Review of IIgs' Imported MOD Players; ShellPlay, SoniqTracker and MODZap by Charles T. Turley (Edited and revised - 5/99) About ShellPlay STATUS: (Freeware) ShellPlay v0.71 is Copyright (c) 1993 by Brian C Bening Released - (19:45 23 Jun 93) All rights reserved. (ShellPlay v.0.71 - Merlin 16 complete source codes are available by email request from: cturley@grin.net I give ShellPlay the top over-all rating of: 10 ShellPlay is an (EXE.) GS/OS shell program, which can be executed via any shell command program, such as Command COM, etc. It can be activated via Merlin 16+, by placing it in the Shell applications folder, with Merlin. ShellPlay can also be activated and used directly, to play Imported Modules from Instant Access v3.0, (IA3.0) provided it is resident in the directory or folder with Instant Access) by double clicking on the MOD.xxx file. ORCA, GNO, and ECP-16, also support ShellPlay (SP). When launched, SP will install itself in the background and return control to the shell; thereafter, any program that does not use the Ensoniq DOC or the Sound Toolset can be used in the foreground. ShellPlay is by far, the best 'Imported Music Module Player' currently available for the IIgs. It has superior effects support and wide range MODfile format support. I've never encountered any type MODfile format, that it couldn't load and play properly. It's the only Imported Music Module Player, seriously devoted to presenting the music at its best and nothing else. That is to say, it isn't cluttered with needless; comments, credits, internal extensions, whistles, bells, multiple player types, dazzle animation, ( FXLasersª ?) and the like, found in the other IIgs MOD players. It's small, very well coded, efficient and serves its intended purpose with flawless audio precision and MODfile special effects. ShellPlay has never crashed on me and its ease of use from Instant Access, makes it the most user friendly, proficient and memory economical of all IIgs MOD Players. It's timing, sync. and special effects audio rendering for playing any MODfile, from within Instant Access, is flawless. ShellPlay does not cache any of the sample/sound/instruments in the Ensoniq DOC's RAM. This allows larger swapping buffers and cleaner sounding RAM instruments, which give it the ultimate in premium sound play functions. Eliminating caching to the Ensoniq RAM, found in the other MOD Players, gives it the ultimate in sound quality. SP gives a very accurate rendering of over-all play, audio special effects and a wide range of (easy-to-use) commands/options, with; full stereo precent options, full tempo support, full volume percent support, PAL 50Hz or NTSC 60Hz tempo set, follow position jumps, modem/hardware support, full support options for MOD song play; random, goto and change. ShellPlay also has the options for; kill and remove ShellPlay and print playlist/print current MODfile. All commands/options are active and available via keyboard input, at any point during the program or play functions. The documentation for ShellPlay is very professional, through, concise and easy to understand. - See below: ShellPlay Command/options and Examples, excerpted from the ShellPlay documentation and edited by me, are included below for your review. COMMANDS LISTING: usage: sp [option(s)] [MODfile(s)] [ [option(s)] [MODfile(s)] [...] ] options: -ts smart PT/constant tempo + -s change current song -tp force protracker tempo -r don't use random play -tc force constant tempo +r random play / re-randomize -t5 constant tempo is PAL 50Hz -C clear playlist -t6 constant tempo is NTSC 60Hz -K kill and remove shellplay -VX set volume percent (0..100) -gX goto song X -SX set percent stereo (-200..200) -l print playlist +|-b follow position jumps -c print current MODfile +|-H modem port hardware handshaking default options: sp -H -r -b -ts -t5 -S70 -V60 Usage Examples: o multple MODfiles can be specified on the commandline. ex: sp after.the.rain bass.o.drums mod.hiv o ORCA wildcards can be used if shellplay was launched from ORCA. ex: sp mod.= o Filenames containing spaces must be enclosed in quotes. ex: sp "mod.Bass O Matic" o Single quotes will force SP not to use ORCA wildcard parsing. This will load one MOD: sp 'mod.