Mercurial > hg > xmms-sid
annotate FAQ @ 35:3fcc147b253a
Updates towards 0.8beta0
| author | Matti Hamalainen <ccr@tnsp.org> |
|---|---|
| date | Thu, 19 Jun 2003 20:13:00 +0000 |
| parents | 469efc05e01e |
| children | 66f8d711cb95 |
| rev | line source |
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| 9 | 1 XMMS-SID - Frequently Asked (and other) Questions |
| 2 ================================================= | |
| 3 | |
| 4 - So what IS the SID and/or what are SID-tunes? | |
| 5 - Where to get SID tunes? | |
| 6 - Why isn't the sub-song control window skinnable? | |
| 7 - When using XMMS-SID with the OpenGL Spectrum Analyzer, | |
| 8 - Can I make my own SIDs??? How?? | |
| 9 - XMMS-SID plays some tune badly! | |
| 35 | 10 - What about SIDPlay1 & 2 support? |
| 9 | 11 |
| 12 >--- | |
| 13 | |
| 14 Q: So what IS the SID and/or what are SID-tunes? | |
| 15 | |
| 16 A: SID is abbreviation for the sound chip that was used in many | |
| 17 of the old 8-bit home computers manufactured by Commodore Inc. | |
| 18 in 1980's. Best known of those was the Commodore 64 home computer | |
| 19 (aka C64 or CBM64, also known as VIC-64 in some countries). | |
| 20 | |
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21 The Sound Interface Device (SID), based on waveform modulation |
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22 and synthesis, was designed by Bob Yannes and is considered |
| 9 | 23 one of the most advanced sound chips at the time. |
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24 |
| 9 | 25 It's capabilities surpassed all of the other chips on the 8-bit |
| 26 home computer market and even most of the ones used in arcade | |
| 27 game systems. Thousands of games were produced for C=64 in | |
| 28 1980's and beginning of 1990's, many of them having excellent | |
| 29 musical score. | |
| 30 | |
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31 Best of those tunes are still regarded as legendary - such as songs |
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32 by Martin Galway (for games Arkanoid, Green Beret, Yie Ar Kung Fu 1 |
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33 and 2, Parallax...), Rob Hubbard (Commando, Auf Wiedersehen Monty, |
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34 Monty on the Run, Warhawk, Sanxion, Delta...), Ben Daglish (Jack |
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35 the Nipper 1&2, Way of the Tiger, Cobra, Avenger) and numerous |
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36 other famous composers. Some of them quit their composing quickly |
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37 after the 8-bit period, but some are still working in the computer |
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38 music business. (Including Maniacs of Noise, Chris Huelsbeck, |
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39 Richard Joseph and Charles Deenen who worked with Fallout 1 & 2's |
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40 musical score) |
| 9 | 41 |
| 42 Today, years after the 'decline' of 8-bit computers, many composers | |
| 43 (mainly from C64 demoscene) continue to compose tunes for SID and | |
| 44 get most amazing things out of it -- things that the designers of | |
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45 the SID didn't even imagine. |
| 9 | 46 |
| 47 For example: SID has only three sound channels, but there are tunes | |
| 48 that use special techniques to "multiplex" them to sound like four | |
| 49 or even six channels. Also these three channels are "limited" to | |
| 50 synthesized sounds, kind like the FM sounds produced by old Sound | |
| 51 Blaster cards on PC. But again, using a certain 'bug' in SID chip, | |
| 52 composers were able to push the limits farther ... Martin Galway's | |
| 53 very famous piece on Arkanoid game was the "first" (later it has | |
| 54 been proven that Chris Huelsbeck's Bad Cat was the first but was | |
| 55 released later) to feature DIGITIZED SAMPLES like speech, etc. | |
| 56 | |
| 57 ... | |
| 58 | |
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59 The "SID tunes" are usually understood to be the files that contain |
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60 the C64 machine code and data that plays the music. SID players (or |
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61 emulators) are programs that emulate the SID chip capabilities and |
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62 other parts of C64 hardware to produce almost authentic re-creation |
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63 of the original music. SID-files (aka SID tunes) can be created by |
