Is MIDI important? I suppose I should answer this question before I review
a sound card whose primary strength is its MIDI performance. The answer,
simply, is yes. There has been some argument about this; games are
increasingly using CD audio or proprietary digital audio schemes that
simply require a sound card capable of 16-bit, 44.1KHz digital playback.
There are two great reasons that MIDI is still important, though. First,
many games still use it for music. Duke Nukem 3D, Daggerfall and Ultima
Online are notable examples. Second, though OGR is strictly a computer
gaming site, we would be naive to think that all you use your computer for
is playing games. If you're reading this article, you obviously access the
World Wide Web, where MIDI is common.

It's also worth noting that many users who don't have good MIDI
capabilities don't care about it, and when they finally get a sound card
that has good MIDI playback, they take far more interest in it.
Regardless, wavetable sound cards are very affordable now, and there's no
reason that you should settle for FM synthesis.

What is the AWE64?

The name would seem to suggest that it is the 64-voice equivalent of the
Sound Blaster AWE32. Not exactly so, though Creative Labs would like you
to think so. The AWE64 essentially is the AWE32 PnP. It uses the same 1MB
ROM bank for MIDI instruments, has 512k onboard RAM for instrument samples
called "SoundFonts" (4MB RAM on the AWE64 Gold) and is fully Plug-and-Play
enabled. It's full-duplex, which means that it can both record and play
digital audio at the same time (important for Web-phone applications). It
comes with a standard mid-quality desk-boom-style microphone and the
standard array of software: the AWE control panel, text-to-speech
converters, Voyetra MIDI sequencer, Web-phone, SoundFont editing utility
and all kinds of redundant control panels for the CD player, WAV recording
and playing and what have you. The AWE64 also packs in full versions of
Accolade's Eradicator and Bullfrog's Magic Carpet 2. But one shouldn't
really consider this a reason to buy a sound card. It should be chosen for
the hardware.

WaveSynth/WaveGuide

What you would expect is that, where the AWE32 PnP is 32-voice polyphonic,
meaning that it can play 32 voices at a time, the AWE64 would be 64-note
polyphonic. This is not quite the case. The AWE64 will let you play 64
notes at a time, but 32 of them are played by the WaveSynth/WaveGuide
synth, which is a 32-note polyphonic software wavetable synthesizer.
Especially interesting is the WaveGuide part, which doesn't rely on
wavetable synthesis to reproduce instrument sounds. Wavetable synthesis
uses digital samples pitch-shifted to the appropriate note to create its
sounds, while WaveGuide relies on a relatively new sound technology that
uses a mathematical model of an instrument's acoustic properties to
reproduce the sound it makes. This is good for solo instruments, but not
as good for group instruments like "String Ensemble" and "Orchestra Hit."
It also allows more realistic expression, much as a real musician would
produce. The catch is, wavetable instruments are easy to make, and the
AWE64 (and AWE32 PnP) comes with a nice utility to do so. WaveGuide
instruments are very difficult to produce, so don't count on doing much
with them yourself.

While the WS/WG is a niftly little bit of technology, there is really no
excuse for Creative Labs to market a card that is essentially an AWE32 PnP
and a 32-voice software synthesizer and call it the AWE64. It should also
be noted that this software synthesizer will eat up 10-15% of your CPU
power, so don't count on many games supporting it. Had Creative Labs
included this technology in the AWE64 hardware, it would have been more
deserving of its name and a much better value.

SoundFonts

With the AWE32, Creative Labs introduced the idea of SoundFonts. These are
instrument banks of custom wavetable sounds that developers and users can
load into the sound card's RAM to customize their music. The original
SoundFont format had some information that was directly related to the
Emu-8000 chip and the AWE32, making it a pretty closed format. Those have
been removed from the SoundFont 2.0 format, making it much more open and
accessible so that other sound cards, keyboards and synths could be made
that use SoundFont banks. The AWE32 PnP includes 512k of RAM to store
these SoundFonts, and the AWE64 follows suit. All AWE32 and AWE64 cards'
RAM can be upgraded to store more, higher-quality samples. This is a fine
idea, works very well and is even occasionally used by game developers,
but it's nothing new.

Upgrading RAM

So how, from a hardware perspective, is the AWE64 different from the AWE32
Pnp? Well, the AWE32 uses 30-pin SIMMS for RAM, which are sort of old and
a little hard to come by but relatively cheap (especially now that they're
nearing obsolescence). The AWE64 uses a special add-on daughtercard that
you must buy from Creative Labs. The company says that this is a good
thing because it ensures quality control and will be easily available. It
sounds like a scam to make more money to me; 30-pin SIMMS are not that
hard to come by and cheaper, and I've never heard of anyone buying "bad
SIMMS" for their AWE32 and having trouble returning them.

The Final Word

With some decent PCI sound cards coming to market soon, users should shop
carefully when considering a current-market sound solution. At $230, the
AWE64 is $80 more expensive than the AWE32 PnP and offers nothing of
significance for your money but the WS/WG software synth, which is
unlikely to ever be used for games. Couple this with an idiotic
RAM-upgrade scheme, and there is no reason on Earth the average gamer
should choose the AWE64 over the AWE32 PnP.

Don't get me wrong -- the card is good. It has excellent sound quality,
slightly improves on the AWE32 PnP's signal/noise ratio and is full of
features. And true to the Sound Blaster name, it's compatible with
everything under the sun. It's just 50% more expensive than a card that is
almost exactly the same and even better in the RAM-upgrading respect, the
AWE32 PnP.

Written by: Jason Cross
Date: April 2, 1997