Let's talk about a 32-bit Amiga Paula
category: general [glöplog]
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and the EMU8000 used in AWE32/64 beats the shit out of classic GUS
That's true but you also should take into account that the GUS was released in 1992 and the AWE32 in 1994.
The step up from the standards back in 1992 (OPL synth & 8bit 22kHz PCM) was much bigger. At that time it exactly filled the existing gap when you came from the Amiga to the PC and where used to Paula sound.
In 1994/95 we already had Pentiums for software mixing and 16bit 44kHz Sound Blasters.
Not much reason to upgrade to an AWE except a better DAC and some reverb for MIDI game music.
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Gravis couldn't keep with proper Win9x drivers
There were open source drivers for the GUS PnP which worked really well for me until late WinXP days (basically until ISA busses were no longer available).
In Windows it didn't have much benefits over onboard audio, of course. But I could still dual-boot into DOS to watch old demos.
Maybe the following topic is of your interest...
Paula (Amiga) inspired audio driver [0.95 - envelopes]
My good friend and former member "Tranquilizer of Secretly!" bought a Prelude soundcard for his Amiga 1200/060 back then.
Compared to the PC market, where motherboards often had "cheap" onboard sound cards, the Amiga solution was just a bad joke. (pure hack, connected using the A1200 clock port)
Prelude 1200 soundcard
Paula (Amiga) inspired audio driver [0.95 - envelopes]
My good friend and former member "Tranquilizer of Secretly!" bought a Prelude soundcard for his Amiga 1200/060 back then.
Compared to the PC market, where motherboards often had "cheap" onboard sound cards, the Amiga solution was just a bad joke. (pure hack, connected using the A1200 clock port)
Prelude 1200 soundcard
MaxReplayTest.lha - Determine Paula's max. replay rate (Aminet)
[ Source: MaxReplayTest.readme ]
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In the good old OCS times Paula and Audio was quite simple as there were
only NTSC and PAL Amigas. On both systems the maximum replay rate for
audio was something around 28.6 kHz.(*) With the upcoming of ECS and AGA
the maximum replay rate also increased and Amiga magazines and other
sources talked about a doubled maximum rate when using the new screen
modes i.e. something around 57.2 kHz.
But what is the real maximum replay rate using a specific screen mode?
I could not figure it out for over 20 years! :-( But now, everything
is different! :-D
(*) there seems to be a second difference i.e. audio playback using the
audio.device vs. "direct DMA". As I only use the audio.device and do not
really understand the direct DMA playback, I am only talking about Paula
in combination with the audio.device.
[ Source: MaxReplayTest.readme ]
The AAA chipset, which was never released, would have offered a reworked sound core, although (as far as I understand correctly) it would have only featured 8 audio channels.
Information about this can be found in the linked PDF on the following pages:
An Overview of the Advanced Amiga Architecture and Other Future Directions
(1993 Developer’s Conference Release)
Information about this can be found in the linked PDF on the following pages:
- Site 8 - 2.3.8 Sound
- Site 16-17 - 3.4 The Mary Chip
An Overview of the Advanced Amiga Architecture and Other Future Directions
(1993 Developer’s Conference Release)
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In 1994/95 we already had Pentiums for software mixing and 16bit 44kHz Sound Blasters.
No we didn't. Assembly 95 compo machine:
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- i486DX2/66 with 4 MB of RAM
- MS-DOS 6.20
- VLB SVGA-board with TSENG ET4000/W32
- 1 MB Gravis UltraSound sound card or original Sound Blaster Pro 2.0
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No we didn't.
Gathering 95 compo machine:
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- Pentium 100 Mhz
- Stealth 64 bit graphics card
- Soundblaster PRO/16
- Gravis Ultrasound MAX 1 MB.
- Roland SCC-1 / MT-32
So probably somewhere in between...
Paula... yes, at the time of release it even make fairlight ( the synthesizer producer, not the Democrew ) shit in their pants.
8 Bit PMC , 4 chanels even as independent like nothing else. AM-FM Synthesis. ( listen to cracktros, some games like Fire n Ice or Civilization, this was also dope ) but then, as time went by, we reached 1987 as the A500 and A2000 were released.
Around 1988-1989, Commodore should have developed something, at least with 8 Chans an 16 bit quality... but they missed that, they released a weak sucessor of the OCS GFX Chip in 1990 and even in 1992, the Paula Chip was unaltered, it was at this time crap compared to that, what we called then a "Standard" No matter what they planed, no matter what might possibly was planed, Commodore missed to set new standards in 1990 and even the Amiga 1200 was only "ok" for 1992 and came simple 2 years to late.
8 Bit PMC , 4 chanels even as independent like nothing else. AM-FM Synthesis. ( listen to cracktros, some games like Fire n Ice or Civilization, this was also dope ) but then, as time went by, we reached 1987 as the A500 and A2000 were released.
Around 1988-1989, Commodore should have developed something, at least with 8 Chans an 16 bit quality... but they missed that, they released a weak sucessor of the OCS GFX Chip in 1990 and even in 1992, the Paula Chip was unaltered, it was at this time crap compared to that, what we called then a "Standard" No matter what they planed, no matter what might possibly was planed, Commodore missed to set new standards in 1990 and even the Amiga 1200 was only "ok" for 1992 and came simple 2 years to late.
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Commodore missed to set new standards in 1990 and even the Amiga 1200 was only "ok" for 1992 and came simple 2 years to late.
