Envy24HT (VIA/ICE 172X) Audio Driver OS X PowerPC porting and extension project

[ITzTravelInTime]

Hi PowerPC users, I am the guy who ported the kx audio driver to PowerPC macs, and i have decided to get into another project, porting the Envy24HT audio driver to PowerPC macs!

Why this? Mostly because i love putting all sorts of crazy pci cards in my macs and also because i already own some of the supported hardware and so i thought it will be cool to use some of them on PowerPC macs as upgrade paths.

I didn't have to start from scratch luckily since there were an abbandonware open source driver for hackintoshes, so all i had to do is basically port it to PowerPC macs and old OS X.

For now other than adding support for old OS X and PPC cpus, the major changes have been a rework of memory management and a general improvement of compatibility for 64 bit oses support and the addition of support for various sound cards and overall improvement of some areas of the driver implementation, like the volume controls.

That said here you can find the github repo with the source code, and a very old driver release (which has been made obsolete by the new one i am working on) and were future releases will be published: https://github.com/ITzTravelInTime/Envy24HT

Currently supported and tested cards are:
- Terratec Aureon 5.1 Sky (best support)
- Terratec Aureon 7.1 Space (best support)
- Terratec Aureon 7.1 Universe (best support)
- Terratec Phase22 (best support)
- Terratec Phase28
- M-Audio Revolution 5.1
- M-Audio Revolution 7.1
- M-Audio Audiophile 192
- ESI Juli@
- ESI Prodigy 7.1 Hi-Fi (Alpha support partially working)
- ESI MAYA44 (Alpha support partially working)
- Audiotrack Prodigy 7.1 (best support)
- Audiotrack Prodigy HD2
- Infrasonic Quartet (Pre-Alpha support not working yet, but groundwork has been done)

Cards that might work (but are currently untested or need implementation work):
- Hercules Fortissimo cards featuring the VT172X chips
- Onkyo SE 90
- Onkyo SE 150
- Onkyo SE 200
- Offbrand PCIe cards featuring the VT1721 or VT1723 chips

So I leave you with this screenshot of the ESI/Audiotrak Prodigy 7.1 HiFi i own running on my G4 MDD with Leopard, which, seems to be working well for now.

 

[eastone]

If I remember correctly M-Audio cards have official drivers.

 

[ITzTravelInTime]

If I remember correctly M-Audio cards have official drivers.

That's not the point really, because lots of them does here, the point is really supporting the cards that never got drivers for ppc os x, while also keeping the driver unchanged from the intel version, which supports all of those cards, so i can release universal binaries and provvide alternatives in case official mac drivers are unfindable on the internet, like with some of the listed terratec cards, which supposedly had them but nobody managed to get a copy of them.

 

[Tratkazir_the_1st]

Man, you're great . As mentioned above, Revo5.1-7.1 already got official drivers, but I don't remember if they are universal (so hack-users need Intel drivers anyway) .

BTW, what about Envy24HT-S? I don;t know what's the difference between this chips, this name just jumped in my head .

 

[ITzTravelInTime]

Man, you're great . As mentioned above, Revo5.1-7.1 already got official drivers, but I don't remember if they are universal (so hack-users need Intel drivers anyway) .

BTW, what about Envy24HT-S? I don;t know what's the difference between this chips, this name just jumped in my head .

1) Actually some cards got universal drivers, but just for the 32 bit kernel mode, so only for tiger and leopard or snow leopard and lion running using the 32 bit kernel mode.

2) The various chips from the VIA/ICE Vinyl series such as the Envy24 or the Envy24HT do work slightly differently from each other, as much as breaking driver compatibility (as far as i can confirm), but the linux community managed to make a general purpose driver for a good chunk of the chips from that series, but since this mac driver has always been only for the Envy24HT, i will keep it this way, since really making a universal driver will mostly mess things up more than it needs, because also there is another driver for the plain Envy24 chip (that perhaps i will be forking off too one day), and also because i am not really an experienced developer when it comes to drivers, my C and C++ experience comes mostly from user land programming, ms-dos and arduino.

Edit: i found some evidence that the Envy24HT-S chip might work with this driver (see the comments to the linked forum thread), but of course this needs testing:

[New Envy24HT Driver] For Audio PCI Card Onkyo SE-200

I've built a kext driver based on Envy24HT kext to support Onkyo SE-200 PCI sound card. Just built it but i have not get that device yet. Now if anyone has that card, please check if my modified driver works with it or not. That is an expensive card and i don't want to buy it before I'm sure that...

www.insanelymac.com

 

[ITzTravelInTime]

Ok so, i have to massively correct myself, apparently the envy24HT-s is driver compatible with the envy24ht, because i just relised that basically i have it in one of my sound cards, so i will now try to get some more of them to experiment with, but specific sound cards will still need extra code in order to work or the driver will just kernel panic because the sound card you are trying to use is unkown. That said i'd love to get some onkyo, esi/audiotrack and m-audio stuff to try, also because those are mostly the most well documented in the linux drivers. There are even some chinese cards with an integrated pcie to pci bride that i could try getting.

