[Solved] Realtek AC'97 Audio in Win98

[danklambsauce]

Hello,

I need help on something. I'm trying to get the Realtek AC'97 Audio Driver to work on Win98 and can't find a solution. I have tried installing through both the Realtek and Windows Device Manager, but doesn't seem to work when i reboot (even though i have changed it from SB16 to AC'97 in the VM menu). Also, everytime where i feel like it's getting close to working, it BSOD's me.

Maybe there's something i'm doing wrong, but i can't tell what it is. PLEASE HELP ME!

-Blake

[mpack]

I'm not sure why you posted this in "Windows Hosts"? Your question doesn't mention the host at all. Moving it to "Windows Guests".

Let's also try to be explicit: do you have a Win98 driver for AC'97, copied into the guest?

The question also needs to be asked: the template default audio for a Win98 guest is SB16, because Win98 has native drivers for that. Why do you need to change from the default?

[danklambsauce]

Because if i am playing a DOS game i can't seem to get working in DOSbox thru Win98, how am i supposed to hear MIDI? I know that the AC'97 driver has a built-in MIDI Synthesizer.

[Sonny86]

I also have this problem that i can't get MIDI to work in Win 98 or earlier.

Win 98 FE doesn't have a default driver for AC'97 and it looks like VirtualBox doesn't offer MIDI emulation with the SB16 emulation.

[socratis]

Most probably because the people that either pay for VirtualBox support, or know how to code and provide the changes required, are not particularly interested in MIDI emulation...

[andyp73]

Win 98 FE doesn't have a default driver for AC'97 and it looks like VirtualBox doesn't offer MIDI emulation with the SB16 emulation.

You need to download the Windows 95 drivers from Realtek not the Windows 98 one.

1. Go to http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads/
2. Click on "AC'97 Audio Codecs (Software)"
3. Accept the license / download terms.
4. Download the Windows 95 driver
5. Copy the file to your Windows 98 VM
6. Unpack it with WinRAR or some such.
7. Update the driver for the audio device through device manager as running the setup.exe will fail.

Whether it works for what you are trying to achieve is not something I know.

-Andy.

[Sonny86]

How can i unpack the driver? The driver comes as an *.exe file, not a *.zip or some other archive.

[andyp73]

The .exe file is in fact just an archive file with a .exe decompressor on the front of it. Tools such as WinRAR and 7zip will be able to ignore the .exe part and unpack the files from the archive part.

-Andy.

[mpack]

I suggest unpacking the zip or rar before copying the unpacked files into the VM, avoiding the unnecessary complication of finding a free zip or rar tool for Win98.

[andyp73]

The site http://dk.toastednet.org/vogons/win98/ has links for a bunch of utilities that are useful for Windows 98 including 7zip v9.20 and the last versions of IE and Opera that run on Windows 98.

-Andy.

[mpack]

I appreciate that the tools may be available, but it's still an unnecessary complication: the task can be performed just as easily without them.

[Sonny86]

I could unpack the AC '97 Win 95 driver from the *.exe and install it succesfully under Windows 98 FE. It works fine, MIDI also works now. Thanks!

[mpack]

Thanks, marking as solved.