SID Player for the Spectrum

A SID player was developed for the Spectrum in 2003 in the Czech Republic. It accepts YM files from the Atari-ST and Commodore. Can't be used in Russian clones because of processor and ULA timings. If someone could code a tool to make the process easier it would be great.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• sinclair
• zx
• spectrum
• speccy
• SID
• player
• demo
• ym
• atari
• czech
• republic

[Ahle2]

LOL :P . The YM is not nearly as good as the SID chip. To make the YM do PWM, they have to send new data to the YM registers at very high rates, which make the Z80 processor overloaded. It takes almost all processor power to make this possible. But there is no way that they could emulate the triangle wave, saw wave, ring modulation or filter of the SID. The sid IS superior in every way, thats fact!

[zxspectrum128]

No one said the YM or AY chips were better than the SID. This is about an achievement. :) You may be seeing the Spectrum playing .mod files soon, but that's another story. :D

[cv643d]

Nice soundtrack, can you download the tunes from somewhere and how can you play them in Windows? Any players around?

[zxspectrum128]

I believe wikipedia has a few links to SID players for Windows.

[leerees]

As a fan of bass I've always liked square waves, In UK Grime (a sub genre of UK Garage music) a lot of producers used 50/50 squares put through a LPF. Whilst grime sounded quite simple at home when you heard it in a night club it was a whole different experience, people would go mental for the basslines.

[leerees]

when i was a kid I had my spectrum rigged to a very loud stereo, and the raw square wave basslines were earth shattering. Whilst the music on my mates c64s were better, they were all played through their crappy TV's. To answer your question, a 50/50 with no filter produces the most intense bass possible. You need to hear it on a 15" subwoofer to appreciate it.

[inphanta]

This is a good approximation I've seen put to better use on Atari ST demo tunes, but it sounds nowhere near as good as a real SID. Still no ADSR, filters, modulation and suchlike, but objectively speaking this is a good result for the YM chip, but it's no SID beater.

[retro8059000]

hi

it sounds like 'Our House' from Madness

[mistertentpole]

the music at 5:05 is amazing.  What's the name of this one anyone?

[xxxogchris]

SID can produce sounds in more ways than YM.And SID can produce any sound YM can.

[Ahle2]

But still, the SID can sound EXACTLY the same !

Ofcourse nobody sat the PWM register to 50:50 duty cycle and only used square waves without filter. (why should they?)

Still i´m VERY impressed by some YM/AY tunes.

[RazorFastClaws]

Ah, but i didn't say the YM or AY are better. I just love the sound better if programmed by a skilled programmer. The SID's design is far superiour for sure.

It's just a personal preference and thats why i used " In. My. Opinion."

[factor6]

Well, this is not SID chip emulation from C64, but "SID" is called a technique of playing of YM chip on Atari ST, which is emulated here. So C64 SID and Atari ST (this one) SID are DIFFERENT things!

[Ahle2]

That´s a matter of oppinion though, because the sound generation in the YM2612 is fundamentally different from the SID.

Personally i have a love/hate relationship to FM sounds. The 7 OP Yamaha DX7 can generate some AWESOME sounds when programmed properly.

But the <=4 OP FM sound chips can sound awful/squeaky when not properly programmed (most Genesis games)