Update: We haven't tried the last drivers but unless you can use the 2013 drivers for the YMF744 chip we don't feel this is in interesting choice if you care about 3D sound in games. The major limitations is that it only got 8 3D streams which we don't think is enough in today's games. The EAX support may have improved since we did this review but we have yet to test this.

Over the past few months we have featured Sensaura’s 3D audio technology. First in a technology article and then later in a visit to their London office. I had first tested the Yamaha Waveforce 192d when I was writing our review of Motorhead. However, I held off writing the actual review of the Waveforce 192d in anticipation of Sensaura and Yamaha releasing drivers that supported the Environmental Audio Extensions to DirectSound 3D (or EAX for short). Well these drivers were finally released to the world in late April of this year making now the right time to test out Yamaha’s flagship gaming sound card.

Technical Overview:

As I noted above, the Waveforce 192d is powered by Yamaha’s DS-1 (YMF724) sound chip.

 The card itself offers the following features:

• accelerated MS DS and DS3D
• 3D streams in hardware
• signal to noise ratio of >90 dB
• a S/PDIF (Optical) digital output connector (mini jack type) for enhanced digital capabilities, including direct digital recording to CD, MD (Mini Disk) and DAT (at a fixed 48 kHz frequency);
• 8 types of Reverb and Chorus, as well as 36 types of Variation and Echo for Mic-in (aside from EAX support);
• WaveForce Synthesizer featuring up to 192 notes of simultaneous wavetable sound (64 hardware) (polyphony), a full range of 676 musical instrument voices and 21 drum kits;
• uses Yamaha XG technology which expands on basic GM (General MIDI) format, providing many more voices, voice editing capability, effects and other features;
• uses Yamaha's Soft Virtual Acoustic (S-VA) and mathematical representations to virtually recreate any acoustic wind instrument for a complete, accurate replication of its sounds;
• compatible with DS3D, EAX and A3D 1.x;
• supports Phat (TM) Stereo 3D, providing enhanced support for 3D audio;
• SoundBlaster Pro in Windows DOS box, and supports real DOS mode via PC/PCI and D-DMA;
• General MIDI (GM) Support;
• 16-bit A-D and D-A converters;
• joystick/MIDI port;