===Blue===' o If only one song is loaded, it will continuously repeat. o The options passed to Shellplay are case sensitive. This will clear the playlist: sp -C This will print the current song: sp -c o Options can be separated or grouped together. These are equivalent: sp -C -S100 -V50 sp -CS100V50 Option List Examples: -?: print a brief option summary. -K: stop shellplay and remove it from memory. -ts: guess the tempo method (Protracker or constant) to use by examining each song before playing it. -tp: force SP to use Protracker tempo. -tc: force SP to use constant speed tempo (otherwise known as VBL timing). -t5: use 50hz timing for constant speed tempo -t6: use 60hz timing for constant speed tempo -b: don't follow position jumps. Position jumps are commands used within MODs to create infinite loops or to hide songs. +b: follow position jumps. -VX: set the volume to X% of the maximum. Where X is between 0 and 100. -SX: use X% stereo. X can be any value between -200 and 200. -S100 uses no channel mixing. This is how MODs are played on the Amiga. -S0 is Monophonic. -S200 uses channel doubling. Sounds similar to -S100; but, it has slightly better quality. +s: skip to the next song. -s: skip to the previous song. -gX: goto to song number X. +r: play MODs in random order. The playlist will be randomized each time +r is encountered and when songs are added to the playlist. -r: play MODS in the order they were added to the playlist. -C: clear all songs from the playlist. -l: print out the playlist. -c: print the name of the MOD currently being played. +H: use hardware handshaking on the modem port. This will confuse your terminal program unless it is set to 8N1. Also, your terminal program will not be able to control hardware handshaking while this option is enabled. -H: do not use hardware handshaking on the modem port. Bugs: o Random crashes... Blah. Article author notes: (I HAVE FOUND NO INSTANCE WHERE RANDOM CRASHES OCCURED. IN FACT, I'VE NEVER HAD THE PROGRAM CRASH ON ME, WITH ANY MODFILES). o While SP is running, Apple DMA SCSI cards may choke when transfering data from disk. This can be worked around by turning off DMA on your SCSI card. o When running on extremely fast accelerator cards, the sound may be grainy. Other stuff that may appear in the future: o a desktop version of Shellplay, for those people that do not have or want shells. o the Xplayer (tm) toolset, featuring all of the great features of Shellplay. o Xplayer. A sixteen channel MOD editor (and player). I've been advised that ShellPlay future upgrades have been abondoned by the programs author. It's rumored to have been placed in Public Domain. I've been furnished with the SRC. CODES and if I find the programs rumored status as public domain to be correct, I plan to coordinate and promote its expedient update as FREEWARE or SHAREWARE, to a GS/OS desktop application program; player/editor or NDA, etc. ShellPlay authors Internet E-MAIL address is: vacc0001@student.tc.umn.edu Author notes: Attempts to contact - (Does not respond to E-MAIL). About soniqTracker STATUS: (Freeware) soniqTracker v0.63 Written by Tim Meekins Released at: AppleExpo West - 4/93 (last known update) Copyright (c) 1992,1993 by Tim Meekins - All Rights Reserved. I give soniqTracker an over-all rating of: 8 SonicTracker is a GS/OS application program, with a very user friendly and tasteful, artistically designed program structure. The documentation furnished with the program is through, very professional in content and easy to understand. SoniqTracker, is the second best GS/OS desktop application MOD Player for the IIgs and the best, with respect to GS/OS applications. It's professionally constructed, using both ORCA-M and ORCA-C. According to Tim, when finished, soniqTracker will be a complete music and instrument editing system using custom music formats. The music editor is currently under construction (according to the author) and is not included with this version. This version of soniqTracker will import Amiga-style mod songs into soniqTracker's internal format. Also included is a jukebox player, an alarm clock and a screen saver. According to the programs author, future versions will include a music and instrument editor and the ability to import numerous other music formats. The soniqTracker sequencing engine may also become available for use in other programs. Editors note: (In my last conversation with Tim, in mid-December '93, he informed me that he was working on an update and hoped to have it ready for release soon. I'm rather puzzled on the future status of updates for sonicTracker. I hope he dosn't abandon update efforts and I'll be looking forward to a new updates and release soon.) A splash screen with the soniqTracker logo appears, after it starts. Press any key or click the mouse button to continue. If you have a weak audio card or a SonicBlaster that can't handle the Ensoniq 5503 being pushed to its limits, then lower the volume setting in the Preferences menu. SoniqTracker supports all know IIgs stereo cards. None of them need any ajustment settings, with the exception of the SonicBlaster card. There's a potentiometer on the SonicBlaster. When turned to a low setting, it will remove distortion. For