Did the Vectrex have superior a sound chip for its time?

[Dripfree]

So I always marvel at the sound quality of the Vectrex, minus the buzz of course. But it seems to just have a certain intangible difference that I cant put my finger on. Perhaps its just the flow of the music it just seems less bleepy bloopy. Lately I have been playing vectrexagon and the music if fantastic. I realize this is not the best example seeing as the game is very new, but it is still the vectrex producing that audio. The sound seems much better than anything of the time, and I think it's surprising just how long it took other consoles to catch up. I figure there must be some technical reason for this and I'm curious as to what it may be.

[Keatah]

Loved the tone and timbre!

[Mayhem]

Better than most, but not as good as the SID.

[roland p]

I liked the music in this demo, it sounds very analog.

 

[Dripfree]

I liked the music in this demo, it sounds very analog.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=De80w-ZuQYw

Yes that is a great example. The Vectrex seems to somehow soften every thing down. Like I said I can't quite put my finger on it. Perhaps some type of volume control. The volume seems to swell and fade on each note creating a rounder less harsh tone. At least I think that may be it... Anyway I think it wasn't till the 16 bit generation when most other companies matched that quality.

[SiLic0ne t0aD]

Those AY-3-8910 chips and its variants are my favorite.. so many different sounds, the Veccy really does it best. The Inty sounds good but not as good as a Vectrex for whatever reason.

[Keatah]

There's some interplay between the cabinet and speaker cone - that helps richen up the timbre.

[BinaryStar]

Yeah, the built in speaker makes it sound great imo. Its a pretty average sound chip. Nowhere as good as the likes of the c64s SID or even the NES or Gameboy sound chips. The Vectrex sound chip only produces square waves, you cannot alter PWM. However, you can generate some very cool sounding tones and effects by using the amplitude modulation feature of the chip.

Edited July 14, 2016 by KidQuaalude

[jdollatari]

great discussion sadly i have nothing to add but appreciate this as a former and hopefully future owner once again. that audio clip was great thanks for posting!

[Keatah]

Vectrex has 2 sound chips.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Instrument_AY-3-8910

AND

Direct modulation of the speaker via the 6809 itself.

 

All blended together through a simple resistor network before it goes to the audio amplifier.

 

[BinaryStar]

Can you explain the "Direct modulation of the speaker via the 6809 itself" part?

[ZylonBane]

The Vectrex doesn't have two sound chips. What he's alluding to is that the AY sound chip can be put into a mode where the CPU can directly control the volume level-- that is, play digital audio. Most 8-bit era sound chips were capable of this trick, even if they weren't explicitly designed for it.

[Keatah]

Incorrect. There's 2 distinct pathways. Please review the schematic and programming notes.

 

You may either use the GI AY-3-8910 synthesizer chip.

..and/or..

Build the waveform entirely with the CPU and output through the MC1408/MUX/DAC.

 

Two entirely separate sources can be used to generate sound. In fact, direct modulation of the speaker by way of the CPU is where the voice of "Spike" comes from.

[BinaryStar]

Interesting. I've used sampled audio on Vectrex before but I used the method of modulating the volume. I thought that was what Spike did too? Does anyone have any code examples of doing this and bypassing the sound chip?

 

Playing back/remixing a drumloop on Vectrex :

Edited July 17, 2016 by KidQuaalude

[GroovyBee]

I don't know anything about the Vectrex hardware, but looking at the schematic its roughly:

Write S/H low (6522 port bit B0), and drive SEL0 and SEL1 both high (6522 port bits B1 and PB2 respectively) to route the DAC output to the audio mixer (a simple resistor network).

Write the DAC data to 6522's port A data register (bit 7 is inverted before being presented to the DAC).

Update the DAC data on a timer (if available) or a timed software loop at the playback rate you want.

 

You'll probably need to "OR in" the shadow copy of what the OS thinks is on the 6522's port B because its other port bits control additional hardware.

[mikiex]

http://vectrexmuseum.com/share/coder/DIS/CLAY/ORIGINAL/SOUND1.AS9

Is an example of using the 6522 only correct? I am pretty sure I used this in some experiments a while ago.

 

It would be interesting to know which method gives the best results / pros and cons because I didn't try the AY method yet.

Both use the 6522 because because the AY is connected to that as well.

 

For Dripfrees original post, was it superior? Well it was the same as other AY based machines. These days with a lot of that is hindsight and progression of the art of chip music. No decent AY music existed back then even if the chip was capable.

[CatPix]

Incorrect. There's 2 distinct pathways. Please review the schematic and programming notes.

 

You may either use the GI AY-3-8910 synthesizer chip.

..and/or..

Build the waveform entirely with the CPU and output through the MC1408/MUX/DAC.

 

Two entirely separate sources can be used to generate sound. In fact, direct modulation of the speaker by way of the CPU is where the voice of "Spike" comes from.

Interesting.

I knew the Vectrex used the AY chip, but I always figured that the tone and some sounds effect were different from what you'll hear from the Amstrad CPC, even from CPC or ZX Spectrum demos demos that used the AY at full capacity.

This added feature is probably what make the difference. Interesting detail

 

One AY demo to compare :

 

So it's not superior, but there was added flexibility. And that's just my personnal opinion but the AY never received as much attention BITD than SID and POKEY, despite receiving some great tunes of it's own on the CPC (and probably some late Spectrum games).

 

 

[adamchevy]

Of course the Vectrex is superior! We need a ghouls and ghosts port on the Vectrex.