The Stereo Sid-Player Keyboard Version 7.0 ------------------------------------------ By Mark A. Dickenson (C) 1987 Mark A. Dickenson I would like to thank you at this time for downloading the Stereo Sid-Player Keyboard program. I have spent much time and effort in producing this program and there have been MANY people on Quantum Link that have helped in finding errors and making suggestions on how to make the program better. Without them this project may have been still-born. Special thanks goes to Jerry Roth (Dr J5) for all of his help in bug detection and enhancement, and to Nick Zelinsky (NickZ) for his idea for loading two music files and playing them at the same time for 6 voice stereo (I was racking my brain for a way out of making a 6 voice editor). I would like to let everyone know that this program will NOT work with most of the fast loaders on the market if you have the second SID chip installed and turned on (well it's a 50-50 chance it will work). What will happen is the music will just lock-up and stop playing at odd times. This is because cartridges like FAST LOAD from Epyx use BOTH $DE00 and $DF00 addresses. The program seems to work just fine if you tell it you do not have a second SID chip (Address = NONE). It would appear that both the SID chip and the Fast Load cartridge will reside together at the same memory locations BUT some values sent to the second SID chip trips latches in the Fast Load cartridges causing it to take control when it shouldn't. Most of the cartridge fast loaders seem to use this method. A fastloader for the Stereo Player has been uploaded to QLink and you should use it if you are going to play music with the second SID chip turned on. This program supports MONO and 3 STEREO playback modes, Word files as well as Picture files and Picture/Word file combinations. If you do not have the stereo modification you can STILL use this program for playing your SID's. It works the same way as SID-PIC, Kplay and a host of other players. The difference is in all of the extra FEATURES in the program. One new feature is the addition of PIC (picture) files. I found that I got tired of looking at the same old picture when a song was playing so I have added an extra feature to PIC's. If you press the 'SPACEBAR', while a picture is being displayed and the music is playing, the picture will disappear and the keyboard will comeback with the flashing keys and playing Orchestra. If you press the 'SPACEBAR' again the picture will comeback. All of this happens WITHOUT interrupting the music! If you want to see something strange press and HOLD the 'SPACEBAR' and the computer will cycle back and forth between the picture and keyboard at a high rate of speed, STILL WITHOUT interrupting the music! This same feature works with the combined use of PIC and WDS files. If you are playing music that has a picture and words, you will be able to look at the picture while the words display at the bottom of the screen. Also if you press the 'SPACEBAR' and go to the keyboard screen you DO NOT lose the words. If you go back to the picture the words are still there and in SYNC! You can even hold down the 'SPACEBAR' and watch the screen flip back and forth and NOT lose track of the words. (FEATURES - FEATURES - FEATURES) I have fixed a bug in the Credits that can sometimes cause garbage to scroll across the screen. I have also fixed the bug in the display of word files. Before, if the song ran out of words and the MUS file requested more it would lock up and scroll garbage on the screen. Not anymore, it just scrolls blank lines as it is supposed too. The file size limits are - 112 Blocks for Music or Music and Words 68 Blocks for Music or Music and words, if a Picture is used The different playback modes are as follows: MONO - This will playback all MUS songs in MONO (even if you have the second sid chip installed it will still just play in MONO) If you DO NOT have the second SID chip installed, then you should leave the ADDRESS command set to 'NONE' and the MODE command set to 'MONO'. This is what the player normally powers up to when it is first started unless there is a Stereo Configuration file on the disk. STEREO - This is a 3 track (track stands for howmany audio tracks you have for playback not howmany voices you have in the computer) stereo mode where you have indicated how you want the music playback in STEREO. This allows you to take ANY music file created by the Sid-Editor and make it playback in STEREO. EXTENDED STEREO - This mode will allow you to take a 3 track music composition and control the STEREO effects from WITHIN the music file by the use of the FLAG command. 6 VOICE STEREO - This will allow you to load in two 3 track music compositions and play them back at the same time. One 3 track on the left channel and the other 3 track on the right channel. The Left channel must have a .MUS designation and the Right channel must have an .STR designation. It is very simple to create 6 voice compositions. All you have to do is use your current editor to make a left channel and a right channel music file. Then rename the right channel file to .STR (Example: MUSIC.MUS and MUSICR.MUS, MUSIC is the left channel and MUSICR is the right channel. Rename MUSICR.MUS to MUSIC.STR. You now have a 6 voice composition.). If you wish to test your music without having to rename the music, then download PREVIEW 6.0A. This program will allow you to play ANY two music files at the same time regardless of their names. Here is an example of the files you would find on disk for a 6 Voice composition with word files. The name of the music file is MY MUSIC. MY MUSIC.MUS - This is just like any other music file on disk. MY MUSIC.STR - The right channel. The player looks for this file when it loads in the every .MUS file. If it is found then it will playback as a 6 Voice music composition. If the Address is set to NONE then the program will NOT look for the .STR file. MY MUSIC.WDS - This is the accompanying word file for the 6 voice file. This could also have been a picture file (MY MUSIC.PIC). Stereo Sid-Player Keyboard Commands ----------------------------------- 'F1' or 'P' - When one of these two keys is pressed the currently highlighted song (in white) will be loaded and played. 