the ultimate in stereo output, get the SoundMeister card, which can certainly handle the Ensoniq 5503 being pushed to its limits. SoniqTracker will definitely support this hardware. Tim Meekins, related in his documentation for soniqTracker: " Very rarely, soniqTracker will come across a mod file it can't load and it may get confused. In fact, if you do encounter such a file, please let me know! Songs that are not music modules are also hard to recognize, since the basic NoiseTracker-style module contains no special identification bytes in the file. soniqTracker will do bounds checking and will abort if the file does not appear to be a music module. If you get error $BADD when loading a mod, it isn't mod of the types supported by soniqTracker, or, it isn't even a mod. " For your review, the soniqTracker commands follow: When a song is being played, the following key commands are available: option, escape, q stop the song and quit the player 1-4 toggle tracks 1 through 4 on or off space pause the song, press any key to resume, but it will be intrepreted. So, pressing q will stop. I recommend pressing return <,> decrease or increase the volume s tab through each of the stereo modes (see preferences section) h toggle between 50Hz and 60Hz n skip to next song (see Jukebox Player below) (CAP LOCK/SHIFT: or any option/command will work in upper or lower case) With some of the music, a grain/static audio effect might be observed. In general, soniqTracker gives an excellent rendering of; stereo, sound-scape, audio spacial dimensionality special effects and clearity. It supports all of the special play effects with near perfection. I have encountered a few rare Modfiles that sonicTracker detected with unsupported or unknown effects, which I've reported to Tim. The animation and graphic screen during play is very etherial, graphically pleasing and of a professional, entertaining and friendly nature, as are the graphic content of the credit screen and the screen saver. The program is very user friendly and easy for even a first-time IIgs computer user to deal with. Special Notes, Tips and Tricks, concerning the use of soniqTracker follow: The music module format (MODfile) originated on the Amiga in the program SoundTracker. Additional music players followed such as NoiseTracker, ProTracker, StarTrekker, and many others. Along with these additional players came differences in the MODfile format, yet despite the differences, they use identical signature bytes (except StarTrekker) and provide no method for differentiating between them. Luckily, the ProTracker format has gained momentum and the number of modules using features of other players is diminishing. SoniqTracker primarily supports ProTracker modules, but does have advanced code for recognizing other MODfile formats. For some astounding special effects with stereo/audio dimensional and spacial phase sound shifting, try holding down the S key during MODfile play mode. For some interesting tempo phase shift effects, try holding down the H key during MOD play mode. These options can give you some amazing effects, if you want to record the MODfile, as it plays via soniqTracker, onto a regular stereo or DAT storage media such as; cassette tape, Digital mini-disk, etc., via your stereo cards out-put to external recording devices. Thus, allowing you to play them in your stereo, home or portable unit. About MODZap MODZapª v00.90b3 By Ian Schmidt Copyright (c) 1992-93 Two Meg Software - All Rights Reserved. STATUS: (Freeware) Last update and release: 8-19-93 I give MODZap an over-all rating of 7 MODZap was the first GS/OS application that played Imported Module music files. It's been upgraded, patched and updated a great deal, with many improvements and additions, from its first beta release. Ian Schmidt is to be commended, for his continued support and upgrade efforts of this program, despite the many agrivating obstacles he's encountered. His efforts and contributions to the IIgs user show his promise and commitment to their needs with sound and music. My review of the final MOD Player, with select excerpts from the MODZap documentation/maunal file, included with Ian's premission, pertinent to understanding the operations and use of the program with my notes and comments included, follow: MODZapª is an Amigaª music module player for the Apple IIgs personal computer. It combines high playback quality with speed and a range of features to insure that MODs sound good. MODZapª's primary mission is to reproduce modules conforming to the standard set by the ProTrackerª program on the Amigaª. Support is also provided in a lesser form for StarTrekkerª and NoiseTrackerª modules. Authors notes: (This MOD Player is my least favored, due