ESS ES488
The ES488 was the first audio chip in ESS' AudioDrive line, released in 1993.
|
Released | 1993 |
| Bus | ISA 8-bit | |
| FM Synth | None | |
| Sample Range | N/A | |
| Packages | ||
| Standards | Ad Lib, Sound Blaster 2.0 | |
| Plug & Play | No | |
| See Also | ES688, ES1488 |
The ES488 was a 12-bit mono digital audio chip and was Sound Blaster compatible (mono only). It created all of the speech and sound of a Sound Blaster board, but required an external FM synthesizer to produce FM output, such as the Yamaha YM3812 (OPL2).
The ES488 was a highly integrated IC, combining digital logic, a microcontroller, an audio CODEC and other analog functions onto a single 52-pin plastic quad flat pack ("PQFP") package. . It also provided some power management capabilities. It was socket-compatible with the later ES1488.
OKI entered into a partnership agreement with ESS to sell OKI-branded ES488 chips as the OKI M6388. These were pin-compatible and functionally the same as the ES488.
The ES488 can be found on the following cards:
- ProLink SoundPlus-ES488 (FCC ID: IB9SOUNDES488)
- NTi Audio Magician
- Some Orchid Fahrenheit VA/VLB cards (others have an OKI M6388) - ES488 was used in this case as an ancillary chip for audio processing.
Revisions
There was just one revision of the ES488, called ES488-F.
Competition
By 1993, ESS was pretty late to the party. We'd had FM synthesis in DOS since the launch of the Ad Lib Music Synthesizer in 1987, and Creative Labs had utterly cornered the sound card market with the Sound Blaster (1989), Sound Blaster Pro (1991), and even the Sound Blaster 16 (1992). It's hard to believe ESS saw a market there at all, but my guess is that in the similar vein to Aztech, they went directly for the low-budget clone market, selling their ES488 to Taiwanese sound card manufacturers in volume.
From what I can tell, the ES488 did not sell well, as there are very few cards that use it. They did prevail, however, and buckle up as they saw much greater success in the coming few years!
In the Media
There is very little in the press around the ES488 AudioDrive.
Setting it Up
Sound cards that use the ES488 will likely have jumpers or DIP switches to configure the card's I/O Base Address (220h or 240h), IRQ (2, 3, 5 or 7) and DMA channel (1 or 3). The default configuration is likely base address 220h, IRQ 7, and DMA channel 1.
The ES488 does not require any device drivers to be loaded for use in DOS. Just be sure to have your BLASTER environment variable set, for example have this in your AUTOEXEC.BAT:
SET BLASTER=A220 I7 D1 T3
For Windows, the drivers will default to I/O base addresses from 220h - 22Fh for Sound Blaster, 388h - 389h for Ad Lib, IRQ 7, and DMA channel 1.
Downloads
ES488 Datasheet Get in touch if you can provide this missing item! |
Windows 3.x Drivers ESS AudioDrive ISA card drivers for ES488/688/1488/1688/1788/1888, plus MPU-401, ESSVOL and ESSCFG. |
Windows 95 Drivers ESS AudioDrive ISA card drivers for ES488/688/1488/1688/1788/1868/1878/1888, |
Pictures
An NTi Audio Magician, Rev2.4
- note the lack of an OPL2 chip, so no FM synthesis from this card