poobah
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Posts posted by poobah
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The RAP-10 is listed as having high-end distortion issues.
And while the Turtle Beach card passed their hardware tests, its software wasn't up to the task of muti-track audio.
Meanwhile the Falcon could use Cubase Audio (an app that wouldn't appear on the PC for another three years.
I'm really not aware of anything in 1993 (or even prior to 1996) that could do multi-track audio sampling on the PC (other than perhaps the IQS system and I have no idea where a person would purchase that from).
Multi-track sampling is a whole different animal, I doubt there was a PC-based solution for it during that time period.
The "high end distortion" comment seems odd, and the measurement suspect since the RAP-10 doesn't have a PA on it.
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It was temporarily running the BBS. Thunderstorm..... No response. Black screen. It does have a power light but no HD/Floppy activity light if I recall. I also lost my U-Verse router. The BBS ran through a Lantronix device which survived unscathed so I don't know if the surge came through the network (I have a lot of machines and devices and only the U-Verse router and Falcon were damaged). The garage behind the building was struck by lightning and perhaps the apartment building itself, so it might have come through the electrical, but then again, only the Falcon and the U-Verse router were trashed. (And a lot of U-Verse routers died that day, when they came to fix mine, he said there were still 200 people they had to fix in the area).
I did try swapping out the power supply and ram from the other Falcon (that is kinda flakey) but no change (so it's more involved than the power supply). That's as far as I've looked into it so far since lately I've been focusing on my BBS and the TT030.
Lightning.... ugh
Well start with the basics... do you have clock signal, does it come out of reset, do you see the activity on the bus, go from there
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Any good with helping to diagnose dead Falcons fellow Ohioan?
Define dead =D
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So definitely check the voltages with it loaded down before you hook it back up to the ST. Often times when you lose a component like that, it can take other stuff with it.
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Here's the 1994 PC Magazine audio interface benchmark:
Awesome link, it appears my memory is a little fuzzy.
Looks like the TB card (barely) edges out the RAP-10 on most of the measurements, though they both have impressive specs.
At any rate, both cards are evidence that you could indeed do professional music work on PCs of the era.
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Rev. H TT030, others should be similar
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Prior to that, pro audio on the PC platform was a lot of stumbling around in the dark and only a glimmer of hope for people with massive budgets. As for 1992 and 1993, pro audio on a PC was still a pipe dream with the raw elements still cooking on the stovetop.
The RAP-10's list price was $600.00 and its performance level is a notch below the Turtle Beach card that I mentioned.
The RAP-10 was essentially a Sound Canvas on a PC card. It wasn't meant (nor did it provide much support) for PC gaming. Serious musicians used them. I'm pretty sure the RAP part stood for "Roland Audio Producer." The Turtle Beach Multi-sound was an excellent card, but the RAP-10 had a better SNR. (For context, "back in the day", a good friend of mine used the RAP-10 & Cakewalk for professional music gigs.)
So yeah, expensive as all heck, but a good bit past "a pipe dream".
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Ahh yes, my old friend serial-bus data frame checksum error, and his buddy, Error 138, Device timeout.... How I loathed you both.
Somewhat amusing anecdote.... I actually had an occasion to indicate a malformed serial transmission with some development hardware, can you guess what I wrote to the log?
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The Roland RAP-10 was out in '92 or '93.
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I guess what I was driving at, is that there are a lot of potential noise sources for the vanilla ST sampled output, and you sort of nibbled around the edges, but there's really a lot more to it than what you've researched. The distortions you have identified are definitely there, but not for the reasons you might think. You can generate reasonably good output with the vanilla ST hardware (or worse). Certainly, the limitations you correctly identify don't make it easy, but it really is more about the source material and how it is manipulated than the exact specs of the hardware. Would better sound hardware been a good move on Atari's part? Absolutely (hence the STe DMA sound).
