Stereo Sound Effects in C&C for DOS

[Rich Nagel 0]

How do folks, first post here in the forums

 

Something that drove me nutz throughout the years was that the original Command and Conquer (for DOS) didn't support stereo sound effects.

 

Years ago I stumbled upon the graphics within one of C&C's MIX files that seemed to indicate that Westwood had indeed thought about supporting stereo sound effects, but prolly canned the idea before the game's release. When running the game's sound setup program ("SETUP.EXE") and testing your sound device selection, EVA has a graphic for (and says) "Center". But, in the "SETUP.MIX" file there are similar graphics for "Left" and "Right" <G>.

 

Anyhow, a few years ago I figured out how to enable stereo sound, and until now, never had any place on the Internet to share the info... until now

 

Here goes...

 

The sound setup program for Command and Conquer for DOS has no choices for a stereo sound device when selecting the sound card of your PC. In actuality, the game does indeed support stereo sound effects, but your "CONQUER.INI" configuration file must be manually edited to enable a stereo sound device.

 

When running Command and Conquer's sound setup program ("SETUP.EXE"), take note of the sound card that you have selected. Then using your hex editor of choice, open the game's sound device driver file "HMIDRV.386".

 

Text search through the file for a stereo version of your selected sound card, and then take note of the two hex values located eight hex offsets before (to the left of) the "HMI DMA Driver" text portion of the sound device name.

 

These two bytes are the byte-swapped hex values that are used in the "Card=" line (located under the "[sound]" heading) of the game's "CONQUER.INI." configuration file.

 

In example, if you selected "Sound Blaster Pro/Pro2" within the game's sound setup program for your sound card, the name of the sound device contained in the game's sound device driver file "HMIDRV.386" will be "HMI DMA Driver For Sound Blaster Pro 8 Mono". Using your hex editor, note that the hex values of the two bytes located eight hex offsets before the "HMI DMA Driver" text are "0f" and "e0". These two byte-swapped hex values in the game's "CONQUER.INI" configuration file will be listed in the "Card=" line as "Card=e00f".

 

Now using your hex editor, text search for the stereo version of this sound card, which will be "HMI DMA Driver For SBPRO 8 Stereo". Note that the two bytes located eight hex offsets before the "HMA DMA Driver" text are "01" and "e0". Then using your text editor of choice, simply open the game's "CONQUER.INI" configuration file, and edit the "Card=" line to read "Card=e001".

 

Bingo! Stereo sound effects in Command and Conquer for DOS, even though the game's sound setup program doesn't natively have options for stereo sound devices! Note that you may also have to text edit the "Reverse=0" line in the game's "CONQUER.INI" configuration file to read "Reverse=1" if the stereo sound effects seem to be backwards within the game.

 

Lastly, note that the "Channels=" line (located under the "[sound]" heading) of the game's "CONQUER.INI" configuration file sets the total number of sound effects that can be played simultaneously within the game. Text edit this to a higher value (such as "Channels=8" or "Channels=16") to have more simultaneously played sound effects for a fuller sound within the game.

 

Enjoy the new stereo sound effects... they sound quite cool in-game!

 

[CCHyper 3]

Yea, i played with this last year, though the only problem is, this is Stereo output, but the input sounds are not Stereo to being with, because the DirectSound is forced to 22050 / 16 in the DirectSound_Init, of course this can be changed like i did with Tiberian Sun.

 

If someone was to re-master the sounds, i would happily edit the DirectSound_Init.

 

But otherwise, good job, nice to see more people messing with the classics

[Rich Nagel 0]

Yea, i played with this last year, though the only problem is, this is Stereo output, but the input sounds are not Stereo to being with

 

The input sounds shouldn't be/don't need to be in stereo format :wink: The stereo effect is heard as panning in your left and right PC speakers, depending on the spot of the map that you're currently viewing, so the input sound effects should be mono to begin with (to allow the game to pan them).

 

In other words, I'm currently looking at the eastern side of the map/battlefield, but some of my tanks are destroying enemy structures at the western side of the map. In this case, the battle sound effects are panned to the left speaker... quite a cool effect

 

 

because the DirectSound is forced to 22050 / 16 in the DirectSound_Init, of course this can be changed like i did with Tiberian Sun. If someone was to re-master the sounds, i would happily edit the DirectSound_Init.

 

Note that the above is for the DOS versions of the game (I don't have any of the Windows versions of C&C, so I can't experiment with them), and the DOS executables don't use DirectSound, but rather native DOS low-level drivers ("HMIDRV.386").

 

 

P.S. After playing the game for a while with stereo enabled, the scheme appears to be that all battlefield sound effects are variably panned, while EVA and radio communications are always centered (which makes sense). Man! Now we need 4-channel (surround-sound) support <LOL>!

 

Edited September 28, 2008 by Rich Nagel