Product Reviews

To date, the new generation of PCI sound cards has fallen firmly into the game-playing camp. Yamaha's latest sound card, the WaveForce WF192XG, aims to bring the advantages of PCI to the musically minded. Like many of its more entertainment-focused counterparts, the WaveForce features a heavyweight DSP (digital signal processor) that, in this case, supports the DirectSound 3D compatible Sensaura standard in hardware. It also has a 64-voice 2Mb wavetable synthesiser and much more. Read the specifications list above and you'll see what Yamaha has squeezed into this remarkably silicon-free card.

Driver installation is simple and, when the card's up and running, the installation CD's snazzy but sluggish multimedia front end allows you to perform a number of necessary housekeeping tasks. You can install the bundled applications from here and there are a number of audio test applets for checking that the card is working correctly.

Once operational, the results are breathtaking. The WaveForce uses Yamaha XG technology, an extension of General MIDI that includes many more parameters to allow a richer, more configurable sound set. For example, you can control parameters such as Brightness

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and Harmonic Content for an analog synthesiser sound.

The main wavetable uses the Yamaha AWM2 Tone Generator engine which can handle up to 64 simultaneous voices. If you have a reasonably powerful PC, you can add up to another 128 voices using the supplied software S-YXG50 wavetable synthesiser. This needs a fast Pentium II for maximum quality, but my non-MMX Pentium/200 made an acceptable attempt at 32 software-driven voices. For Pentium II/233s and above, the card also supports the stunning Sondius XG Software Virtual Acoustic Synthesiser - 256 different mono instruments which sound more expressive than their wavetable counterparts.

The supplied software, Yamaha's XGWorks Lite, is excellent. It gives control over the XG engine down to the finest DSP detail. Eight Reverb and Chorus settings are available, with 36 variations to cover everything from distortion through EQ to compression. The more time you spend, the more you realise what the card's capable of.

On the digital audio side, the card is a respectable, full duplex affair, capable of simultaneous record and playback at up to 48kHz. No signal to noise ratio is specified, but the card is reasonably quiet in operation. SoundBlaster compatibility is included in Real DOS, but you're better off sticking with your old sound card if this is something you're going to need on a regular basis.

The WaveForce WF192XG is a steal at £51. The power and quality of XG coupled with the fine software make it a real bargain. It's biased towards musicians, but its all-round flexibility and power mean it's not restricted to this market. The only thing likely to top it this year is the SW1000XG, a next-generation, high-end Yamaha PCI sound card due in October. But don't let this put you off buying the WaveForce now.