mainly to the unprofessional and interlaced nature of the documentation (MZmanual file), with its crude, vulgar language and rude, needless content, directed towards me, my music efforts and the 1WSW team. The documentation is scattered with hyper-critical and totally unrelated program documentation content. The program is not very 'AUTO' user friendly, comparing it to soniqTracker. The complex nature of its alternate modes, players and such, leave the novice user of a IIgs confused and unable to cope with the random system crashes that they are presented with in certain players, like the QuadraScopeª mode, etc. This release of MODZapª is designed and oriented towards the seasoned power user, skilled with multi-tasking needs and using other advanced operating extension shell programs such as GNO, etc. I don't advise its use by the novice IIgs user. My personal Prefs recommendation, for the best in uniform (over-all) MODfile play results, using a standard stock IIgs ROM 01 or 03, follow: Clock-PAL, Tempo-ProTracker, Stereo-50% Reverb Channel, Player-Classic, use DOCRAM Caching, Ignore MOD./.MOD. However, I was not able to get the MODZap prefs configuration file to save Clock- NTSC. I could not even get the program to use the Clock-NTSC, for any play mode). MODZap documentation pertinent program and user explaination excerpts continued: Important note: ÒNoiseTrackerÓ in this document usually refers to the Amigaª versions of the program. NoiseTracker IIgs modules are not Amigaª-compatible and you should not attempt to load or play them with MODZapª. System Requirements An Apple IIgsª personal computer with at least 1.125 megs of memory. GS/OS System Software version 6.0 or later is required. MODZapªÊautomatically supports all stereo cards and ROM revisions. Caveat Emptor This version of MODZapª has several known bugs, and tends to crash in QuadraScopeª mode. Use another play mode until things are solidified. Author notes: I wonder why the QuadraScopeª mode was even included, other than as a dazzle additive, if it had so many bugs and tends to crash so much, as above noted. The nature and vocal message content of the intromusic digital clip "BRINGING LIFE TO A LIFELESS BREED', the artwork and the program animation (in my opinion), are rather unoriginal, having a negative and dark depressing nature to them. The intromusic digital clip can be bypassed and thanks for adding that option, as it becomes rather agrivating, with each repeated use of the program. MODZap documentation pertinent program and user explaination excerpts continued: New stuff since v00.81a (MODs which certain things fix are in brackets, with the actual titles in parens since people translate Amigaª filenames differently) ¥ MODZap now supports a full 5 octave range, which is important when playing MODs composed on IBM PCs and Atari STs. ¥ Unlike Ôthat other playerÕ, you can now access your Classic Desk Accessories from inside MODZap. ¥ Finally wrote a custom list drawProc so now the instrument list is more informative. The instrument number as seen in the scrolly player, the instrument type (looping, cached looping, or one-shot), and itÕs residency (a ram card for swapped, a chip for cached, and a blue X for non-existant insts). ¥ Wrote and tested brand-new swapper using loop-mode operation just like the popular ShellPlayª. As a result, stereo mixing now works great. Also, the ÒphasingÓ effect heard in soniqTracker and NTGS where the same sample played twice in a row sounds slightly different is not in evidence here! ¥ Notice: MODZap's prefs file is supposed to be sparse, so launching MZ from a non-ProDOS disk will cause about 4k of disk space to be wasted. There are no other problems associated with this (everything will work normally). ¥ There are tons of new Options, including a 'startup path' so you can select a path for MODZap to automagically go to on startup (much like Kangarooª or SuperDataPathª, only free =) ¥ A fun memory-trashing bug which has been around a while got squished; this means the end of random wackiness/hangs/crashes. Ê¥ There are lotsa new player modes: Oscilloscope, a 160x128 scope display of MZ's current output, Oscilloscope (ZipGS) which is a 320x128 scope display for people with ZipGSª accelerators (in beta testing, TWGS machines fared no better than unaccelerated ones), and QuadraScopeª, which individually shows the output of each track like ProTrackerª on the Amigaª. ¥ Instruments may now be cached in DOCRAM for faster performance and cleaner sound. Since the cache manager is new, there is an option to cleaner preferences. There also is a new cache indicater light in the Pumpy Playerª which glows brighter the more tracks are playing from cache. This is actually the