MOD player comparisons

[beni0005@student.tc.umn.edu (Brian C Bening-1)]

In article <C5394u.Ix8@news.iastate.edu> irsman@iastate.edu (Ian Schmidt) writes:
>In article <fmlinC5347p.A5@netcom.com> fmlin@netcom.com (Frank M. Lin) writes:
>
>>Ian, this is coming from you?  I can't believe it.  :)  I thought MZ
>>and ST are similar in quality, and shellplay closely.  But SP certainly
>>don't have the best sound, at least in the case of SpaceDebris.  NT was
>>the first to play MODs I think, but can't compare with new MOD players.
>
>On 2.8 Mhz systems its pretty even, but on a Zip shellplay leaps way out ahead.
>It seems conventional thinking on programming the Ensoniq still works best on
>normal GSes :)

I have found few (if any) MODs that SP plays differently while I'm running
my GS with the Zip off.  Although, I don't have a good ear for music; so
I'm probably missing something. :)

Frank, how does SP play SpaceDebris differently than ST or MZ??  It
certainly did not sound bad with SP when I tried it out. 


I've been experimenting with SP this morning to try to find out what you
guys  hearing...

While SP was playing SpaceDebris, I turned on and off my Zip (using the Zip
CDA) several times.  After I did that, instrument $12 on track 4 started
playing as noise, instead of the actual sample.  I then quit SP.  Afterwards,
ORCA ran _very_ slow.  There were large pauses in between everything it
did.  I didn't check, but I don't think SP left any interrupt routines
running which could have slowed the system down.

I've only been able to duplicate this twice and I don't know what the hell
is happenning.  I guess I'll have to mess around with it some more to find
out. 


I have also found that if I run ST after I have ran SP, ST will play songs
at half speed.  I _do_ know why this is happenning.  ST is not
intiallizing the Wavetable size register (DOC reg $DE) for the oscillator
ST uses as the tick timer.  For ST to work that reg has to be 0.  SP
leaves it set as 1.  I suppose I could have SP erase the DOC registers
when it exits;  but since it makes SPs sound quality seem better (by
screwing up ST), I just might leave it like it is... :)  


>>You got the MZ letters in the player screen from the Bulla1 disk huh?  :)

I noticed that too.. :)


--Brian