Fritz: All Fritz/All Fritz.zip/All Fritz/FILES/MUSIUSIC/PLAYERS.LZH/SOUND.DOC

Text File | 1990-03-24 | 6KB | 105 lines

                              Documentation
                                   for
                          SOUND.EXE & SNDCVT.EXE
                                   by
                      Alex Takessian  CIS [75655,223]


   Now, you can enjoy those nifty AMIGA, MAC and ATARI sounds on your PC.
SOUND.EXE will directly play MAC and ATARI sounds, but AMIGA sounds must be
converted to the MAC/ATARI format with the included program, SNDCVT.EXE.
Both SOUND.EXE and SNDCVT.EXE will display some help if run them without
any command-line parameters.  One of my favorite uses of SOUND.EXE is in my
autoexec.bat.  I run SOUND.EXE from autoexec and play "Gooooooood Morning
Vietnam" upon boot-up.  You can make up a bunch of batch files to play
various sounds.  That way you don't have to bother with all the parameters
each time you want to playback a sound.

     These programs are freely distributable as long as you don't make ANY
cash profit from them (you can trade them.)  Do not send me any money
either, but I would appreciate hearing how SOUND.EXE performs on machines I
haven't tried it on yet.

                Send any constructive comments by EMAIL to:
                 Alex Takessian     Compuserve [75655,223]


     SOUND.EXE will play any file as sound, not just the digitized sounds
of the AMIGA, MAC, and ATARI.  This means you can create your own sound
files (like from BASICA or if you have a sound sampler, etc.) and play them
with SOUND.EXE on your PC.  SOUND.EXE ignores any header data in the sound
file and definitely will not produce the correct sound from a file that has
been delta or Fibonacci compressed.  Fortunately, most sound files I've
seen are not compressed.  Since the programs tell you the input format when
you run them, I won,t repeat it here.

     Since different PCs have various CPU rates, you will have to
experiment with the period parameter to get the sound to play at the right
rate.  I suggest that you start with a small period and work up until you
find the correct one.  Once you've got it then you can twiddle the filter
number.  The default filter number (7) is pretty good for most machines.
On slower machines a filter number of 6 may sound better and on faster
machines a filter number of 8 may sound better -- experiment.  When the
program is making sound it disables system interrupts because they
adversely affect the sound quality.  That means that you can't stop the
sound with a CTRL-C, BREAK, or ever CTRL-ALT-DEL.  So, if you enter a too
long period or too many repeats you will have to turn off the machine to
stop the sound -- or just wait till its over.

     The file format SOUND.EXE expects is just a sequential file of bytes.
Each byte represents the sound intensity from 0 to 255.  For instance, if
you wanted to make a sound file of just a sinewave you would make the
sinewave vary from 0 to 255 at a specific frequency.

     This program will play sounds through the internal PC speaker.  No,
the sound isn't as good as on those "artsy" machines, but its a whole lot
better than you are used to from your PC.  If you're like me, you've
probably tried some program on your PC that is supposed to generate speech
or some other sophisticated (read nifty) sound.  After hearing how horrible
it sounded you probably decided that making nifty sounds wasn't one of the
PC's abilities.  Well, that is partially true, but there are always ways of
pushing hardware to its limits and getting better performance out of it.

     Unlike many other PC sound making/playing programs, this one uses
variable-rate pulse-width modulation (VRPWM) to fool the PC's speaker into
generating better sounds.  Unfortunately, the PC's speaker is connected to
the output of a digital circuit which can only turn it on or off (obviously
designed by a thermostat company.)  This is great for making all those dull
mechanical beeps and buzzes we're so used to, but its terrible for making
normal sounds (like Robin Williams' famous "Goooooood Morning Vietnam!!!".)

     Fortunately, due to the nature of the VRPWM method used, the sound
quality is directly proportional to the PC's processor speed and somewhat
proportional to the speaker's electro-mechanical properties.  (Bear with me
on this.  I just hate it when people try to simplify technical stuff for
me.  Kinda implies I'm a moron or something.)  Anyway, the faster your
processor is, the better the sound quality (ie you get your money's worth.)
So, if you bought a super-duper 50MHz 386/387 machine for word-processing
(don't laugh -- this is a common industry practice. Seriously!) your
machine will sound great, but if you're still tied to a 4.77Mhz IBM (or
compatible) there is a slight chance that you may possibly be disappointed.

     Fear not though.  I have tried this out on lots of (well a few,
anyway) machines and haven't been disappointed with the sound quality.
That includes my NEC MultiSpeed portable (9.54 MHz, V30), an IBM AT (6 MHz,
80286), an IBM AT (8 MHz, 80286), a COMPAQ 386SX (16 MHz, 80386SX), and a
COMPAQ 386 DeskPro (16 MHz, 80386).  I haven't tried it on any 4.77 MHz,
8088 machines or XT-type machines.

    Yes, the 386 machines and most of the 286 machines at work are used
exclusively for word-processing.  The engineers are allowed to use the
older (6 MHz) computers for engineering purposes (when they are not being
used for word-processing.)  Consequently, I have to wait all day for a
fractal to be generated while the secretary's COMPAQ 386/20 wastes millions
of powerful CPU cycles waiting for each painfully slow keystroke of text.
This is an industry practice!  AARRGGHHH!!!!  Okay, enough bitching.


                            Hope ya enjoy it.
                Alex Takessian    Compuserve [75655,223]