opposite behavior from the cache LED on the ZipGSª accelerator card. ¥ The FXLasersª have been rescaled so they come up to full brightness quickly and fade away more slowly. This allows you to better see what's going on; formerly the lasers would take so long to trip that if of effects, you'd just barely see the laser start to appear before it was reset by the next effect. Additionally, there is a new Aqua laser for the position jump F/X. ¥ There are several new key-equivalents: OA-J for Jukebox, OA-I to save an instrument, and OA-S for the new Save Module item. Author Notes: Concerning the OA-S for the new Save Module item, I had no success when I tried to save 'a Module item'. This is rather vague and unclear regarding just what Module item it is supposed to save, how it is used and from where it is to be used. My first impression from the information about this OA-S, was perhaps it might actually save the MODfile. The fact that I was unable to get any results from this OA-S (new key-equivalent ?), drove me to explore, until I found where it was active and for what exact purpose it was intended. The only time that OA-S will function is from within the OA-T and then it saves the information, as set for the prefs, to the MODZap configuration file. The function of OA-I is a needed and very useful key-equivalent, that I commend Ian, for including with this updated release of MODZap. It's the only currently released GS/OS application MOD Player, that will allow you to save the sample/sound instruments from a MODfile. MODZap however, does not support the end loop of a sample, sound, instrument, (even when it presents such, during the sample play on the keyboard) when it saves them as binary file types, with the strange aux.value of $00DC. If you wish to use them for anything that does not accept a binary sound file, it's required that you either; change the file type or convert them to the correct sound file type, i.e. $D8 for your own individual needs. MODZap documentation pertinent program and user explaination excerpts continued: ¥ When saving instruments, the instrument's name as shown in the list is now the default filename, instead of the MOD's filename. ¥ Fixed looping so it doesn't loop 65535 times (MOD.TechMaru [TechMaru]) ¥ Fixed tone portamentos so they stop correctly at the target. (MOD.Nebulos [Nebulos]) ¥ Fixed arpeggios so they work without an accompanying note (MOD.Taking [taking on the world]) ¥ Added Ultra-Turbo mode for GNO users. This mode runs with no animations at all, which dramatically increases available processor time. ¥ Prefs can now be saved...once you set things up how you like, click the Save Prefs button in the Options dialog and they'll be saved to disk, in your user folder for AppleShare users. ¥ You now may optionally turn off the safety net of filename prefix/suffix checking and select filenames yourself. ============== Using MODZapª ============== When you run the program, the splash screen will appear and a short digitized sound clip will play. Click the mouse button to continue the program. To skip this intro, simply hold down the Open Apple key once the program begins running. There are lots of ways to open modules with MODZapª.... 1) Use Open MODule... and select one. 2) Use Force 31 Instrument or Force 15 Instrument if you have one that the auto type checker botches for some reason. 3) Use Jukebox... to grab a whole bunch to hear in a row. 4) Install the MODZap.Icons file and double click a module from the Finderª. Once you have one open by whatever means, the Module Control Panel will appear. It will show you the title, type, and creator program if possible. Only StarTrekkerª has a distinctive signature of all the popular Amigaª Trackers. The control panel includes a list of instruments containing information as follows: Instrument number | | Instrument residency: a ramcard for swapped, a chip for cached, and an X for N/A. | | 3 > O BigTubeGuitar | Instrument type: an arrow for one-shot, a loop for looping, and a loop with a ramcard for cached looping. Additionally there is a keyboard you can click on to play whatever instrumentÕs name is highlighted in the list. Author notes: (This is an very useful program inclusion and one of the best features of MODZap. The other MODfile players do not have this feature). Playing the module once it is loaded is very simple. Just select Play MOD from the Sound menu. The Graphic Player will pop up and the module will begin. (this happens automatically in Jukebox mode). To stop playback for any reason, press the Option key on your keyboard or click the mouse button. Otherwise playback will end when the module is done. Note that some modules have a Position Jump command so that they loop forever; this is especially true of modules from games or demos. If that is the case the module will loop forever and the only way to stop it is using the Option key or mouse button. There is a scrolly subdisplay at the bottom of the screen arranged as follows: The left most column of the display shows 4 information items relating to the current song. The top most one is the number of positions in the song, the next one down is the current position number, the third one is the current block number, and the bottommost one is the number of the bottom most position in the block shown on the scrolling part of the subdisplay. Several keys can be used while a module is playing. 