Sound features

[antime]

(The discussion was OT for the other thread, so I started a new one.)

Originally posted by AntiPasta@Mar 5, 2003 @ 04:06 PM

well I think they should at least give you the opportunity to play normal PCM sounds... it's a pain creating proper compressed PSX sound files... just as they could have implemented SOME compression in the SCSP (heck, even my 1990 8-bit Soundblaster can do ADPCM)

I believe there's some code mentioned in some document which would let the Saturn play compressed samples using the SCSP DSP for decompression. However, the otherwise beneficial upsampling feature of the SCSP would destroy the compressed data, so the decompression code would either have to change the pitch of the decompressed sample or only use this to play sound effects at a fixed pitch (or be tricky and decompress to a memory buffer and play from there).

The Saturn would greatly benefit from the ability to use compressed samples, as the sound slots and DSP parameter areas take up a fair chunk of sound RAM. The upsampling feature (all sound is internally converted to 44.1KHz, presumably so the slots and DSP can work sensibly) helps a bit, but you have to be careful so the process doesn't introduce unwanted artifacts.

 

[AntiPasta]

well, I figure one can use the 68k for all the decompression... it really puzzles me why Sega stuck all that power in weird places, but now it actually comes in handy

The PSX is far more straightforward in it's architecture, it actually has one programmable processor (the CPU itself) instead of 6 like the Saturn (SH2 + SH2 + SH1 + SCU + 68k + DSP)

Actually, I quite like that idea

 

[wonder_k]

humm... never heard that one succeded to manipulate the SH1's actions though...

 

[AntiPasta]

yeah but let's just say it's an ordinary CPU, that might run a computer on its own without being confined to just the CD system... heck this SH1 alone (provided it's hooked up to the appropriate hardware) could easily outdo the GBA

 

[antime]

Originally posted by AntiPasta@Mar 7, 2003 @ 11:07 PM

heck this SH1 alone (provided it's hooked up to the appropriate hardware) could easily outdo the GBA

Touch and go.. For most applications the ARM architecture is far more efficient, the conditional execution and free shifts can really help. The SH1 is clocked at 20MHz and the GBA's ARM7TDMI is clocked at 16.8MHz. For most computationally intensive tasks I'd expect the GBA to be slightly faster, but you'd have to run benchmarks to be able to say anything meaningful.

 

[AntiPasta]

16.8? Heck I heard it was 14... anyway, I'm not that much into ARM asm yet so it was more like a semi-educated guess... anyway I still think MIPS is best

 

[wonder_k]

maybe this is not the thread to post about this but isn't the ARM used in the GBA in some way related to those "StrongARM" computers built in the early '90s?

 

[antime]

You mean RISC OS computers? Yes, the ARM architecture made its debut in Acorn's Archimedes.

StrongARM is a processor architecture originally developed by the late DEC in the mid-90's, based on licensed ARM technology. At some point, Intel ended up with the architecture and are developing it further under the XScale brand.

 

[wonder_k]

Originally posted by antime@Mar 10, 2003 @ 04:45 PM

You mean RISC OS computers? Yes, the ARM architecture made its debut in Acorn's Archimedes.

StrongARM is a processor architecture originally developed by the late DEC in the mid-90's, based on licensed ARM technology. At some point, Intel ended up with the architecture and are developing it further under the XScale brand.

yeah, that's it! i remember those things booted thei os right from some sort of rom. ^.^