Commodore Free 12/Commodore_Free_Issue_12_2007_Commodore_Computer_Club.d64/t.soasc faq2

Text File | 2023-02-26 | 11KB | 339 lines

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SOASC= FAQ - Frequently Asked Qestions:

PART 2

Q: "Why MP3? and not OGG, FLAC, Plain
WAV or "that other personal favourite"
format, dude?

A: It was a totally egoistic and
personal choice. This is afterall
a PRIVATE project intented for my own
amusement. MP3: It's the most common
format for all kinds of people and
hardware. End of story. OGG: Might be
better with those "unhearable high
frequencies that you would NEVER miss
if you had nothing to compare too
anyway!" End Of Story.FLAC: Why should
I? Better go real WAV instead, and
also FLAC is a non typical format that
are not "all over" compatible "all
over" everywhere. End Of Story.

WAV: That would be dream, yes. But it
would take 10 times as much space. So
400GB x 10 that is. For the years to
come, not an option. But in future,
why not! I really can't believe if
anybody would be unsatisfied with the
SOASC= audio quality of the MP3's.
Those higher frequencies you claim to
be issue with the MP3 are frequencies
in the approx 18000Hz-20000Hz range.

Note that the Hi Freq cutout example
was boosted by 17DB, just to get the
maximum volume for you to listen
too.The Original Recorded WAV (8580)
vs The 18000Hz-2000Hz range (you claim
you can here this?? Maybe your dog
will!)The Processed MP3 Result (8580)
vs The 18000Hz-2000Hz range (is there
anybody out there at all?) And the
best of all. If anybody have better
recordings, they are free naturally to
enjoy those. But why not do the same
thing with the rest of the current
available C64 music as well... ohhh
don't worry...it's just about
90000 tunes of manual processing work
for you. See you in another dimension
and in a galaxy VERY far from here!
Remember that the SOASC= project is
an automated process, and can be
restarted anytime, anywhere with any
sound specification we would ever
dream of. There is no more work
involved, there is no problem having
the computers and C64 record for 90
days straight with an 30 minute break
each 3th day to extract the results.
I have no further comments.

Q: "Hmm, I'm not really impressed.I
can hear static noise in the
recordings!

A: Again, SOASC= is about the
AUTHENTIC and GENUINE sound from real
C64's. Its the key factor! The SOASC=
project records both music played on a
8580 and 6581 SID CHIPS. It records
them EXACTLY out of the AUDIO/VIDEO
connector on the Commodore 64 itself.
so naturally noise will emerge from
the chips inside. Well, popquiz: Did
you really care about the noise back
in the days? Did you actually hear it
and did you hate the C64 for that?
Could you really do something about it
Did it REALLY caused so much of a
trouble for you? Do you use the same
music equipment to listen to C64 music
(MP3 version) TODAY as you did BACK
then?

No. You were like the rest of us
either connected to a crappy
television with horrible speakers, or
you did actually have a sound system
with AUXinput. Now....what do you
really remember? The NOISE that WAS
there (trust me it was, and even more
that in the SOASC= recording!) or the
music itself?.the answer is the music
of course, so easy!

Anyway, when doing tests during the
recording, naturally noise was
detected. But, by improving the
internal grounding and also connect
the AUDIO IN on the SID chip to GROUND
the noise apparent in the recordings
was "completely" removed. By writing
"completely" its actually based on the
sound material itself. Further studies
during the recording showed that tunes
did vary in volume. So lower volume
means the "normalize" routine had to
boost the final output more resulting
in more noise, but if the volume was
quite high, the noise would be really
totally gone!

We could of course do some software
post processing to remove the noise,
humm etc...but we'd never know what
a typical all over setting would do to
THAT particular tune, so that idea was
totally ignored too!

Furthermore I DID NOT add the -
b option to PSID64 (screen blanking)
! There were tips about this reducing
noise, yes on the 6581 I noticed so
just minorly, but a number of songs
were detected to be out of sync
completely with this option. (It
may be due to defective SID files and
was confirmed by HVSC that those tunes
noticed on ACTUALLY had bad bytes in
them....typically a lot of the
VARIOUS\ M R\Nilsen_Ronny\xx.sid)
But since I had already added a better
physical grounding as mentioned above,
this option did not have any relevance
to the SOASC= project and where
rejected.Furthermore in the "changelog
.txt" for the PSID64 project, it
states: "Implemented screen blanking
to improve audio quality when using
the RF modulated output of your C64.".
It specifically mentions "RF modulated"
and nothing about the AUDIO/VIDEO out
connector So confusion is here all
right.

Q: "Why not build or buy dedicated
newer hardware for the purpose, such
as HardSID?"

