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XTC-PLAY.FAQ
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1997-07-30
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XTC-PLAY
FAQ
Q: Which sound cards does Xtc-Play currently support ?
A: Xtc-Play has been tested with the following cards
- GUS 2.x (classic) and 3.x
- GUS Max
- AMD Interwave PnP (Pro) aka GUS PnP
- Sound Blaster
- Sound Blaster Pro
- Sound Blaster 16
- Sound Blaster AWE 32 (SB16 mode)
- Mozart Sound System (SB-Pro mode)
--> Any GUS or Sound Blaster clone should work
Q: Which GFX card will work well ?
A: These cards were tested but any standard VGA card / VESA compliant card
should work.
- S3 Trio V64+ (Vesa 1.2 and 2.0)
- S3 Virge (Vesa 1.2 and 2.0)
- ET4000 (Vesa 1.2 and 2.0)
- ET6000 (Vesa 1.2 and 2.0)
- Matrox Mystique (Vesa 1.2 and 2.0)
- ATI MACH 64 (Vesa 1.2 and 2.0)
- Cirrus Logic (Vesa 2.0)
Q: There is no NNA support for ITs ... Why ?
A: This question was asked a 100 times. IT NNA's are VERY difficult to
implement in my current player routine. I have to rewrite about 2500 lines
of code just to support NNAs and the bugs coming with this implementation
will be manifold and hard to find and correct. So I have to wait till I have
enough time to rewrite all this...
--> WAIT !!!
Q: I'm inside the filelister and now it seems that there is now way to get
back to the player screens, but loading another module, why ?
A: YES, this is one of my favourites, asked a 1000 times ....
If you take a look inside the .DOC file you might find the answer, the magic
key is TAB. And before someone asks again, NO! , we won't change it to ESC
like in Cubic! (Eh you know : ESC for Escape!!!)
Q: Older versions of XTC-Play like 0.60 supported more module formats than the
current one. Why ?
A: The older version of XTC-Play until version 0.60 were written with Borland
Pascal 7.0. Due to a lot of memory problems , the player was *completly*
rewritten in C and some time later in C++. Because of this, all parts of the
player had to be coded again from scratch and so we decided what is more and
what is less important. But don't worry, all formats which where implemented
in 0.60 will be implemented in the new versions soon. If you especially
desire support for some formats, feel free to write me (except for MIDI).
Q: My GUS has only 512kb on-board, so why am I able to load larger modules ?
A: Xtc-Play uses some kind of intelligent memory management called "doubling".
If the sample size is larger than the amount of RAM on your card, XTC-Play
will first try to convert 16bits samples to 8bits samples, than it will
decrease the sample quality by 50% and then at last by 75 percent.
Theoretically this will expand your memory by factor 8 (making a 4 MB GUS
out of a 512kb one), but be warned : any conversion will result in quality
loss !
BTW: This memory management was implemented before Cubic's similar system !
Q: After loading a module XTC-Play ends up with Exception 7
A: Exception 7 means coprocessor not found, to gain most performance for all
screens XTC-Play was compiled with the coprocessor option, I.e. you need at
least a 386 with an optional coprocessor, a 486-66++ is recommended. All 486
DX classes and Pentium classes have an internal coprocessor. If you are not
able to obtain such a machine, feel free to contact kilroy or Bee-Man and
ask for a version with coprocessor emulation.
Q: When entering the Setup it does offer a 320x200 mode only.
A: Xtc-play does not directly access all available graphic cards, it needs some
kind of VESA driver, either version 1.2 or later (e.g. 2.0). Normally this
is no problem because all modern cards have an internal VESA driver, at
least applying to the VESA 1.2 standard. Use a 2.0 BIOS if available - it
speeds up all screens.
Q: Although a VESA driver is enabled I am still not able to switch to other
modes.
A: Some cards like Cirrus Logic don't conform to the official VESA 1.2
specifications. The best way is to load a VESA 2.0 driver such as UNIVBE
and everything should be fine.
Q: What is UNIVBE ?
A: UNIVBE is a driver that provides the best compatibility of your card.
It applys to the latest VESA 2.0 specifications and will speed up all screens
inside the player by introducing a so called LFB. The latest version of
UNIVBE is 5.3a, you may get the file either from a local BBS or via Internet
at http://www.scitechsoft.com
Q: I've loaded UNIVBE but I am no more able to switch to the high resoluted
text-modes.
A: This is a bug (or a feature ?) of UNIVBE, it disables all hi-res textmodes.
You should start UVCONFIG -i and then rerun UNIVBE. This will reenable all
textmodes in future.
If this fails :
1. Complain at Scitech
2. Use another VESA 2.0 driver, either your internal (e.g. most Matrox
cards have one) or another external.
3. If you have an ET4000 or S3 Chip, you don't need to worry, because
they are directly accessed by the player.
Q: The IT support sounds pretty good, but is far from perfect, why ?
A: During the development of XTC-Play a lot of formats have passed, and some of
them were really tricky (e.g. DMF), but IT is nothing compared to them. IT
tracker itself and the format is one of the best formats ever created, but
also one of the most difficult. "IT" breaks with most conventions and is
totally different compared to most other formats. Kilroy is working heavily
that "IT" will sound as good as all other formats, but please give us some
time, this will take a (short) while. Also look at NNA, third question...
Q: Some "IT" modules aren't loaded, why ?
A: Some "IT" modules are packed with Zirconia's module packer. This packer
provides a very good compression ratio and they can still be recognized as
modules by XTC-Play. But you'll have to obtain the mmcmp134.* packet,
including several files, so that XTC-Play is able to decompress them. This
packet is available inside some IT tracker versions, or separatly. You can
get they file either at ftp.cdrom.com/pub/music, or at most sound related
BBS (the Sanction WHQ holds the file under mmcmp134.zip). Once you got the
file, decompress the archive and choose between two EXE files :
1. MMTSR.EXE, this is a TSR which should be started before they player, it
will intercept all disk accesses and automatically decompress packed
modules in the background.
2. MMUNCMP.EXE, the original unpacker. Put that file in any directory which
is in your path, XTC-Play will recognize this and decompress the IT file
automatically.
Later versions of XTC-Play will have direct support for MMCMP !
(When I crack the 16bits decompress routine...)
Q: What is MP3 ?
A: MP3 is the so called audio MPEG-1/2 layer 3 standard.
They are most effective compressed WAV files in maximum 48kHz, 16bit stereo,
with a compression level of 1:11, that means an 11MB Wav file will be packed
down to 1MB of an MPEG stream, 1 minute will aproximately use 1 MB of
diskspace. MPEG uses a lossy compression, which filters out frequencies the
human ear SHOULD not be able to hear. MPEG streams are available through the
internet or some BBS.
Q: If I try to play MPEG streams the sound output is garbled.
A: MPEG needs some heavy calculations and because of this you may need a
Pentium for best quality and performance. Since version 0.93 there is also
support for mono output by using the /1 switch. This will reduce the amount
of CPU load by 50%. So it may theoretically work on a 486 DX2-66. If this
works, you can also try to start without this switch, because XTC-PLAY
recognizes automatically when your computer is to slow and will drop down to
mono. I.e. if your computer is at least a fast 486 that the MPEG-Stream will
be played at 90% in stereo, drop down to mono for a short second and then up
to stereo again. Using this trick, even slower machines are capable of
playing MPEGs in best quality possible. If all this doesn't help, you can
also try to limit the frequency by using the "/F" switch. Try first /F22050
and then /F11025.