Cheap PCI Mac-compatible sound cards?

[oneboyarmy]

In my most recent haul of Macs, I picked up a Umax S900 - unfortunately, I'm getting no audio from the internal speaker, and the headphone jack on the front is only outputting to the left channel. (I also have a StarMax that isn't giving me squat as far as audio goes.) I can't find that this is a common problem but I've seen a few things on the internet talking about the same symptoms.

Does anybody know of a cheap solution rather than some of the pricy DigiDesign or M-Audio stuff? I would like to be compatible with at OS 8 but it's not really a requirement. eBay turned up nothing and I've never seen one posted around here.

Or if somebody has an idea of what I might be able to do to just fix the thing, that would work too!

 

[MacJunky]

There are none, at least not really.

At one time creative released a soundblaster for Macs but it only has OS 9 drivers and it did not last long at all.

 

[oneboyarmy]

It's such a bummer - but really, unlike earlier PCs, Macs never needed sound cards unless you were doing something involving higher end audio!

Maybe I'll get lucky and find something. I don't want my SuperMac to be on permanent mute.

 

[protocol7]

I tried an old PC SB Live in my G4 to see if it would work with the Mac drivers.

It doesn't.

 

[Unknown_K]

From what I read the SBLive was released for OS 8/9 and never had OSX drivers from creative, bit I also found this:

"Mac OS X Jaguar owners have discovered that Apple has added support for some Sound Blaster products directly into the OS. The 24-Bit Sound Blaster Extigy and 16-Bit Sound Blaster MP3+ both work under Jaguar or newer OS releases, at least at a basic level. (These units ship with PC-only software bundles.) At about $59 US, the MP3+ is a good choice for iMac users looking to add digital and analog audio I/O to their systems at a reasonable price."

http://www.itnetcentral.com/tech/soundblaster-live-mac-edition-635.html

Same article talks about how stripped down (hardware and software features) the mac edition of the SBLive card was, no wonder it didnt sell well.

 

[LCGuy]

One thing I'd be really interested to know is whether the SB Live! Mac cards are the same as those sold for PCs. I have a couple of SB Live cards in my PCs, and while I currently have no Macs with PCI slots, it'd be interesting to know whether I could use them on a desktop PCI Mac with the Mac SB Live! software.

 

[MacJunky]

I am not sure about most other normal ones, but if it shipped in a dell it is not like a normal SBLive.

 

[LCGuy]

How is that? I have one that came from a Dell, and apart from the fact that its a SB Live! 5.1 (whereas my others are 2 channel only), it looks almost identical to my other SB Live! cards which came from generic PCs.

 

[MacJunky]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_Blaster_Live!#Sound_Blaster_Live.21_Dell_OEM

The 5.1 digi is ok it seems, but the other(like I have kicking around here somewhere), bleh.

 

[protocol7]

Like I said, I tried one and the drivers didn't pick it up. I have another (different model number on the board) but didn't try it as I figured there must be something different about the Mac versions.

 

[Gorgonops]

... found this:
"Mac OS X Jaguar owners have discovered that Apple has added support for some Sound Blaster products directly into the OS. The 24-Bit Sound Blaster Extigy and 16-Bit Sound Blaster MP3+ both work under Jaguar or newer OS releases, at least at a basic level..."

Just to avoid confusion... since I was slightly confused when I first read it and had to refresh my memory: The "Extigy" and "MP3+" were external USB sound devices. I'm not sure why a blurb about them appears in an article about the SB Live Mac edition. (I'm actually disappointed there isn't some rudimentary support for SB Live in OS X, since I have a pile of them in the junk card box and I could use another analog input on my G4 tower.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_Blaster_Live!#Sound_Blaster_Live.21_Dell_OEM

That Dell OEM card is pure, unadulterated evil. The ALSA driver for Linux didn't recognize it for a *long* time, and as I recall if you pulled it out of your Dell and replaced it with something that actually worked you'd lose the front panel audio jack.

Anyway, all Soundblaster Live cards suffered from PCI bus compatibility issues. It particularly affected VIA PCI bridges (actual hard crashes) but even with Intel boards you'd sometimes end up with weird voodoo. I have to wonder if hardware issues (in addition to low sales) are what *really* doomed the Mac version. When it comes to PCI compatibility I've always found Macs, particularly old ones, to be... "touchy".

 

[Unknown_K]

It seems too much of the soundcard is actually software (controlling a fast DSP) so porting to the mac had problems (designed for Windows and X86 CPUs).

 

[MacMcNanus]

Add a USB card, then use a Griffin iMic. You'll need at least OS 9, but the iMic acts as a full stereo USB sound card with input and output.

 

[Forrest]

The iMic won't work when plugged into a USB card according to http://www.griffintechnology.com/articles/37-i-have-a-pci-usb-card-in-my-older-mac-can-i-use-the-imic

 

[Bolle]

Besides the Audiomedia 3 and some old M-Audio Audiophile there wont be a lot of a choice if you need OS 8 Support.

Sometimes those actually go away on ebay pretty cheap.

I know the M-Audio Revolution 5.1 and 7.1 have OS 9 drivers as well - never got those working tho back when I had that card in my G4. Also it might actually cost more than a used AM3 or Audiophile if youre lucky.

 

[Bunsen]

If you can go to 8.6 or 9.x you might have luck with a cheap generic USB sound device for under $5 from dealextreme.com.

 

[CJ_Miller]

Depends how cheap you want, and/or how patient you are. You can probably score an AudiomediaIII or a Lexicon Core2 in the $20 range if you look around. It's always good to have some Mac-friendly audio cards around. Going the Soundblaster route sounds like a headache though.

 

[Bunsen]

I just opened this thread to suggest the Digidesign AudioMedia III, but I see it's already been mentioned. So consider this a +1. You should be able to get it working under System 7.x -> MacOS 9.x with the right combination of Digi INITs. It's almost certainly a no-go for OS X.

I have a vague recollection that there was a PCI version of the AMII as well (as opposed to the Nubus version).