Lazerbeat
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Tokyo, Japan

This chip looks like an absolute beast.

From http://www.x68000.de/soundchips/scsp-ymf292/

Technical Specifications
Channels: 32
Channels 1-32: PCM / ADPCM Waveform playback with a sample rate of up to 44.1 kHz.
Channels 1-32: FM Synthesis, Channels can be hooked together to have more Operators. Inside Games, they usually used 4 Operators, which results in 8 Channels of FM Audio while a maximum of 32 Channels would be possible.
Stereo: Yes
Used to play FM, Sequenced and Streamed Audio
Runs at 22.6 MHz
512 KB Sample RAM
The FH-1 DSP provides 16 build-in effects: Reverb, Early Reflection, Delay, Pitch Shift, Chorus, Flanger, Symphonic, Surround, Voice Canceler, Auto Pan, Phaser, Distortion, Filter (HP, LP, BP), Dynamic Filter, Parametric EQ and Mixer.

According to wikipedia

The SCSP is MIDI compliant, and can be hooked up to external equipment (such as keyboards).

Anyone know of any sound tracks which really put the FM (8 channels of 4op FM??!!) aspect of the chip through its paces? Any interesting projects using it?

A little discussion on soundshock didn't go very far.

Theta_Frost
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Milwaukee, WI

That does look quite interesting!  Very handy having all those effects as well, all those filters on the FM part would be very good sounding.  The possibility of sound synthesis on the sample channels would be very awesome as well.  I'd love to hear of any projects with this!

ant1
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uhajdafdfdfa

I'm wondering why they put a "voice canceler" DSP in a games console! Hahah. From that description it looks very cool though.

Shiru
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Russia, Moscow

Probably because the consoles those days were used as CD players as well, just like PS3 used as Blu-Ray player today.

ovenrake
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lolusa

This has always been my favorite system, and playing it recently, I haven't really noticed a real synthesized sound too often. Most of it was soundtracks recorded form real instruments (from what I can tell). Though that many channels of FM synthesis could do some real wonders.

Emar
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☺☺☺
ovenrake wrote:

This has always been my favorite system, and playing it recently, I haven't really noticed a real synthesized sound too often.

idk ive been checking it out and some of the stuff does sound at least 50/50 PCM and FM, like this one;

pretty rad smile

...but compare that to the playstation version... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLsJYI_zr1w

Last edited by Emar (Aug 13, 2010 12:28 pm)

Jredd
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Actually, I happen to have a Sega Saturn with a cartridge for extra ram that also allows you to play Japanese games in my possession once again! I was going to make my own topic in here asking if it would be alright to post some of my old songs here that I made using Deazamon 2. It is a game that lets you edit/create your own shmup, The music program was kind of like Mario Paint on steroids. At the time I made those songs, my Saturn couldn't save so we recorded the songs to VCR tape tongue. They were later recorded onto our computer and made into mp3's. I  even brought a CD of them to my high school once a long time ago but some kid borrowed the CD and never returned it....bastard. Anyway, Here's an example of one. I don't think this game uses the chip to it's fullest by any means but it's still bad ass smile.

http://8bc.org/music/Jredd/A+New+Beginning/

I'll put some more in the music section here if you guys like Ha ha.

TmEE
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Estonia, Mahtra

Saturn has a very powerful sound setup...

You have 32 channels/operators. Each channel can either be an operator or a PCM channel. You can have as many FM channels as you wish, limited by your operators... you can have 31 one operator channels and 1 PCM channel or perhaps 1x 32 oprator FM channel. Each op/ch has self feedback, and you can tie the oprators in almost any algo you want. One operator can have 2x input operators, or 1 input operator + self feedback. You are NOT limited to certain waveforms (only with hardware vibrato, there you got sine, triangle, saw, noise, like OPM), you can use any kind of waveforms you want, even drum samples, lol.
Then there's the DSP. I have not figured out wether the DSP gets its default program from 68K/BIOS or its stored inside a ROM in the chip... you CAN load in your own DSP code though.
Then there's the lovely 68K in charge of all sound related tasks big_smile

You are meant to use its synthesis part for sounds rather than plain samples... you only have PCM sample support, no ADPCM (only if you do it in software on 68K) and raw PCM gets limiting with 512KB of sound RAM, but with FM you can do wonders with just one single 512byte sample !

Last edited by TmEE (Aug 19, 2010 7:51 pm)

cheapshot
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Tokyo, Japan

Interesting stuff. I have a Saturn sitting in my living room here and I never realized it had such a beast under it's grey plastic casing.

Esopus-dragon
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New York, New York

Dezaemon 2 is a shooter maker for Saturn and includes a music editor. ^^ I found interesting videos of homemade games made on Dezaemon 2 and the music is super. I want to get it. ^^;

Aly James
Offline
FRANCE
TmEE wrote:

Saturn has a very powerful sound setup...

You have 32 channels/operators. Each channel can either be an operator or a PCM channel. You can have as many FM channels as you wish, limited by your operators... you can have 31 one operator channels and 1 PCM channel or perhaps 1x 32 oprator FM channel. Each op/ch has self feedback, and you can tie the oprators in almost any algo you want. One operator can have 2x input operators, or 1 input operator + self feedback. You are NOT limited to certain waveforms (only with hardware vibrato, there you got sine, triangle, saw, noise, like OPM), you can use any kind of waveforms you want, even drum samples, lol.
Then there's the DSP. I have not figured out wether the DSP gets its default program from 68K/BIOS or its stored inside a ROM in the chip... you CAN load in your own DSP code though.
Then there's the lovely 68K in charge of all sound related tasks big_smile

You are meant to use its synthesis part for sounds rather than plain samples... you only have PCM sample support, no ADPCM (only if you do it in software on 68K) and raw PCM gets limiting with 512KB of sound RAM, but with FM you can do wonders with just one single 512byte sample !

I just read the manual...Indeed it is a beast, I might try to make vsti someday with that ^^

Noplanet
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USA

Virtua Fighter 2 is definitely FM synth tunes.

Warez Waldo
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Planet Zaxxon

Yo, saturn seems serious.

snesei
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Detroit, Michigan

I wish there was a Saturn tracker. Also I love the Megaman 8 OST so much

herr_prof
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Unsubscribe

Of course with specs like that you can always buy a motif es with the PLG-150DX card big_smile.

http://usa.yamaha.com/products/music-pr … motif_es6/
http://usa.yamaha.com/products/music-pr … plg150-dx/

marcb0t
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Noplanet wrote:

Virtua Fighter 2 is definitely FM synth tunes.

Not entirely. I hear a LOT of presampled sounds. Including wavy organs, orchestra hits, pan flute stuff, sampled distorted guitars, and so forth.

Now some of the basslines, guitars, and keys could possibly be produced by the FM portion. Ultimately, It is either entirely pre sampled sounds, or a mix of on-chip Saturn FM and samples. I don't know how easy or difficult that would be for the developers, though.