 

[ITzTravelInTime]

Just found out about the existance of this very obscure japanise card, it' remarkably similar to the ESI Prodigy 7.1 HiFi that i own, to the point that it lets me think that it might actually use a licensed design from ESI/Audiotrack or that both cards might be based on some unknown third party reference design of some sort.

Anyway the card is the TOKYO STYLE S010（DCS-SEV24/PE）and as far as i know it's one of the very few PCI Express sound cards that might work with this driver. If you ever get/currently own one let me know immediately, i'd like to let you try it on OS X using the driver patches i have made for the ESI/Audiotrack Prodigy 7.1 HiFi (I will still need to know the complete set of pci and subsystem ids taken from the card, before making any driver build that would not kernel panic when attempting at using this card).

BTW there are also some chinese PCIe cards featuring the VT1723 chip, those might also be made compatible with the driver (IDK about VT1723 compatibility with the VT1724/VT1721), but i don't have any hardware for tests and eventual code adjustments, so for now it's all totally hypotetical.

To end the post here is a picture of it from the internet:

And here is a picture of the ESI/Audiotrack Prodigy 7.1 HiFi without the shroud for comparison:

They look remarkably similiar, and probably just feature the same chips (with the addition of a pcie bridge on the japanise one)

 

[ITzTravelInTime]

So i have been working again on the driver recently, and since i have got a maya44 rev g, i have improved support for it by adding proper volume controls for output. I have also been working on adding support for the other DMA channels to hope to get the second set of outputs working.

Also since they use the same codec i have been also working in parallel with the prodigy 7.1 hifi and i was able to get some noise to play back from the other channels, this is just a start, but we might see multiple channels working from the prodigy hifi at least.

Also this is me experimenting, i am keeping the source code on github updated if you want to try it, and i can't give any ETAs whatsoever on when i can release a driver.

That said this might actually become a pretty decent driver in the future now that we have some form of multiple dma support.

Before i end this post i am also looking into some other cards using the envy24ht family i could get for a test, like some Chinese ones using the vt1721 chip, it's the same used by the terratec producer phase 22 which is fully supported, and those are also available on pcie too.

 

[ITzTravelInTime]

So after a while of not working on this driver I have got an Aureon 7.1 Universe and i have added initial support for it based on the code for the Aureon 7.1 Sky and the Producer Phase 28.

So far i have tested it without the dock (that i own, i will get to testing it later) and i have been able to get the main outputs, multiple sample rates and volume controls working since it's very similar to the 7.1 Space, mre testing will be done thugh.

Also i have decided to push the initial support for it to github for now if you want to see the code: https://github.com/ITzTravelInTime/Envy24HT

Update: the dock is working without additional code changes

 

[ITzTravelInTime]

BTW, what about Envy24HT-S? I don;t know what's the difference between this chips, this name just jumped in my head .

I was checking messages in this thread after a while and actually the Envy24Ht-S already works with this driver, i have realized that some cards that it supports use that chip, so as long as your sound card is on your compatibility list it's good to go, for other cards i can make an effort as long as i can get my hand on a card to test and debug (in my little free time)

 

[skinniezinho]

I was checking messages in this thread after a while and actually the Envy24Ht-S already works with this driver, i have realized that some cards that it supports use that chip, so as long as your sound card is on your compatibility list it's good to go, for other cards i can make an effort as long as i can get my hand on a card to test and debug (in my little free time)

Thanks a lot for this driver.
Long long time ago I had a Terratec Aureon 7.1 (flash modded to audiotrak)...in XP...
I think I used it on hackintosh still.
I am getting my hands on G5 and plan to buy an envy24 card again for cheap and I was super keen to know about this driver.
Although I don't see a place to download a release on github, or I am missing something?

 

[eastone]

Try this one:

https://github.com/ITzTravelInTime/Envy24HT/releases/download/1.0/Envy24HT_PPC+Intel32.zip

 

[ITzTravelInTime]

Thanks a lot for this driver.
Long long time ago I had a Terratec Aureon 7.1 (flash modded to audiotrak)...in XP...
I think I used it on hackintosh still.
I am getting my hands on G5 and plan to buy an envy24 card again for cheap and I was super keen to know about this driver.
Although I don't see a place to download a release on github, or I am missing something?