'F2' - If the F2 key is pressed (shifted f1) all of the selected songs (the ones that were highlighted in reverse text when the RETURN key was pressed) will be played. 'F3' - This will play every song on the disk. 'F4' - Pressing the F4 key will toggle between auto repeat and single play. When the auto repeat is selected then the playback modes (f1, f2, f3, f7 and r) will repeat all of their selected songs continuously. 'F5' - This will scan the disk that is currently in the disk drive for Sid-Player music files. 'F6' - This will clear all of the songs that were selected for the F2 function. 'F7' - This will play every song on the disk starting at the current highlighted song (in white). 'F8' - Quit Sid-Player - not much else to say here (you WILL be given the chance to back out). 'RETURN' - Select/Deselect song for use by the F2 playback function. 'HOME' - Pressing this key will bring you to the top of the current directory list 'SHIFT HOME (CLR)' - This will move you to the bottom of the current directory list. This is very useful if you have a large number of songs on the disk and the one you need to play is towards the end 'CURSOR DOWN' - This will move the directory list forward one song 'CURSOR UP' - This will move the directory list backward one song '+' - This key will move the directory list forward five (5) songs at a time '-' - This key will move the directory list backward five (5) songs at a time '1' to '9' - This will allow you to select how many times a song will play before continuing on to the next song. The number of times a song will repeat is indicated in the box to the left of the highlighted song (in white). 'M' - When the 'M' key is pressed it will make every song on the disk playback in stereo (even if they have been marked mono only). Here is how each song will be played back if the stereo override has been enabled. 1 - If the song has been stamped (more on this later) and the stereo options are set at, all voices mono and the number of notes per side at one, then the stamp will be loaded into that files option designator and played in that manner. After the song has played you can check the stereo options by pressing the SPACEBAR to see how it was setup. 2 - If the song has been stamped but the above conditions haven't been met (all mono, # notes 1) then the playback will use what is currently in that stereo option file. 3 - If the song isn't stamped then the playback will use whatever options have been set for the file. 'R' - This will repeat the last song played without reloading the song from disk. 'SPACEBAR' - This will allow you to change how a song will be played (stereo or mono). There is a window to the right of the highlighted name. This starts out with an 'M' in the window. This means the song will be played back MONO. If it is an 'S' then the song will playback in STEREO using the options that have been set for it. Lastly, if there is a '6', then the file is a 'NON-STAMPED' 6-Voice Stereo file. This will be explained in more detail near the end of the document under the title 'Stereo Options Menu'. 'C' - This will allow you to execute any of the Disk Drives DOS commands as in S0:PROGRAM - to scratch a program and ect. 'D' - This will display a complete disk directory to the screen. If you wish to pause the list press the 'SPACEBAR' to resume the listing press 'RETURN'. 'K' - There are now two different keyboard routines. The 'OLD' routine was in version 3.0 and would keep a key lit until a REST was encountered. This helped in following the keys as the music played. The 'NEW' routine is more like a person playing the piano. If a key is to be on for the length of a quarter note then it will be lit for that time and then turned OFF (unlike the OLD routine). This gives a more true to life playback. 'A' - This allows a person to tell player to look for the second SID chip at address $DE00 or $DF00. If you do not have the second chip installed then you can select NONE. (default on start-up is NONE). 'Back Arrow' (located upper-left by the number 1 key) - This will put or save a CONFIGURATION file on the disk. When the program starts, it will check for this file. If it is present, it will be loaded and parameters set. The following information is in the file: REPEAT ON or OFF, KEYBOARD OLD or NEW, ADDRESS NONE, $DE00 or $DF00, STEREO or MONO. Stereo Option Menu ------------------ Now we are down to the hard one for me to explain. This will allow you to tailor a particular song for playback in stereo. You have individual control of each voice. You control the stereo/mono status of each voice. You also control howmany notes will be played by a particular voice before changing from the left channel to the right and right to left. For an example, let's use a song called music.mus. We can make voice 1 stereo and play 5 notes per channel, voice 2 stereo and 1 note per channel and voice 3 mono (note per channel is ignored on mono selections), track one will start on the left side, track two will start on the right side and left or right side is ignored on track three since it is mono. Once you have tailored the song the way you like, you can stamp the file. This will add to the end of the music file, information that can be used by this program for later playback. It will in no way affect any of the Sid-Editors or Players on the market. If you stamp the file then later edit it, your stamp will be lost. 