= line of your win.ini file (\os2\mdos\winos2\win.ini). If this trimmed version doesn't work, email me and I'll put up a larger version that should avoid any errors (I'm running out of space on my account). I'm working on cleaning this step up, though I really think Creative should send me a check. ;-)

This section should work, but usually doesn't (Try as a last resort).
Theoretically, the easiest way to get sound in WinOS2 is to install the Windows drivers that come with OS/2. Unfortunately, this doesn't seem to work for many, including myself. The proper method for doing this would be as follows:
 * 1) Run the WinOS2 control panel (control.exe).
 * 2) Open the drivers applet.
 * 3) Click add.
 * 4) Select Browse and go to path: [Your OS/2 Boot drive]:\os2\drivers\sbawed2
 * 5) Add all four drivers that are listed (this must be done one at a time, repeating steps 3 and 4).
 * 6) Close control panel, you should have sound in WinOS2 now.

The latest and greatest WinOS2 compatible drivers
These updated Windows drivers [1.5 meg] for the AWE 32 allow the AWE to operate without using 386 enhanced mode. The current drivers on the Creative labs BBS, FTP, and WWW sites require VxD's (.386 files) to operate. OS/2 doesn't allow the use of VxD's, so the drivers fail. These are newer than the ones in the \os2\drivers directory, so you should use them if at all possible. These are the newest AWE drivers that work with OS/2. All newer drivers require the use of VxD's.

This file contains driver versions:
 * Creative Labs Sound Blaster 16 Auxiliary Audio version 2.10
 * Creative Labs Sound Blaster 16 Wave and MIDI version 3.06
 * Sound Blaster AWE 32 MIDI driver version 1.27.1
 * Voyetra / Sound Blaster SuperSAPI FM Driver version 1.51

An important note about this file is that it will mess with your autoexec.bat and config.sys files. I'm not sure what the name of the backup file is (I'll check on it - feedback would be helpful as well), but you must remove the changes it makes, as they are meant for DOS and don't work with OS/2. I would make my own backups just in case, and restore them after running the update.

As mentioned above, I'm currently having a few problems with these, but will resolve them and post the solution.