1-4 toggle the disable/enabled status of tracks 1-4. The spacebar pauses and unpauses playback. The Esc key exits the player if you are in single mode, and aborts the jukebox if you are in jukebox mode. More About the Jukebox: There are some standard behaviors supported by the Jukebox; here goes. Open Apple-clicking adds files to a selection. Shift-clicking selects everything between the current selection and the nearest other selection. Open Apple-clicking an already selected file deselects that file. MODZap imposes no limit on the number of MODs selectable in Jukebox mode other than that the filenames must all fit in avalible free memory (this is very hard to do even with the largest MOD collections!). ============= Menu Options ============= There are several options avalible in the Options item of the Options menu. They are as follows: ¥ PAL/NTSC (soniqTRACKERª calls these 50 and 60 Hz respectively). 99% of MODules are PAL (50 Hz) but due to the way early Amigaª trackers worked some older modules created on United States Amigasª may be NTSC. If a song sounds too slow, try NTSC. There is no other way to distinguish, although some modules may come with documentation which tells you what setting to use. (eg MOD.Sandman.PAL or MOD.Everybody.NTSC). ¥ÊIgnore Tuning allows you to ignore the fine-tune bytes in MODules in case a module sounds weird with them. ¥ Ignore Arpeggios allows you to ignore arpeggios in case you get a MODule which sounds weird with them. v00.75 added rangechecking so that some modules which formerly needed this option shouldn't now. There are key equivalents for some of the items in the dialog box: A toggles the Ignore Arpeggios check box, T toggles the Ignore Tuning check box, Return is the same as the Okay button, and Open Apple-period (.) is the same as the Cancel button. Additionally, one item is in the Options menu so that you may conviently access it without disk swapping: ¥ÊLoop Music allows you to determine if MODules play once or repeat until you press the Option key or click. Note that this has effect in Jukebox mode also so you must press Option or click to allow the Jukebox to switch next one in the series. ================= Selectable MODs ================= MODs must meet certain criteria to appear in the Open and Jukebox dialogs. o Their type must be TXT or BIN, or $F4 with an aux $6900. o Their name must start with MOD. or end with .MOD (case is now insensitive) unless Ignore MOD./.MOD is checked in the Options dialog. ================================================== Effect Commands Supported and their Laser colors ================================================== *NOTE: the ProTracker definitions are used by MODZap. E-effects will still show up on the lasers for StarTrekker modules, but will have no effect on playback* *NOTE2: If no color is stated, that effect doesn't trip the lasers* 0 - Arpeggio if nonzero effect data, no effect otherwise (Purple if Arp.) 1 - Pitchslide up (Red) 2 - Pitchslide down (Blue) 3 - Tone Portamento (Green) 4 - Vibrato (Purple) 5 - Tone Portamento with Volume Slide (Yellow) 6 - Vibrato with Volume Slide (Yellow) 9 - Sample position jump (Green) A - Volume slide (Red) B - Song position jump (Aqua) C - Set volume (Blue) D - Break to next position (Aqua) E - Multiple effects (all of these are White) E1 - Fine pitchslide up E2 - Fine pitchslide down E6 - Set Loop/Jump to Loop (includes undocumented mode used by MOD.BassBins) E9 - Retrigger note EA - Fine Volume Slide Up EB - Fine Volume Slide Down EC - Note Cut F - Set tempo (Red) Note that some effects are ignored deliberately; this includes the following: 8 and E8 are not defined on any Amigaª tracker. E0 controls the Amigaª hardware filter; the IIgs has no such beast. EF is a 'useless' effect which was removed as of ProTrackerª 1.3 on the Amiga; Lars Hamre told me that since its not supported on the Amiga any more I shouldn't support it on the IIgs. (heh) Comparison Chart: Feature MODZapª Noise Tracker GS soniqTRACKERª ShellPlay -------------------------------------------------------------------- Compatibility: NoiseTrackerª Yes Yes Yes Yes ProTrackerª Yes Limited Yes Yes StarTrekkerª Yes Limited Yes Yes Others No SoundSmithª No No Sonic Blasterª Yes Yes Yes*** Yes*** SoundMeister ª Yes Yes Yes Yes # of Effects: 21 3 19 29 Other: Swap method: Loop-mode Swap-mode Swap-mode Loop-mode Filtering: N/A Yes Yes N/A Sound quality: Fair Very Good Very Good Excellent DOCRAM Caching Yes Yes Yes No Smart volume Yes Yes No Yes Smart looping Yes Yes^ Yes Yes Editor No Yes* No No OS GS/OS 6.0 P8-GS/OS GS/OS 5.0.2 & up GS/OS 6.0 Keyboard Yes Yes No No Multi-Players Yes Yes No Yes Jukebox Yes Yes~ Yes Yes (Random-play) Tuning Yes No Yes Yes ÒScrollyÓ Player Yes Yes Yes (Goofy) No Bouncing Notes No Yes No No Freq. meters Yes No Yes No Lasers Yes No No No Loading speed Fast Slow Medium Medium Rating 6.9 N/A 9 10 ~ Noise Tracker GS has two Jukebox related programs (so to speak); NT MOD Player, a GS/OS application program to play its music module files in single order (selected by the user) and VAMPS/NTV Jukebox, a basic program, that AUTO-loads to RAM and plays in sequence all data specified music modules, within the basic programs data statement line. ^ Noise Tracker GS attempts to do Smart looping with proper per-set PARM. * Noise Tracker GS has 2 save formats, neither of which are Amiga MODules. ** I.E., number and severity of known bugs. There has been at least one (confirmed ?) (alledged) documented case of Noise Tracker GS destroying a hard disk partition. NoiseTracker GS also crashes frequently during song entry and editing. Author Notes: I have never been given any supported or confirmed documentation, to show that Noise Tracker GS ever destroyed a hard disk partition. I would love to see such documentation, if it does, in fact exist ! I don't agree that Noise Tracker GS also crashes frequently during song entry and editing. It does occur on ocassions, when proper per-set PARM is not exersized. *** The AE Sonic Blaster card has problems with very high output levels. MODZapª, SoundSmithª, Noise Tracker GSª, and many others lower the levels slightly to compensate; soniqTRACKER and ShellPlay allow you to manually compensate for this. Legal Stuff: Two Meg Software is a trademark of Ian Schmidt. Amiga is a trademark of Commodore Business Machines, Inc. GEnie is a service mark of General Electric Information Services Company. America Online is a service mark of AOL, Inc. Sonic Blaster is a trademark of Applied Engineering, a division of AE Research. CompuServe is a service mark of CompuServe, Inc, a division of H&R Block. SoundSmith is a trademark of Huibert Aalbers. Noise Tracker GS is a program ID of 1WSW and OSRL Finder and Apple IIgs are trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc. Known Imported module with problems: (Example MODfile included: Number1,(an Amiga Noisetracker module) can and often does crash MODZap. Using all modes, settings options and players with MODZap gave very poor audio rendering of this Imported Module file. It plays perfectly with every special effect presented to perfection, with ShellPlay. SoniqTracker plays it very well, with near perfection for its special effects. Noise Tracker GS, loads it prefectly and give a very good audio play rendering. I test loaded and played this example MODfile, from GS/OS v6.0.1, with no INIT/DA's, using a standard/stock IIgs; ROM 01 and ROM 03, with 4 Megs of RAM, from both; 3.5 disks and internal Zipdrive and Focus IDE hard drives. I've informed Ian of the problems encountered with MODZap and with the example MODfile: Number 1. He assured me he would look into the problems I informed him of. Of all the IIgs MODfile Player authors, Ian Schmidt is the only one that can be contacted by phone with relative ease. He is friendly, informative, supportive and very helpful with information and any questions you present, concerning MODZap. If you wish to contact him you can reach him by voice phone at: (515) -296-8812. I've test loaded and played dozens of Imported Module files, of every kind, with all three of these MOD Players,using all of their modes, players and options, from GS/OS v6.0.1, both with and with out INIT/DA's, using a standard/stock IIgs; ROM 01 and ROM 03, with 4Megs of RAM, from both; 3.5 disks and an internal IDE hard drives, using the audio equipment; SoundMeister stereo card, KOSS electro-static Model ESP-950 headphones, including an E/90 energizer amp., to obtain an accurate audio rendering and deligent, comparitive review of their over-all ease of operability, audio play quality, special effects support and performance abilities, with my over-all rating for each. Charles T. Turley, Ph.D., V.A.E. Unus Mundus Mollismerx Magus' Apple IIgs FOREVER !! -END OF FILE-