Educational System - tape images?

+DrVenkman · February 17, 2018

I found a loose copy of the Educational System Master Cartridge cheap at a local retro game store so of course I picked it up. I also remember hearing Kevin Savetz talking about working with folks in the community to digitize and clean up the audio files that from the cassette lessons.

My forum search-fu is failing me today - I've been working on multiple projects and perhaps I'm just not using the right terms in the right order - but my question is really two-fold: first, can someone provide a link to the host for all those audio lessons?

And second, can any of the existing peripheral emulation programs handle and play these audio files on cue from the Atari? (In other words, am I gonna have to break down and replace the belts on one of my FOUR dead 410's, then records some audio cassettes from the .WAV files to play around with this cart?)

Thanks!

baktra · February 17, 2018

If I understand correctly item #2, you are looking for a software for PC that would listen to the MOTOR CTRL signal and use that signal to control playback of a WAVE file on PC.

I don't think there is such software. For sure APE (with USB version of their SIO2PC device) is capable of listening to the MOTOR CTRL signal when it is interpreting a .CAS file, but it cannot control playback of a WAVE file on PC.

Edited February 17, 2018 by baktra

+DrVenkman · February 18, 2018

If I understand correctly item #2, you are looking for a software for PC that would listen to the MOTOR CTRL signal and use that signal to control playback of a WAVE file on PC.

I don't think there is such software. For sure APE (with USB version of their SIO2PC device) is capable of listening to the MOTOR CTRL signal when it is interpreting a .CAS file, but it cannot control playback of a WAVE file on PC.

That's too bad but not unexpected. It occurs to me that a cheap Arduino or maybe even a PIC could be programmed to "listen" to the SIO bus motor control signal to play and pause playback of audio files, returned back along the audio input line. Might be a fun project, though you'd need some kind of display or interface on the microcontroller to tell it which lesson audio file to play.

I have a spare Raspberry Pi 2 that would work as well, interfacing along the GPIO pins. Hmm ...

baktra · February 18, 2018

That's too bad but not unexpected. It occurs to me that a cheap Arduino or maybe even a PIC could be programmed to "listen" to the SIO bus motor control signal to play and pause playback of audio files, returned back along the audio input line. Might be a fun project, though you'd need some kind of display or interface on the microcontroller to tell it which lesson audio file to play.

I have a spare Raspberry Pi 2 that would work as well, interfacing along the GPIO pins. Hmm ...

Raspberry Pi 2 seems to be better candidate, as it has enough storage to store and play back wave files. Yes, listening to the MOTOR CTRL would be possible with GPIO pins (5V is needed, of course). Sending signal back to AUDIO IN - I believe that would be possible with Pi's audio out, if the signal is adjusted to proper level (not sure how what are the parameters of the AUDIO IN of SIO), but anyone with a data recorder, dual track tape, and a simple oscilloscope could let us know what is the voltage.

Full data recorder emulation with Pi would be nice, but I am not sure if software on that machine one can reliably switch a GPIO pin with a frequency of 22 kHz (minimum needed to support turbo upgrades).