For now, I haven't released an up-to-date driver yet, mostly because the support for the new sound cards is still very basic, although I might put together a quick release when I have more free time next week.

About choosing a sound card, check the ones with "best support" on the first post of the thread, I personally recommend the Terratec Aureon Sky or Space (if I end up doing the new release even the Universe card) or the Phase 22, don't except the same features as in the official Windows XP and the open source Linux drivers, but the basic stuff is there.

On the G5 also pay attention to the fact that some sound cards simply don't work with the 3.3v slot, some have the 3.3v key on the PCI connector but will cause the g5 power supply to go into protection mode (fixable by removing the card, it happened with a lot of my ESI cards for instance that otherwise works well on the G4). In my experience, usually the Terratec ones are a safe bet to go to if you want good PCI compatibility and make use of this driver.

Try this one:

https://github.com/ITzTravelInTime/Envy24HT/releases/download/1.0/Envy24HT_PPC+Intel32.zip

That's an old release though, missing a lot of new stuff, as I said, support for the new sound cards is still crude, that's why I haven't done a new release yet.

 

[skinniezinho]

Try this one:

https://github.com/ITzTravelInTime/Envy24HT/releases/download/1.0/Envy24HT_PPC+Intel32.zip

Thank you, will do the job to test.

For now, I haven't released an up-to-date driver yet, mostly because the support for the new sound cards is still very basic, although I might put together a quick release when I have more free time next week.

About choosing a sound card, check the ones with "best support" on the first post of the thread, I personally recommend the Terratec Aureon Sky or Space (if I end up doing the new release even the Universe card) or the Phase 22, don't except the same features as in the official Windows XP and the open source Linux drivers, but the basic stuff is there.

On the G5 also pay attention to the fact that some sound cards simply don't work with the 3.3v slot, some have the 3.3v key on the PCI connector but will cause the g5 power supply to go into protection mode (fixable by removing the card, it happened with a lot of my ESI cards for instance that otherwise works well on the G4). In my experience, usually the Terratec ones are a safe bet to go to if you want good PCI compatibility and make use of this driver.



That's an old release though, missing a lot of new stuff, as I said, support for the new sound cards is still crude, that's why I haven't done a new release yet.

Thank you for getting back to me.
If I understand well you are talking about the PCIX G5 correct?
That is one of my doubts, if PCI cards work on PCIX. Right now I still don't have full info on the g5, just know it is a 1.8 DP.
On my side the usage will be basic, just listening to music. Phase 22 I can find for cheap, and I found an ESI Juli@ also, which I may go for, given the more up to date drivers for all platforms.
Kinda offtopic: I see you have also drivers for Asus Xonar cards, are they powerpc compatible? by your experience is there any pci xonar that would be equivalent or better to the envy24 cards we are talking, regarding sound output for headphones?

 

[ITzTravelInTime]

I see you have also drivers for Asus Xonar cards, are they powerpc compatible? by your experience is there any pci xonar that would be equivalent or better to the envy24 cards we are talking, regarding sound output for headphones?

The xonar driver was something extremely experimental, and it basically never worked, and it was never ported to powerpc. On the hardware side, there is nothing preventing them from working, you don't even need to flash a sound card to make it working, it's just the lack of drivers on OS X, and yes depending on the model you can get better quality than many of the much older Envy24ht options, I might recommend those cards for Linux on the PPC macs, but not any Apple OSes.

Thank you for getting back to me.
If I understand well you are talking about the PCIX G5 correct?
That is one of my doubts, if PCI cards work on PCIX. Right now I still don't have full info on the g5, just know it is a 1.8 DP.
On my side the usage will be basic, just listening to music. Phase 22 I can find for cheap, and I found an ESI Juli@ also, which I may go for, given the more up to date drivers for all platforms.

For the PCIX the dual processor 1.8 G5 should be a PCIX 3.3v machine, I have parts from a 2004 system of that kind. For PCI compatibility, as long as the pci connector has the right notches and doesn't cause the G5 power supply to refuse to power on, you are good to go. If you want official vendor support and good official OS X drivers, then just go for the juli@, but if you want something cheap to use with this driver, then the Phase 22 is a safe bet since i can confirm it works with the G5 slots. I have both sound cards and both are good for PPC macs, including the G5, although the Phase 22 is better supported by this driver. On a tangent note: it has been a while since i have used my ESI juli@, i might do a test on my G5 to make sure it actually works in it, i remember that i just tried it on my G4.

