Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by _spduchamp 335 days ago
I want is someone to fab real 6581 SID chips so I can do stuff like this and have it sound as it should.

10 FORL=54272T054295:POKEL,0:NEXT

15 POKE54296,15:TI$="000000"

20 POKE54277,255:POKE54278,255

25 POKE54284,255:POKE54285,255

30 POKE54276,17:POKE54283,17

40 FORA=8TO1STEP-1:FORB=ATO1STEP-1

45 T=TI+2952/B

50 POKE54273,3: POKE54272,A

55 POKE54288,3:POKE54279,A+B

60 PRINTA,A+B

70 IFTI<TTHEN70

80 NEXT:NEXT

90 POKE54276,16:POKE54283,16

2 comments

Absolutely love the SID chip. The clever way of imitating chord-based triads by just rapid arpeggiating on a single channel was super cool to me as kid.
Arpeggio was everywhere, doable on pretty much any sound chip.

I think what sets SID apart are things like high/low pass filters, finely adjustable PWM width and maybe even finely tunable pitch.

The SID chip is an analog semi-modular synth with digital control. The arpeggios unfortunately seem to be so heavily leaned on that it pretty much defines the chiptune sound, and those arpeggios could be played on lots of other systems, but the SID, when you dig into the beat frequencies and filters is a rich sonic world like no other.

Here is that BASIC beat frequency drone (no filter stuff) https://youtu.be/k2YZkSq2gcY

Wasn't Rob Hubbard one of the guys behind that trick?
There's a syntax error in line 10 (t0 instead of to).

Also, what's the source for this program? I tried it on VICE and failed miserably. Maybe something (else) was copied wrong? Or is it supposed to fail on emulators?