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Well, the one I have hooked to my main unit is an official 2600 adapter, so without confirming I would assume the specs line up properly. The second one is marked as a 9V DC 100mA output. I guess that is causing it then?
Yup, nowhere near enough current.
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It's much higher frequency isn't it? If you have a schematic and some hdl we can consider it. That said I don't think tvs have it in general, so there probably isn't a standard 50Hz pal type mode?
DisplayPort is a bear in an FPGA, you need way more resources than with HDMI. I'm only aware of 1 publicly available implementation.
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(BTW, if anything I've said here is incorrect or misleading, feel free to point that out).
OK, I'll bite
You really are conflating a bunch of different things and painting a worse picture than reality (not that the vanilla ST sample playback is stellar....)
4 bits of amplitude is certainly more coarse than 8 bits, but, given good samples and a decent sample rate, it could still sound fairly good. For instance, although CD's are indeed composed of 16 bit samples (well almost always, but that's another day), those samples are often played through a 1 bit DAC. Yes, much higher sample rate than our lowly ST sound chip, but by the same argument you present, 4 bits is WAY more than 1, so the ST is obviously better than CD quality?
That said, the ST isn't massively oversampling on playback, so the limited quantization levels certainly can come into play, again depending on the original samples. Much like mixing colors or multiplexing sprites, toggling amplitude in the samples 'fast enough' can create the illusion of additional quantization levels. Also, keep in mind that we really discern amplitude as power, so there's a time factor involved as well.
Regarding filtering, that's really going to come down to how the original samples were crafted and what rate they are played back. So long as our original samples don't have any frequency content greater than 1/2 our playback rate, you won't have any aliasing, and you won't have to rely on filters to address it.
None of that is to say that vanilla ST is some kind of sample driven powerhouse, it certainly is not, but given the hardware limitations, the end result depends greatly on the source material and techniques, and only somewhat on the actual sound chip (and in truth, this is because of the limitations of the sound chip)
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I'm in Ohio, I can mod yours if you like.
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On more than one occasion, I've made an offer, and the seller just countered with their listing price..... Sigh.
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The 50 pin centronics is an external SCSI connector, the 19 pin connector is wired for an Atari ACSI port, possibly a rudimentary SCSI adapter.
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It's a hard drive
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in for 2, thanks!
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I think the MSP430 port would be a good starting point for that 
Well, gcc can make msp430 binaries....
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So, because i can be a tick neurotic, After I crimp, I put a wee bit of solder at the crimped end so that wires will never pull out. Leaves a nice rugged spade connector, and is probably massive overkill
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I thought the jailbars were from the clock leaking into the video signal. Try a forum search, I know someone (ijor?) dug pretty deep into the jailbar issue on the 8 bitters
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Definitely start with the power supply.
No power light is odd, Vcc goes right to the KB connector (is the KB connector hooked correctly?)
I've seen a couple 1040's with bad reset buttons that keep the machine in reset, might want to check that
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With most BASIC randomly generated numbers aren't really random, Atari BASIC will generate numbers that are truly random unless special steps are taken.
http://www.atarimagazines.com/v7n11/randomatari.html
Run the program I posted with an additional line looping back to the start(press BREAK to stop), you should find that while sometimes numbers do repeat there are no repeatable sequences. Then RUN again, the new sequences should be different.
Waaaaay off topic, but I did my Master's work on random numbers.......
POKEY uses a linear feedback shift register, it is not random, and is completely predictable. (I was entertained by the linked article that said Atari random numbers are "Too random...."),
OK, back to our regularly scheduled topic...
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I got an Atari TTM194 Moniterm Monitor free to whoever picks it up. I fall in NW Ohio, Putnam county.
Very tempting.... SW Ohio, near Dayton....
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eBay items too cheap to believe... but on the level and a good deal.
in Auction Central
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Somewhere (and sadly I couldn't find it quickly), exxos details the great difficulties he had finding genuine PALs or GALs. Most of them had been remarked to faster speed.