A longer term fix is to soak the whole key pad sheet in Fuelite (Petroleum Spirit)

Dummy here. Reads to me as a regional brand name and an ambiguous generic term. Would soaking in naphtha work?

Most of Creative’s AWE32 cards do use a real Yamaha OPL3 chip for FM synthesis, which can produce two-or-four operator voices. The latter of those can approach the quality of the voices in their DX7-family line of musical instruments. Even the older OPL2 chip that is limited to two-operator voices can sound great when programmed well (not that I’d call it realistic-sounding).

The other synth chip on the AWE32 is the Ensoniq EMU8000. That one does sample-based synthesis as you describe above.

Just wanted to note that Creative misappropriated the term wavetable synthesis when they marketed this and other sample-based synthesis cards of theirs, and the misnomer spread widely to the products of other companies and persists to this day.

Great card, got one in my 440BX retro rig! Plus an AWE64 Gold and a PnP SB16 with a real OPL3 FM chip. That’s just a bit of what’s kicking around here…