
PROGRAM PITSTOP
Your Sinclair, October 1988

[Another catalogue of cock-ups from McCandless. The instructions for Sound]
[FX Generator were incomplete and a line of code was missing from one of  ]
[the hex dumps; the Sound to Light instructions were wrong; and the Album ]
[listing was done on a printer which didn't print the PLAY token.     JimG]

Swallow your tutti-fruttis! Forget your be-bop-alulas! Throw away your
do-wah diddies! Why? Cuz Dave McCandless is here with a symphonic
SOUND AND MUSIC SPECIAL!

Music is the spice of life, they say (who ever they might be) so why
shouldn't music be the cinnamon of computers as well? Sound and music
certainly add a herb or two to the atmosphere and the general
satisfaction of the game - just muffle the speaker with an old sock
while playing to see what I mean. And now in the advent of the 128K
Speccy with its crinkly sound chip, the beepy trills of the original
Speccy have become almost redundant. I say "almost" because despite
the unwieldiness of the 48K speaker programmers have made it possible
to invoke white-noise, pseudo three channel music and even drum beats
in the aged instrument. But on the 128 making sounds is altogether
easier but still fraught with subtle difficulties. A complex range of
decisions is at your fingertips - you must decide which of thirty two
different white noise pitches is best, consider whether to use tone or
white-noise or both, think about the 2048 different tone pitches and
then choose one of the fifteen volumes to play it at ... Complicated.

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SOUND FX GENERATOR
by Simon Owen

So this is where Simon Owen (he of Sprite Designer fame) steps in.
With his FX Generator you can reduce the complexities and numbers
involved into more palatable and readable graphs and wave-forms. And
further more, you can use any sound you design in your own programs.

Method
The same old routine. Using the Hex Loader program, type in the first
program (the massive one) entitled "Effects" which is 2143 bytes long
and begins at 55000. Afterwards, quit the Hex Loader by pressing the
's' key, and then save the precious code with SAVE "Effects" CODE
55000, 2143. The second program, called "PLAY", is not essential but
should you wish to use it follow the same method as above and then
use: SAVE "PLAY" CODE 65000,222. Then when you feel a surge of
inspiration type RANDOMIZE USR 55000 to enter ...

The Generator
This is the main part of the program where your vociferations and
noisy desires can have free reign. The screen shot in this section
[Which was missing. JimG] will indicate to you the what-means-what and
the that-means-that. Use the following keys to create your cacophony:

Key	Effect
Q	Pitch value down [by 1]
A	Pitch value up   [by 1]
O	Down one note
P	Up one note
N	Volume down one
M	Volume up one
Space	Play all 256 notes
CapSh	Auto play ON
SymSh	Auto play OFF
T	Change to white noise
Y	Change to tone
8	Reset all values
V	Reset all volumes to 15
B	Set volume to 0
1	Exit to Basic
L	Load saved file
K	Save file: move cursor to end of effect then press 'K'
C	Repeat copy: move cursor to last note in unit then press 'C'
[These next four command keys were missed out. JimG]
W	Pitch value down [by 10]
S	Pitch value up   [by 10]
E	Pitch value down [by 100]
D	Pitch value up   [by 100]

Here are a few pointers from the programmer for you to note:
- Type in the program.
- Concentrate your design on patterns. If it looks smooth and streamlined
  then it'll probably sound that way.
- For a "rest" or pause use pitch 0 - it's too high to be heard.
  WARNING: take all dogs out of the room.
- Experiment with the "repeat copy" option for excellent effects.

And once you've designed your zappy noise, SAVE it, and then load in ...

The Play Program

[The first eight bytes of the hex dump were missing. As 65004-65007 are data]
[and the routine has two start points at 65000 and 65002 and there are two  ]
[routines in the remaining code which are not accessed from anywhere else, I]
[deduced that the first four bytes must be two JR instructions to jump to   ]
[these two routines. This seems to work OK.                             JimG]

Assuming that you've entered this program and have it on tape, then
load it with CLEAR 64999: LOAD "" CODE. Once you've done that, load in
your saved sound data with LOAD "" CODE a, where 'a' equals the
address you want the data at. Say, for arguments sake, you want the
data at 32768, you would type: LOAD "" CODE 32768 [Of course, without
a CLEAR 32767 first, the Spectrum might well crash after this,
depending on the location of RAMTOP. JimG] and then use:
POKE 65004, 32768-256*INT (32768/256)
POKE 65005, INT (32768/256)
RANDOMIZE USR 65000
If you want to play the effect note by note, do the above and then use:
POKE 65006,255
POKE 65007,0
RANDOMIZE USR 65002
Now every time you call the routine it will play the next note in the
sequence. This is especially useful when you want to do other things
like scan the keyboard or have a cup of tea while you're playing the sound.

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SOUND TO LIGHT
by Graham Mason

The theory of converting sound to light is a dubious one. Turning a
sensation caused in the ear by the vibration of the surrounding air
into a natural agent that stimulates the sense of sight, is certainly
a concept difficult to conceive. Well, it is for me anyway. But, there
again, "difficult" is only a word and the Speccy is a machine that
doesn't want to know its own limitations; and so, using Graham Mason's
program, the dubious can become certain and you can have sound to
light.

What the hell am I waffling about? Just type in this routine and
you'll see what I mean.

Method
Simply use the Hex Loader to type in the block of hex and then save it
with SAVE "s-to-l" CODE 64400,200 [Except that the code is 1016 bytes
long. JimG]. And remember, before you load it always use CLEAR 643999
[Sigh. JimG] first. RANDOMIZE USR 64400 will execute it.

BZZZZZZZZZTTTT!!
The best results come if you use a Speccy 128 (+2 or +3) when you can
hear the sound through the TV. Otherwise, if you use the 48K, then
disconnect the Mic plug and pull the Ear play out of the tape recorder
slightly so you can hear the music. Play the music tape and watch the
result.

WARNING! Do not attempt to use this program if you suffer from
epilepsy or any other related disease.

You can also change the effect the routine produces by POKEing random
numbers into FBA6 to FBAF [That's 64422 to 64431. JimG]. This affects
the way the screen reacts, the fade-out delay, symmetry and speed. Try
combinations like 1,2,1,254 and 3,2,3,254 for screen rotation and so
on. Experiment to find the effect you want.

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ALBUM
by Chris Joseph & Alan Starck

And now finally onto the music part of this special (you were
wondering when it would come in weren't you?). A couple of wacky lads
by the names of Chris Joseph and Alan Starck sent me the "totally
completely quite strange and not very normal" album of weiiirrrd songs
they have composed on the 128K. Their sense of humour is so strange
that they almost ... almost wrote to Duncan MacDonald (!!!!). Anyway
if you have a 128K machine then simply type in the programs [Restoring
the missing PLAY commands. JimG] and RUN them. Have fun!
