EightyOne and the AY

[Spirantho]

Hi everybody,

Maybe someone has some advice....

Following on from my "Hi!" post in which I asked if anyone knew of anything using the ZonX sound box, I thought I'd have a quick play...
However it seems like there's a few problems with the ZonX emulation - in as much as the course tuning register doesn't do the right thing!
Outputting R0,132 and R1, 1 should make a middle C - it doesn't, you get a high something-or-other. Try fine tuning it and you get steps of about half a semitone every two values. Out R0,110 should make a C#, it makes a note a few tones higher than the last. Try course tuning it and you'll get a small step in either direction, i.e. change R1 upwards in small increments and the note will change but not always in the same direction! Change the course tuning on a real ZonX and you get a low note for any values of R1 greater than 1, there's just a slight change to the all-pervasive high note on EightyOne.

Please take this as constructive criticism, it's a very good emulator - but please can we have working AY support otherwise anything I write no-one's going to be able to use except the three people in the world with a ZonX setup? If possible it'd be nice to have it without the sound breaking up all the time too.

Thanks!

[siggi]

.... except the three people in the world with a ZonX setup ...

I also have one, so we are 4

Siggi

[Spirantho]

I included you.

Edit: By the way, have you ever actually done anything with it or has it always just been a curious black box that wants to be used but never is?

[siggi]

I used it to play the music of the demo programs and the ZX-Team hymn(*)

It is here (last picture):

http://forum.tlienhard.com/phpBB3/viewt ... rver#p1487

Siggi

(*) All of them are stored on my ZX81 web-server: http://zx81-siggi.endoftheinternet.org/d:musik/zon-x81/

[kmurta]

Two games that make use of zonx81:

http://www.zx81.megahospedagem.com.br/f ... cosmic.zip
http://www.zx81.megahospedagem.com.br/f ... unar10.zip

enjoy

Kelly Murta

[zx81jens]

hi!

thats cool. i will throw my atari into trash

really great. i´ve tried this in basic some time ago - not fast enough.

muchas gracias
y salu2
jens

[BrunoFlorindo]

Wow, I read the other thread before finding this one. I didn't know you were already testing EightyOne.
As you said, it's a good emulator. Mike Wynne, the author, was still developing it and fixing bugs. Unfortunately due to family problems (a tragedy if memory serves correct) and maybe other things in real life the development of the emulator came to a halt. He used to post here and even helped me with my AY-related questions (see my post history), but no one has heard from him in a long time.

It's interesting that the AY has been around for such a long time but it never became popular among ZX81 users. That could still change. I have hope that I'll see the new ZX Spectrum AY interface (currently being sold my Rich Mellor, who hosts this forum) adapted for ZX81 use. If that happens I'm sure you will find it easy to use, especially if you already knew how to do it on a Spectrum.

[RWAP]

I daresay if there was sufficient interest and we knew how to make best use of an AY interface on the ZX81, the Spectrum AY interface could be adapted fairly easily to the ZX81 - what would need changing?

[Spirantho]

I would say very little would need changing. You might be able to stick a crystal on the board the so the timing would be the same between the '81 and the Speccy 128K. Everything else should just about work anyway - after all the ZonX works on Speccy and ZX81.

It's a shame Mike has stopped on EightyOne - I even mailed him but it bounced. Maybe I should take a look at the source but there's no project file there and it's a bit strange. We do need an emulator with working ZonX support, though! Otherwise nothing will ever use it!

[Moggy]

Hi all
I downloaded the two games mentioned above, and they played perfectly on my version of 81 version (1.0a) as did the hymm.p file mentioned earlier. Perhaps it depends on what version you are running? Also the spectrum/zx81 interface seems a good idea provided the software is not too primitive like the zonx, as a musician I would certainly buy it.