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LGR Oddware - Digispeech Plus Parallel Port Sound Blaster (Patreon)

Published:
2021-04-19 22:48:46
Edited:
2021-04-20 19:24:37
Imported:
2021-07

Content

More LGR Oddware! Because the retro oddness genuinely never ends.

https://youtu.be/Mf39mEPUuJA

This one's all about the DSP Solutions Digispeech Plus, a Sound Blaster-compatible sound device for DOS and Windows PCs that connects via the parallel port. Yeah! It doesn't just do simple OPL2/3 stuff, nor is it a Covox Speech Thing/DSS clone. This thing simply plugs in, runs a TSR, and lets you select Sound Blaster mode in classic computer games using nothing more than the humble printer port. Fantastic.

And of course, this highly uncommon thingie is paired with a number of asterisks and caveats. Because Oddware, heh. Nothing is ever as simple as it seems, and "Sound Blaster-compatible" is a term with a specific meaning attached to it. It also does a number of interesting things relating to the Digispeech standard set by its predecessor, the DS201A. And it's also fully backwards-compatible with the slightly more common Port•Able Sound Plus. Since, well, that's what it is.

Enjoy this funky little doohickey and have a good week!

Files

Digispeech Plus

an LGR thing.

Comments

Anonymous

Unexpected video in viewing area. Great!

Jim Leonard

Cool, another video I don't have to make! I know how these things are programmed, so looking forward to LGR noodlings.

LazyGameReviews
>>58090814

Oooh. Do you have one, Jim? I certainly don't know how it's doing what it does but the limitations seem like they may be a little revealing.

Anonymous

This post really “speaks” to me. Can’t wait to watch!

Anonymous

This digispeech plus just jumps between an admirable ad lib attempt and sounding like a can of pringles with wires, I love it!

Anonymous

Quite cool. I have been working on recreating a PCMCIA soundblaster so always interesting to see these sound related things and how the serial/printer port were pushed to the limits.... did not know there had been plans for a Creative Labs "Port Blaster" or the PCMCIA product from DSP!

Jason Wellband

That speech synth took me back to being a kid and going to the state school for the blind's summer camp and hearing JAWS for DOS for the first time. Sounded eerily similar, maybe the same tech. I don't remember what hardware they used sadly.

LazyGameReviews
>>58093149

I went a little deeper into JAWS in this video, might be worth a watch 👍 https://youtu.be/bPW2S4fZMJY

LazyGameReviews
>>58092479

Haha, yeah that's an accurate description. Once you pop t̷̢͈̠̆ḥ̸̂ë̴̳̯̦́̔͝ ̴͍͉͂̉͝f̶̛̱̼͆̿u̶͔͒͐̾n̶̳̻͂̓͑ͅ ̵̙̽̓d̶̻͇̲͗͘͝ơ̸̰̾͒ͅn̸̪͓̭̂̕'̸͈̹͆̀t̶̼͍̼́̽̊ ̷̙̀s̵̮̐̾̓ͅṭ̸̯̾̉ő̴̜͚͓̚p̶̭̒͐̿

Anonymous

Probably won't play Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, but if it did, that would be cool!

Valora Inverse

Dunno if you plan to do it more, especially since I know it'd be very dependent on what's being used at the time and where, but I did rather enjoy the whole monitor reflection setup going on in this.

Anonymous

Looks like that DSP Solutions address now comes back to some company named... “Google”? Never heard of em.

Anonymous

I feel it's a bad omen when a company abbreviates its name and adds "Solutions". That's a company that's lost its sense of direction.

Pietro Gagliardi

Wow they didn't even have the DigiSpeech read out the categories or answers in Jeopardy? Was that not the most obvious oversight they could think of? I guess it's faithful to the Genesis version at least?????????? Yes I know it wouldn't have sounded like Alex either but still

Adrian's Digital Basement

The Persario 425! How appropriate :-) Cool device though, I had never even heard of it. It works amazingly well all things considered.

Headset Guy

Hey, I recognize that voice! "This is the pitch and speed of Simon's voice", among other things. I'm most familiar with it due to its use in Kid Works 2 by Davidson & Associates.

Anonymous

the intro! the transitions! in the last year the production value has gone through the roof. not even mentioning the lighting. You still have a passion for the tech and the videos and it doesn't go unnoticed

Anonymous

Looks like a really interesting device, despite the caveats. Always been interested by devices like the Covox Speech Thing - seemed so weird to want to hook up a sound card over parallel, but I guess it's not really much different to all the modern USB cards floating about...

Justin Urhead

"Once mankind live just like the Animals. Then something happened to unleash the power of our imaginations. We learned to talk."

Alyxx the Rat

Epic Pinball sounds like you're listening to it through a phone line.

LazyGameReviews
>>58113165

Heh, same. There's something about the humble printer port being used for things like sound and video that will always give me a good chuckle when using it.

Anonymous

Ah, an Oddware episode, love it! Although it's obviously not at all the same thing, this one brought back vivid memories of using MODPLAY to play .MOD tracker files over a self-soldered parallel port DAC (the pride!)

Anonymous

The test sample I've heard in much more elongated version in a 1993 shareware artificial life simulator called Evolve! Lite by Funtek (or Evolite as it's found online). I'm slowly trying to find out the name of all the tunes in it and I wish I knew what this one was...! Nice to get it in a format that isn't adlib though I suppose...!

Anonymous

Can you do a tour of your place where you film your videos?

LazyGameReviews
>>58194865

I've done a few tour videos before! Here's the main game room as of a few years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2TjTgG3LaA And here's more storage stuff: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y29silThj1M

Anonymous
>>58192007

It's Adlib based so not amazing, but it's presumably originally a stock piece of music and trying to find it is infuriating! I'll see if I can find it later and post it

LazyGameReviews
>>58142592

Ahh nice memories indeed. I've got a hand-soldered parallel DAC myself that I used to play tracker tunes with before I got a real Covox speech thing. It's awesome hearing it do its thing.

Anonymous
>>58192007

https://www.dropbox.com/s/sj60ylqmpt1neze/04%20-%20In-Game%20%233.mp3?dl=0 Your version is better sounding, for certain, but this one appears to be longer. It's a small thing, I've just been trying to track down what these things are called since I first played the game many many years ago and hearing your demo music repeatedly through the episode made me happy. Having a filename helps too! Although the driver disks you posted to archive.org appear to have been taken down...