'F1' - Toggle SONG playback from to STEREO to MONO and MONO to STEREO. This will change the letter in the window to the right of the highlighted song (in white) from M to S and S to M. 'F3' - Change voice working on from 1 to 2, 2 to 3 and 3 to 1. 'F5' - Toggle the current voice selected from MONO to STEREO or STEREO to MONO. 'F7' - Exit the Stereo Modifier Screen 'F8' - Stamp the file with the current stereo parameters. 'L' - When pressed current voice selected will be designated to start on the left channel (this is the default) 'R' - When pressed the current voice selected will be designated to start on the right channel. 'CURSOR KEYS' - Will move the number of notes on the current selected voice up and down. The maximum number is 98 and minimum is 0. If ZERO is selected then the voice will play on whatever side it is told to exclusivly. Extended Stereo Format Usage ---------------------------- The Extended Stereo Format will allow you to have more control over your stereo music from WITHIN the music file itself by the use of the FLAG command in the Sid-Editor program. This is the same command used by the word files. What I don't understand is this, the FLAG command was set back for future expansion of the player or for controlling programs from within your music file. Why did the person that created word files NOT place a limit on what could be used for scrolling word files! All that was needed is to check for a 1 value. That would leave FREE the 254 values to be used by other features that people may want to impliment. Ah, well, what's done is done. If you have selected Extended Stereo on the Stereo Options window, then you can now control the entire 3 track stereo process from within your MUSIC FILE! The following is a list of the FLAG commands that are used and what function they will perform during the execution of the music file. FLAG Value Description ---------- ----------------------------------------------------- 255 Set Track 1 to Mono Playback (play on Left & Right Channel) 254 Set Track 2 to Mono Playback 253 Set Track 3 to Mono Playback 252 Set Track 1 to playback on Left channel only (Zero notes) 251 Set Track 2 to playback on Left channel only 250 Set Track 3 to playback on Left channel only 249 Set Track 1 to playback on Right channel only (Zero Notes) 248 Set Track 2 to playback on Right channel only 247 Set Track 3 to playback on Right channel only 246 Change Track 1 channel for playback (If Right channel change to Left, if Left change to Right (Flip/Flop)) 245 Change Track 2 channel for playback 244 Change Track 3 channel for playback 243 Increment Track 1 Note counter by One (increments the Note Per Side counter for howmany notes to play before changing channels (sides)) 242 Increment Track 2 Note counter by One 241 Increment Track 3 Note counter by One 240 Decrement Track 1 Note counter by One 239 Decrement Track 2 Note counter by One 238 Decrement Track 3 Note counter by One These new commands will give you a whole new range of control over your 3 track Stereo music. You can still have Word files with Extended Stereo, but you will have to use values less than 238. I would recommend using JUST the value of ONE (1), since I do plan on coming out with further enhancements to Sid-Players in general. The FLAG command was ment to control other functions from within your music file. So let's do it! Just having it control WORD files is just too limiting. I hope everyone enjoys the new and added features of the player and I am ALWAYS open to comments and criticism. If you find a bug or qwirk in the program be sure to let me know here on Quantum Link, my ID is Mark A D. This program will work quite well with or WITHOUT the stereo pack installed on a commodore 64/128. If you select stereo without the stereo pack, the music will just sound very odd. If you have any questions or comments about the program just leave Email on Q-Link to Mark A D. It is very interesting to note that there are a large number of sid songs that sound very good in stereo. Now you are probably wondering how can I play this music back in stereo? Well there are many ways to do this. I will give you two of them. 1. I am offering a schematic of how to install the necessary components. It will cost $15-$20 for you to make it. The most expensive part is the extra SID chip. The schematic is in another file and it is free. I wish you much luck in constructing this project. If you don't feel upto the construction you may choose one of the following two alternatives. 2. *** Not available until FALL of 1987 *** This is the last and most expensive one. This is a cartridge to plug in the cartridge slot on the 64 or 128. This way you can take it to a friends house and show it off without having to take the whole computer. The price for this is (gads) $49.95 + $3.00 shipping. Send to: Mark A. Dickenson 600 South West Street Nevada, Missouri 64772 I hope this catches on because I like the SID music and would like to see more of it. Especially in stereo!!!! For all of you tech buffs the chip resides in memory at $DF00/57088 or address $DE00/56832. This will give you 6 voice stereo sound 3 per channel on the Commodore 64 or Commodore 128. The chip number is 6581. Also, I would suggest that everyone change the chip address from $DF00 to $DE00. It has less conflict with items like the RAM Expansion Unit. So from now on in all Stereo Schematic documentaion I will ONLY tell how to install it at address $DE00 and the upcoming cartridge will be at $DE00. Thank you, Mark A. Dickenson (Mark A D)