Aside from the engineering team and the UK division helmed by David Pleasance, mostly, I don't think that Commodore even cared about being a trendsetter anymore. I blame Mehdi Ali for his indifference to the Amiga brand, being in charge and all that.
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Paula... yes, at the time of release it even make fairlight ( the synthesizer producer, not the Democrew ) shit in their pants.
Fairlight had 16 channels of 16-bit audio in 1985, so their pants were just fine.
Yes, Paula was not the Fairlight CMI, it only used similar principles to it.
and tech-caps aside, what really made this Amiga Paula era special were the people who conjured memorable tunes out of (almost) thin air.
today we have seemingly endless possibilities and most people don't seem to really know what to do with them (or don't have / take the time for exploration).
p.s.: what I for one really wanted back then music-tech wise was a *proper* sampler. these things were prohibitively expensive (!)
today we have seemingly endless possibilities and most people don't seem to really know what to do with them (or don't have / take the time for exploration).
p.s.: what I for one really wanted back then music-tech wise was a *proper* sampler. these things were prohibitively expensive (!)
I think that's what everyone loves about Amiga music: it works on arbitrary sound samples based on real-life, so that once put together with the MOD formats and variations thereof, any style or genre of music is possible. Most of the time, a casual listener could almost not tell the difference and certainly wouldn't believe it came from a 1985 computer platform, such is the versatility and range of the audio!
For the best tunes, the samples were chosen very carefully.
There've been many discussions about the importance of tech in music production and in my opinion you should not get hung up on miniscule details and rather focus on what's really important (even the lowliest 21st century tools rule supreme over what was available in the 80ies and 90ies).
Remember that you are essentially are painting with frequencies / harmonics -- What works with sound A sounds "meh" with sound B.
That being said -- The real magic is in the composition / modulation / sequencing which makes those sounds comes alive.
There've been many discussions about the importance of tech in music production and in my opinion you should not get hung up on miniscule details and rather focus on what's really important (even the lowliest 21st century tools rule supreme over what was available in the 80ies and 90ies).
Remember that you are essentially are painting with frequencies / harmonics -- What works with sound A sounds "meh" with sound B.
That being said -- The real magic is in the composition / modulation / sequencing which makes those sounds comes alive.
On the original topic of a hypothetical AGA version of Paula: While one could imagine increased channel count and resolution, and even support for HD floppies at normal speed, how realistic is it in terms of DMA bandwidth? Is there anything available that isn't reserved for the already struggling graphics, or would AGA Paula be restricted to higher fetch modes for its existing DMA slots?
Paula had no sample interpolation, right?
Right, it's just nearest neighbour. Mixing is done at 3.5 MHz though, so unlike e.g. DOS trackers with interpolation disabled, there's not much aliasing.
Well, nearest neighbor with an analog lowpass filter (or two!) afterwards is the same as sample interpolation, both morally and mathematically. What kind of interpolation will depend on the filter.
exactly. here's an interesting paper on the topic: Paula_SystemTheoretic.pdf
Might sound like a sacrilege but i did have my A500 in september 1987 and had to leave c64 behind, but the music was thousand times better with c64, i didn't care for the fancy sampled sounds Amiga provided that were imho a novelty, but actual music, which doesn't matter of sounds or channels, was still better on c64 (and sometimes lived to be that way). With Soundtracker things changed, however, but for me it wasn't about the sounds but the easiness to create. IMHO a one channel wave can be good if it creates an atmosphere wanted. Even as solo music.
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Well, nearest neighbor with an analog lowpass filter (or two!) afterwards is the same as sample interpolation, both morally and mathematically. What kind of interpolation will depend on the filter.
Certainly, but in a way that's mincing words, because the cutoff frequencies of the interpolation filters used in PC trackers (linear, cubic, sinc, etc.) follow the note frequency per channel (before mixing), unlike the static filter(s) that process Paula's output (after mixing), and it sounds quite different.
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Might sound like a sacrilege but i did have my A500 in september 1987 and had to leave c64 behind, but the music was thousand times better with c64, i didn't care for the fancy sampled sounds Amiga provided that were imho a novelty, but actual music, which doesn't matter of sounds or channels, was still better on c64 (and sometimes lived to be that way). With Soundtracker things changed, however, but for me it wasn't about the sounds but the easiness to create. IMHO a one channel wave can be good if it creates an atmosphere wanted. Even as solo music.
I agree that some of the C64 music was truly phenomenal. Some popular bits were rip offs of "actual" music, though (Philip Glass and Tangerine Dream come to mind). But hey, imitation is the highest form of appreciation, right (love your SLL / Dexion remixes, btw).
It's an interesting phenomenom, though: Once we all started connecting (through BBS and later internet), things started to sound more "samey". Maybe an isolated cabin-in-the-woods scenario is not such a bad idea after all .)
p.s.: as for the 32-bit Paula: it's mere fiction so please excuse me from straying from the topic of this thread. 8 channels would surely have been a god sent.
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Might sound like a sacrilege
You're absolutely right, it IS a sacrilege! I want to hear a wide range of distinct sounds playing music, not just a few basic waveforms with fancy ADSR and filtering effects.
This is all so fucking stupid. Paula was great for it's time but ultimately a technological dead end. Because hardware sample sound channels post 1991 became an anachronism and DSP chips the future. Super Paula in 1995 would have impressed absolutely noone except the most delusional Amiga fanboys, you know, the retards who actually have a bouncing ball tattoo and pyjama :)
@havoc: Angry, much?
foebane: wearing your pyjama?