A
buzzword used to describe a
sound card that uses the same
settings and
configuration as a
Creative Labs SoundBlaster (usually the
16 bit variety), but is usually just another
cheap trick used by
hardware manufacturers to sell you something
under false pretences.
Like in the case of the
marketing gigabyte or the 56k modem you bought just to peel the sticker off the box and have it say 33.6.. what the
oem says often has little to do with reality.
Usually when they say that a
sound card proclaims to be "100%
sound blaster compatible" it usually just means that it uses the following
settings (
correct me if I'm wrong):
I bought an
Acer Magic FX-3D because of its claim of universal
compatiblity and
Plug and Play capabilities...
The
drivers it came with don't work... The
drivers windows comes with don't work... The
kernel module linux comes with won't work... the only way I can get the goddamned thing to work is to use the driver for another card that uses the same chip (the
AD1816)...
Oh, and the best part?
DOS games have no sound unless I specify the
BLASTER environment variable... and if I do, in windows, it either won't recognise it, or will decide to comment it out of my
autoexec.bat...
why does windows think it is smarter than me?