Hi, i am glad to present you my porting project, to make use of sound cards based on the EMU 10k1, 10k2 or compatible sound chips on PowerPC macs running OS X!
About the kx audio driver and the project:
The kx audio driver is a driver project that started on Windows as an alternative to the windows drivers provided by creative/e-mu for some of their consumer and professional leve sound cards, this project was later ported (with limited functionality) to OS X running on Intel computers (mainly for hackintosh usage, but there are a few pcie cards compatible with the driver, so it could be used on official apple hw for those).
After becoming open source the project was abandoned in 2014, so i decided to start a fork of my own to add needed functionality and fixes, mainly for later os versions released after 2014.
In 2021 i got a couple of PowerPC macs and i become the process of porting the latest driver to OS X Tiger and Leopard and then to PowerPC macs.
Supported sound cards:
- most of the Sound Blaster live!, live! 5.1 and live! 5.1 digital series (except for the cards not using the 10k1 architecture)
- sound blaster pci CT4790
- Sound Blaster Audigy, Audigy 2 and Audigy 2 zs series (except the cards using the CA00106 chip and the Audigy FX)
- E-MU cards based on the 10k2 sound chip (like the EMU8852 aka 0404m, including the pcie version)
- Sound Blaster Audigy 4 (SB0610 only) and the Audigy 4 pro
- Sound Blaster Audigy RX (SB0155)
- Sound blaster audigy 2 ZS PCMCIA (potentially, this is still untested)
- other creative and e-mu cards based on the (10k1,10k2, 10k2.5 and CA10300 based cards)
Some sound cards that will NOT work with this driver (and never will):
- ES1370/ES1371/ES1372/ES1373 based sound cards
- Any CA0106 based card and cards with similar architectures (like sound blaster live! 24 bit, sound blaster audigy SE SB0570, audigy LS and similars, but audigy SA is supported)
- Any sound blaster x-fi (some of the pcie ones works on intel macs using a modified version of voodoo hda)
- Any sound blaster recon3D
- Sound blaster Audigy FX
- Any sound blaster Z/ZS/ZX and similar series
- Any sound blaster AE5/AE7/AE9 series
- Any sound card without an emu (or creative) branded sound chip
- Any ISA Sound card
Notes about the current state of the PowerPC port:
Download of the current release and source code:
github.com
To finish this first post off here are some pictures of some supported sound cards and of my setups:
About the kx audio driver and the project:
The kx audio driver is a driver project that started on Windows as an alternative to the windows drivers provided by creative/e-mu for some of their consumer and professional leve sound cards, this project was later ported (with limited functionality) to OS X running on Intel computers (mainly for hackintosh usage, but there are a few pcie cards compatible with the driver, so it could be used on official apple hw for those).
After becoming open source the project was abandoned in 2014, so i decided to start a fork of my own to add needed functionality and fixes, mainly for later os versions released after 2014.
In 2021 i got a couple of PowerPC macs and i become the process of porting the latest driver to OS X Tiger and Leopard and then to PowerPC macs.
Supported sound cards:
- most of the Sound Blaster live!, live! 5.1 and live! 5.1 digital series (except for the cards not using the 10k1 architecture)
- sound blaster pci CT4790
- Sound Blaster Audigy, Audigy 2 and Audigy 2 zs series (except the cards using the CA00106 chip and the Audigy FX)
- E-MU cards based on the 10k2 sound chip (like the EMU8852 aka 0404m, including the pcie version)
- Sound Blaster Audigy 4 (SB0610 only) and the Audigy 4 pro
- Sound Blaster Audigy RX (SB0155)
- Sound blaster audigy 2 ZS PCMCIA (potentially, this is still untested)
- other creative and e-mu cards based on the (10k1,10k2, 10k2.5 and CA10300 based cards)
Some sound cards that will NOT work with this driver (and never will):
- ES1370/ES1371/ES1372/ES1373 based sound cards
- Any CA0106 based card and cards with similar architectures (like sound blaster live! 24 bit, sound blaster audigy SE SB0570, audigy LS and similars, but audigy SA is supported)
- Any sound blaster x-fi (some of the pcie ones works on intel macs using a modified version of voodoo hda)
- Any sound blaster recon3D
- Sound blaster Audigy FX
- Any sound blaster Z/ZS/ZX and similar series
- Any sound blaster AE5/AE7/AE9 series
- Any sound card without an emu (or creative) branded sound chip
- Any ISA Sound card
Notes about the current state of the PowerPC port:
- The release, is tested to work only on OS X Tiger Server and OS X Leopard on PowerPC macs, i am not sure if it works on consumer level OS X Tiger (edit: it doesn't) or other PPC OS X versions i didn't mention and it might likely not work, so i am providing it just for users of the above mentioned OSes.
- Input support while present is currently broken and requires the use of an app that hasn't been ported to PowerPC yet, so consider this release for playback only.
- Disabled the boot args from my x86-only fork, because the current implementation i used for those doesn't allow the driver to be built for OS X Tiger.
- All sampling rates and bit depths are tested to work, but your milage may vary.
- Missing the KX AC97 app because it's not currently possible to compile that using Xcode 2 or 3 and so it needs a more complex porting job.
- Untested on professional level cards that requires FPGA programming via the included edspctrl program, but it has still been included there for at least having the possibility of trying using those.
- Missing midi, gameport, EAX, OpenAL, and other non-playback-related features (actual limitation of the OS X driver port and not of the PowerPC port, and likely will never be supported by the OS X driver).
- No warranty: This piece of software is provided as is for testing purposes only, it might be unreliable and unsuitable for professional usage.
- There might be cracks and slight sound distortions (mainly for 24 bit sound cards running on OS X Leopard).
- Some audio channels will presents cracks or distortions if you don't use them at the 48khz sample rate (workaround, set the sound card to 48 khz in audio midi settings system app).
Download of the current release and source code:
Releases · ITzTravelInTime/kx-audio-driver
kX driver source code (for Windows and Mac). Contribute to ITzTravelInTime/kx-audio-driver development by creating an account on GitHub.
github.com
To finish this first post off here are some pictures of some supported sound cards and of my setups:
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