A: Again, SOASC= is about the
AUTHENTIC and GENUINE sound from real
C64's. Its the key factor! All the old
components and their analogic
specifications make up the sound of
the C64. Most of the key components
around the sound chip is today totally
obsolete not to mention the SID itself
You could get 95% close (with hardware
)to the real sound of C64, but do  I
want that? No, I want the 100% real
thing and so should others feel too.
Do you think the "AUTHENTIC" word is
put into the SOASC= (Stone Oakvalley's
Authentic SID Collection) just for
fun? Ohh, yeah of course you could
canibalize your precious C64 and put
all the REAL components on a PCB card
and play along, but man... you're
destroying a C64 for gods sake, and
why bother then when SOASC= MP3's is
just what you will get anyway without
any PCB contructing and insulting the
soul of C64? Use common...no IMPROVED
sense!

Q: "But why do you do it? What is the
gain? What's the use, its outdated
material and old!"

A: For starters, you are missing one
word in the end there. It should say;
"old school". That is about the things
that matter when you grew up, what
made you what you are today, your
memories and your experiences with the
C64 will be back again to say hello
with the help of remembering the past
and the old school days with crunchy
sound and pixels in 8 bit, 16 color.
Remember, todays equipment will be old
school in 20 years, so its all about
remembrance and the joy of "what was".
There is no gain, except the result of
the real authentic C64 sound:). This
was an electronic and inventive
challenge that I just HAD to do.
Challenges make character, and it is
incredible fun to be able to be
creative and set no limits, what a
boring life if not. Therefore, I just
HAD to do it, and also because I have
so many good memories from the C64
days that I would like to experience
today in other situations and I still
get a kick out of it. It's about human
exploration and playing with your mind

If you don't understand, you're a
zombie and have lost yourself...and
that can't be repaired.Sorry. Anyway,
apart from that I do not trust
ANYTHING else than the real authentic
Commodore 64 playing the SIDS.
Everything else is either emulated (by
software or hardware) and I do not
want to listen to music not intended
to be played on anyting else than the
original Commodore 64's. A lot of
people seem to forget this incredible
important detail when discovering the
SOASC= project in general. It is just
the hunt for the real authentic thing,
and I stress that too much. AUTHENTIC
SOUND IS ALL!

Q: "What do the future hold for the
SOASC= project?

A: The intial goal of SOASC= was to
process the entire HVSC#45 archive,
and then continue to update the
archive whenever HVSC released a new
pack of fixes/new tunes. This is still
unchanged as of Feb 2007. Another goal
is of course to fix recording errors
and issues with the song lengths. This
is a bit more tricky and manual work
which will take some time to complete

It just has to be fixed when it is
discovered, so patience is key. Also
remember that this recording project is
done entirely by one man, due to the
hardware needed to process the tunes!
But there might be a innovative concept
beeing presented during 2006: And this
involves the possiblity for users to
upload SID files to a server, specifiy
for instance a new song length & other
perferences, add it to recording queue,
played and recorded by my automated
recording techniques  (on both 6581 &
8580), and then the MP3 file being
presented as is on a different data-
base. Upon manual verification the MP3
file will replace perhaps a bad
recording, a wrong song lengths tune or
just a plain new tune altogehter, that
are not even in HVSC collection yet!
This will at least let trustable users
& friends of SOASC= project contribute
to help fix the world largest & most
authentic Commodore 64 music archive up
to a perfect standard! This will
without a doubt be a important asset to
theSOASC= project..

Q: "Do you guys earn any money on
this? And, you know what...you could
by adding banners!

A: Earn money on this project? Are
you retarded? Hosting this kind of
massive collection online is really
easy...if one cared to do it the right
way! And so we did, no CRAP - just
pure, clean, serious and the tunes
ready for download. No strings
attached, no nags, no ads, no shit.
This is a respectful archival project
for the SID fans which includes myself
and the website should reflect that.

So by bringing in a bunch of Google
crap ads, stupid search engines
plugins or ANY other kind of third-
party webcode/functionalites beyond
what IMEAN in my greatest belief would
bring my site on a level that would be
similar to SO many other archive sites
out there is REALLY important. This
site should be clean and 100% our
design/functionalites only! If
something would be added it should
benefit the project..like the external
embedded link to YouTube movie of the
SOASC= project. Just a heads up, that
I am VERY aware of what clean and
serious concept/projects are all about
Death to banners, commercial ads,
google ad crap etc. that DOES NOT
benefit the project in question!
Earning money on this project (in any
way) would be subject to law as we do
not own the tunes and are they are
of course copyrighted to their
respective composers/companies, so
there will never be any banners or
stuff making us rich on this.
NEVER EVER, WE ARE SO CLEVER!

Q: "Are there any world records
involved in this project?

A: Hehe, well not officially recorded
by Guiness Records but I guess my
Commodore 64 suffered to most resets
in the entire history. Each machine
will during the entire recording
sequence be reset via the userport
about 95000 times..Guess that counts
for something :) And not to mention
the fact that both Commodore 64's will
have played about 1450 hours of music
during a 4 month period, and doing
nuttin else. I guess its also the
worlds longest project the Commodore
64 has ever been put through or even
suffered through :) It did run for
24/7 with only a 30 minute break
(power off) each 5th day. So did the 4
x PC's involved too..but we don't care
about those. They are only workhorses,
but the Commodore 64 is
preciousssssssss.