RF Generation Message Board

Alright RFgen'ers, I need some old-computer-hardware help.  While sometime in the future I would like to purchase a Sound Blaster 16 ISA, for right now I have a choice of two: the Ensoniq AudioPCI 5200 (ES1371/ES1373 chipset) or the Sound Blaster PCI 512.  I've done a lot of research on both and cannot decide.  At first I was really aiming towards the Sound Blaster, but the more I read regarding the Ensoniq the more I think it is a contender (due to its apparent backwards compatibility with older Sound Blaster hardware). 

Do you already ready have these two cards? If so, why wouldn't you try them out and see which one you like more? Are you just asking to save time?.....sounds like something I would do   :P

I will look them up to see what info I can find.

Oh, and I have a couple other questions to help me answer yours:

Do you want to run stereo only, quadrophonic or 5.1 surround?

And what about the Sound Blaster Live! card? Have any opinions on that one or do you want to stick to those two cards you mentioned?

Already have both.  The Compaq came with the Ensoniq and I bought the SB back in 2000.  I'll probably end up doing as you suggest, and trying them both out.


For the sake of simplicity stereo, I think.  I have enough powered speakers for quad, so I might try that out later.  Oddly enough I do have two different SB Live! 5.1 cards sitting around (one is used in my gaming rig now).  As for the other SB Live cards I don't have any real practical knowledge.  While I do have a lot of hardware experience, it drops off to nil before 1998/1999 (I started taking apart my mother's computer when I did laundry at her house), and you can only gleam so much from magazines and the Internet.

I really appreciate your help, nupoile.  I've got a feeling that as time progresses (And hopefully I start finding more legacy hardware at work) I'll be asking for more.

So far my recommendation (beyond trying out both) is for the Ensoniq.

It looks like the Sound Blaster is a cheaper derivative of the Live! card. Because you're already using one I would try out the Ensoniq just to be different. Plus you could try to get the quadraphonic setup to work. I've never heard one and have wanted to for awhile. Pink Floyd did some quad recordings   :)

As far as sound quality and compatibility, I haven't gotten that far in research so see what one might be better.

Oh, and thanks for the appreciation of my help. My knowledge on this is actually pretty shallow  ::)   I just was into pc gaming in the 90's but never really had too much to spend on it. I did have a subscription to PC Gamer though, most of my knowledge comes from that, wandering around big computer stores and trying to get boot disc's to work.

So far so good.  Man, was it difficult to install some of these drivers.  What a pain in the butt.  Strange as it is, XP has pretty much spoiled me as far as Windows OSs.  Still, there is a strange comfort in the simplicity of Win95.