But i have to be honest to you and say that the 2 sound cards you have mentioned are both made for speakers or line use, not really for headphones and both have mono 1/4 inch jacks so you need a mono to stereo splitter cable, something like the ESI maya rev. G or the Aureon SKY/Space/Universe is better suited for your use (and also the above mentioned maya has official OS X drivers, although support by this driver in the current kext release is totally absent for that card, and the driver will hang the system is an unsupported card is detected, and the current work in progress support is extremely basic and limited to just the main output).

That said, if you need any more info just let me know, also decent cards for G5 and PPC macs are the e-mu cards I support with my PPC port of the kx audio driver (the sb live and audigy cards thatg driver works with lack a setup program to get inputs to work on PPC, that still needs porting from intel macs).

 

[skinniezinho]

The xonar driver was something extremely experimental, and it basically never worked, and it was never ported to powerpc. On the hardware side, there is nothing preventing them from working, you don't even need to flash a sound card to make it working, it's just the lack of drivers on OS X, and yes depending on the model you can get better quality than many of the much older Envy24ht options, I might recommend those cards for Linux on the PPC macs, but not any Apple OSes.


For the PCIX the dual processor 1.8 G5 should be a PCIX 3.3v machine, I have parts from a 2004 system of that kind. For PCI compatibility, as long as the pci connector has the right notches and doesn't cause the G5 power supply to refuse to power on, you are good to go. If you want official vendor support and good official OS X drivers, then just go for the juli@, but if you want something cheap to use with this driver, then the Phase 22 is a safe bet since i can confirm it works with the G5 slots. I have both sound cards and both are good for PPC macs, including the G5, although the Phase 22 is better supported by this driver. On a tangent note: it has been a while since i have used my ESI juli@, i might do a test on my G5 to make sure it actually works in it, i remember that i just tried it on my G4.

But i have to be honest to you and say that the 2 sound cards you have mentioned are both made for speakers or line use, not really for headphones and both have mono 1/4 inch jacks so you need a mono to stereo splitter cable, something like the ESI maya rev. G or the Aureon SKY/Space/Universe is better suited for your use (and also the above mentioned maya has official OS X drivers, although support by this driver in the current kext release is totally absent for that card, and the driver will hang the system is an unsupported card is detected, and the current work in progress support is extremely basic and limited to just the main output).

That said, if you need any more info just let me know, also decent cards for G5 and PPC macs are the e-mu cards I support with my PPC port of the kx audio driver (the sb live and audigy cards thatg driver works with lack a setup program to get inputs to work on PPC, that still needs porting from intel macs).

Thanks for the precious feedback.
If you can test the Juli@ in a G5 would be awesome for me. I already contacted ESI also. When I have an answer I will put it here. edit: "The ESI Juli@ as PCI card will not work in a PowerMac G5 on the PCI-X slots, tit can be used only with PCI slots." Answer from ESI support.
I will double check the used market in france for E-MU cards. Regarding audigy, I remember having a 2ZS at the time, and although good, it wasn't as good as the envy24ht. But that was a long long time.
Regarding the Aureon, the sky I don't find one at all, just the normal 5.1 pci (which I believe doesn't have the ENVY24) and one Universe which is a bit more expensive.
I was also more keen on the Juli@ given that if I need to use it in other system (windows) it has good driver support

 

[ITzTravelInTime]

Thanks for the precious feedback.
If you can test the Juli@ in a G5 would be awesome for me. I already contacted ESI also. When I have an answer I will put it here. edit: "The ESI Juli@ as PCI card will not work in a PowerMac G5 on the PCI-X slots, tit can be used only with PCI slots." Answer from ESI support.
I will double check the used market in france for E-MU cards. Regarding audigy, I remember having a 2ZS at the time, and although good, it wasn't as good as the envy24ht. But that was a long long time.
Regarding the Aureon, the sky I don't find one at all, just the normal 5.1 pci (which I believe doesn't have the ENVY24) and one Universe which is a bit more expensive.
I was also more keen on the Juli@ given that if I need to use it in other system (windows) it has good driver support

About the juli@ it has the 3.3v key so it might work, btw also pcix cards do work in regular pci slots, although they are limited to 32bit mode and slower 33mhz mode. But i will check if it works in my G5 (it might cause the refusing to power on issue)

For the audigy/live remember that the inputs still don't work because i haven't yet ported the setup utility, also if it's better than an envy24 it depends on the envy24 card, basically there are many envy24 cards with various hw configuration on the card, and there are many ones that are very inferior the audigy series. For the e-mu cards they might be more expensive and harder to find, perhaps send me a message if you need more info.

For the aureons, the 7.1 universe requires the updated driver i have't released yet, and the 5.1 fun uses the cmi8738 chip with i actually made to work with a different driver, but quality is much much much worse.