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FamiTracker
Playing around with the new WIP is lots of fun so far.
The two squarewaves are pretty similar to the 2a03 waves, except for their pulsewidths (<-> duty cycles?) are a lot more variable.
The sawtooth wave is pretty tricky though. It seems like if you activate the pulsewidth on it, you lose volume control. The volume control then becomes a sort of pulsewidth amplifier, with there being 3 levels of volume, depending on how far over or under 15 the vol+pulsewidth is. You get an obnoxiously loud saw if it's over 15, a really quiet one if the volume is a little under 15, and if you go too much under then you lose the sound completely.
Can someone explain how the saw works, and describe it's limitations. It seems a lot like the triangle in some ways...
I'm pretty sure the saw wave pulse width settings are buggy right now.
As for how it works, it should be something like the difference between the time it takes for the wave to go from the bottom to the top versus falling down to the bottom again, but here's what they look like... (numbers are duty cycle setting)
Nope, as far as the duty-cycles go, the sawtooth wave has acted like that since one of the 0.2.6 releases. The volume thing is new, though — use to, it didn't have volume control on ANY duty! XD
The pulse width value enabled for saw as an experiment, and this is done because the volume is possible to set a little louder than 15 (as is max for volume sequences). This is accomplished by combining volume as the low part and pulse width as the high part. But if it's set too loud then the channel's internal counter will overflow and distort the wave. The largest possible volume without distortion is 18, and that is done by using pulse width = 1 and volume = 2 (16 + 2). I guess there isn't much musical value in using the distorted wave so the volume could be limited to 18.
This is enabled just to give full control over the channels volume (actually the accumulator adder register), but could as well be disabled altogether if it's only confusing. (Of course it's meant to be documented in the final version.)
Documentation? Searching for one? Look here:
[url=http://nesdevwiki.org/index.php/VRC6_Audio]http://nesdevwiki.org/index.php/VRC6_Audio
Everything for the saw wave is here. NESDEV WIKI!!! :D
i don't think full control of any chip should be removed. sometimes, the horrible/undesirable sounds can be found desirable that said, i haven't heard the horribly distorted saw yet - i still don't understand this channel. i put 2 in the volume column and a V01 in the effect column, and it sounded okay/not too loud. i'm missing something here.
jsr, your nsf player exhibits this distortion behavior with the saw channel?
EDIT:
[quote=Dave]i don't think full control of any chip should be removed. sometimes, the horrible/undesirable sounds can be found desirable [/quote]
That's a very good point. You know the AY-3-8910? The "Sunsoft 5" sound chip derivate from that chip, and was found in only one famicom game : - gimmick! . A few knows that it has the ability to do noise and harware volume enveloppes... A wicked effet could be obtained by using a looped hardware volume and using low values in the hardware volume's period counter! too bad that a few nsf player emulate this... >.>
Ah! Yes, I had seen the "noise" channel mentioned on the NSFPlay site, but the NSFPlug player doesn't seem to mention it at all, and i haven't seen it mentioned anywhere else. I've never heard it used either. Do you have any recordings?
Hemmm.... I don't have any example of noise, but i can show you something special done in PPMCK, using those hardware volume enveloppe for Sunsoft 5B, which I used at a very fast rate for a neat effect that litteraly transform the square wave...
here's the nsf, the source and a (tiny) player that support the hardware enveloppe. (Note : NSFplay support these thing too, with a slightly different sound however.). If you find this awesome, then please say so!
You might want the Sunsoft 5B solo, too. Here it is.
Note on the TESTFME7.NSF :
squares and triangle = melody
noise and DPCM = drum
Sunsoft 5B channels = 2 regular square waves that play along with the "tricked" square wave that sounds too thin alone.
that said, i haven't heard the horribly distorted saw yet - i still don't understand this channel. i put 2 in the volume column and a V01 in the effect column, and it sounded okay/not too loud. i'm missing something here.