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64 ripping the music routines and data from some game or just composing |
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65 the music with some editor. |
| 9 | 66 |
| 67 XMMS-SID is interface for one of those emulators, libSIDPlay by | |
| 68 Michael Schwendt. | |
| 69 | |
| 70 | |
| 71 >--- | |
| 72 | |
| 73 Q: Where to get SID tunes? | |
| 74 | |
| 75 A: There are many collections of SID tunes on the Internet, but | |
| 76 probably the best one and best known one is the High Voltage | |
| 77 SID Collection aka HVSC. | |
| 78 | |
| 79 It is available at: http://hvsc.c64.org/ | |
| 80 | |
| 81 HVSC contains the tunes ripped from all legendary C64 games, | |
| 82 loaders, etc. And more. There are over 15,000 tunes in the | |
| 83 HVSC version 4.0 and more are coming. HVSC also contains the | |
| 84 STIL database (SID Tune Information List) that contains lots | |
| 85 of information about many of the tunes included in HVSC. | |
| 23 | 86 XMMS-SID supports the STIL database and info about the selected |
| 9 | 87 tune can be viewed with the "XMMS fileinfo" window (CTRL+3). |
| 88 STIL information can contain comments from composers, notice | |
| 89 if the tune is a cover and historically interesting facts | |
| 90 about games, etc... | |
| 91 | |
| 92 >--- | |
| 93 | |
| 94 Q: Why isn't the sub-song control window skinnable? | |
| 95 | |
| 96 A: Because the XMMS's code for skins is not exported to | |
| 97 plugins. And besides, you would need new skin(s) anyway. | |
| 98 | |
| 99 Things would be overly complicated if I added a skin support | |
| 100 and I'm not interested, at least for now. | |
| 101 | |
| 102 >--- | |
| 103 | |
| 104 Q: When using XMMS-SID with the OpenGL Spectrum Analyzer, | |
| 105 the sound becomes distorted! | |
| 106 | |
| 107 A: This is a known problem and occurs usually with NVidia | |
| 108 cards and drivers. It is not directly related to XMMS-SID. | |
| 109 | |
| 110 With certain combinations of hardware, this problem presents | |
| 111 itself with all input-plugins (mp3, mod, ogg..) of XMMS. | |
| 112 | |
| 113 Workaround: Upgrade or downgrade your NVidia drivers. | |
| 114 Try lowering your systemload. Close some unnecessary | |
| 115 CPU-consuming applications. Buy faster hardware. | |
| 116 | |
| 117 >--- | |
| 118 | |
| 119 Q: Can I make my own SIDs??? How?? | |
| 120 | |
| 121 A: Yes you can. You need a real C64 or emulator like VICE and | |
| 122 a composing program. There are many available, I know only | |
| 123 few of them: | |
| 124 | |
| 23 | 125 - JCH's editor (search with google) |
| 9 | 126 - Cybertracker (http://noname.c64.org/) |
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127 - GoatTracker (http://covertbitops.c64.org/) |
| 9 | 128 |
| 129 Some of the mentioned tools can be found from Lemon's | |
| 130 collection which is an excellent place to look for info | |
| 131 on games and other Commodore-related software. | |
| 132 The URL is: http://www.lemon64.com/ | |
| 23 | 133 |
| 9 | 134 You should also check http://www.c64.com/ |
| 135 | |
| 136 Besides the above, you'll need some skill in using the | |
| 137 programs and hardware, understanding of music in some | |
| 138 level and good ideas for tunes. :) | |
| 139 | |
| 140 Rest of that is out of the scope of this document, | |
| 141 please don't ask me about this. | |
| 142 | |
| 143 >--- | |
| 144 | |
| 145 Q: XMMS-SID plays some tune badly! | |
| 146 | |
| 147 A: Please read file "README.bugreport". In general this | |
| 148 might be a bug in SIDPlay-library or some other component. | |
| 149 Or it might be in XMMS-SID. Report and I'll see what | |
| 150 can be done. | |
| 151 | |
| 152 >--- | |
| 35 | 153 |
| 154 Q: What about SIDPlay1 & 2 support? I saw some screenshots from 0.8beta | |
| 155 that had selectable support for v1 and v2 in the configuration! | |
| 156 | |
| 157 A: The runtime selection in betas 0-4 was based on patched libsidplay2 | |
| 158 that changed the namespace to not to clash with libsidplay1. I don't | |
| 159 think it is worth of the trouble because a) it would break other apps | |
| 160 using libsidplay2 unless the patched version was statically linked to | |
| 161 XMMS-SID and b) I would have to manually create the patches for every | |
| 162 libsidplay2 update. Too much work, so it's not going to happen. | |
| 163 | |
| 164 Only "feasible" (but also not worth of the trouble) way to achieve | |
| 165 runtime-selectable support would be to create a dynamic plugin- | |
| 166 architechture into XMMS-SID to on-demand load support for emulation | |
| 167 engine(s). I might do this if you are willing to pay 2000 EUR for it :-P | |
| 168 | |
| 169 >--- |