🚀 go-pugleaf

>>> Come to think of it, I think the Awe32 line had some midi support but 
>>> the midi patches were all in the card's rom.

Hardware MPU-compatible MIDI support is available for the external
MIDI interface only. The wavetable needs a driver to be used as a
MPU401-compatible MIDI device. However, most games work with it as
well.

>>(...)The AWE32 had 512k 
>>RAM as standard and could be expanded with SIMMs up to 8 megs.
>Not 8, 32! (2x16MB)

Same goes for the SB32 PnP, but there are also some versions without
RAM sockets.

>But the AWE32 could only utilize 28MB of it, or something like that.

Yes. Additionally, using the OPL chip and the memory banks cost 2
voices, thus only 30 voices are left. Some instruments use multiple
voices. Thus, a good 4MB or 8MB wavetable upgrade often provides
better sound than the SB32/64 EMU chip with only 1MB. Or upload a good
GM patch set into the RAM...

>And I've never had a problem with PnP + old DOS games, since there is
>a "PnP driver" (or whatever you want to call it) and a config program
>to set up the card so it works "as a SB16" in DOS. Have played many
>old DOS games with my AWE64 without any problem.

In my case, the SB16 compatible part worked well after plain BIOS
initialization. The Wavetable and the other remaining components
needed to be initialized first by the PnP tool, though.