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I'd build a Windows 98 VM in my Mac with VirtualBox to run some old games, like "Z". It is running, but without the great soundtrack. When testing, I realize that the soundtrack is in midi files, and not even Media Player is playing any midi. It opens the file, knows time etc. (recognize the file) but no sound is played.

There is a Sound Blaster Midi Sinth installed, the problem might be the VM itself that don't emulate the full Sound Blaster 16 card. I'm thinking about some alternatives: to change the VM sound card (not a clue of how to do it), or to install a driver that synthesizes the midi in wave to use the wave port that is working, but didn't find one.

There is a topic here but for XP or above. I tried midiox, but hasn't it's own driver, or I don't know how to make it work.

Also couldn't get in the Virtual Box forum, I'd make an Oracle profile, but didn't work. I did ask at and they advise me to ask here. So here I am… any ideas?

ADDITIONAL INFO

I tried to play those MIDI files by Mac OSX Lion (outside VM). QuickTime ask for install v7, but I have 10… I tried RealPlayer but no sound, same situation as inside VM. Finally I tried a free app "MIDI Trail" that plays full 100% the music using as OUT setting the "Apple DLS Music Device". Virtual Bux uses CoreAudio. Is the same?

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Gustavo
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2 Answers2

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(This is an old question, but is the number one result I got googling about this)

I managed to get MIDI sound on Windows 98 SE under VirtualBox by using the Realtek driver for Windows 95 and ICH AC97 audio. (using SB16 is posible to get wave sound but no midi)

On the Realtek website, download the Windows 95 driver, by clicking Downloads->"AC'97 Audio Codecs (Software)"->Next and then click on the "Windows 95 for Driver only".

For reference, the filename is 0001-VXD_A406.exe (and in case you wanna check it, the md5 is b5f78cb9d97297e503fdf20ff722de63)

You can also find it on the web.archive.org, at https://web.archive.org/web/20180913222117/https://az695102.vo.msecnd.net/rtdrivers/pc/audio/0001-VXD_A406.exe

Now, it can't be directly installed on Windows 98; it complains that this driver is only for win95.

So, using 7zip on the host machine, extract the contents of the EXE. Among other files, it contains a directory called "Win95". The driver itself is there.

Next, configure the virtual machine to use "ICH AC97" audio and start the virtual machine. Once plug&play detects the new device, use the driver from the Win95 directory.

And that's it. It should be able now to play MIDI music!

For reference, I tested this using VirtualBox 5.2 and Windows 98 SE.

chris-l
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Did you changed the Audio Controller to "SoundBlaster 16" (Under Setting, Audio) ? If you already did, it might be VirtualBox bug on SB16 emulation, refer to https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=12425 for more details.

If it is the case, you might try DOSBox. Here is the comparision between Vbox and DOSBox https://gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/27690/why-do-people-use-dosbox-over-virtualbox-in-a-gaming-context

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Eric Leung
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