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README
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1991-06-09
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Here is CASIO, a primitive program to download 16-bit voices from the
Casio FZ-1 synthesizer to the Amiga computer.
This program only has a limited audience, but for those who have an
FZ-1 and want the ultimate in sample quality on the Amiga, it will
be a godsend.
You'll need Bill Barton's MIDI library, version 2.0. It's around,
on Fred Fish disks, archive sites, etc. Contact me for it as a last
resort.
The program includes the binary, CASIO, and the source code, plus a
Makefile for Aztec C 5.0 or later.
To use CASIO, get your Casio FZ-1 MIDI'ed up bidirectionally to the Amiga
(out-to-in and in-to-out, the Amiga needs a bidirectional link so it can
ack or nack the packets as it receives them)
Verify the link with some other program that you know works.
Finally, use the Casio front panel to select an output device of
MIDI, run CASIO with an argument being the filename you want
written on the Amiga, as in "casio train_whistle", then select
"voice dump" on the Casio and hit "save".
The Casio firmware is sensitive to data errors at the wrong point in the
protocol, so if you get one, your Casio will hang and it will have
to be power-cycled. Thus it's probably a good idea to save a killer
voice to disk on the Casio before trying to download it to the Amiga,
just in case.
Remember that MIDI is pretty slow for samples, MIDI goes at 3000 bytes
per sample, but the transfer format only sends 4 bits per byte, plus
there are delays for acks, so for example a 100 Kbyte sample would
take at least a couple of minutes to transfer. You should see the
same indication on the Casio you see when it is saving to disk (a moving
blip), but it will move much, much slower when going to MIDI.
To convert the raw 16-bit data of the Casio FZ-1 over to the Amiga
IFF 8SVX sample format, use my FZIFF program, a companion release.
Note that the Amiga cannot play back a sample faster than around
25,000 samples per second. This pretty much dictates that you use
the 18K sample rate on the Casio when sampling for the Amiga.
My recently posted SMUS player is particularly useful with
these samples, because you can create multisampled instruments that
do not suffer from the one-sample-per-octave and each-sample-must-be-
of-exactly-the-same-length problems that the IFF 8SVX.
The program HILO, which is included, simply traverses a sample file
you've received from your FZ-1 and prints the highest and lowest
sample values found. The highest possible value is 32767 and the
lowest is -32768. If you run it and the values aren't in this
vicinity, you might want to resample at a higher volume. Of course
if they're exactly those values or really really close, the voulme
might be too high, resulting in distortion. If it's just close, you
usually won't notice -- let your ear be the judge. This distortion
usually shows up as a sort of crackling sound when played back, or when
played back on the Amiga.
Share and Enjoy,
Karl Lehenbauer
3918 Panorama
Missouri City, TX 77459
Internet/BITNET: karl@sugar.hackercorp.com
Usenet: uunet!sugar!karl