VOGONS


IBM Music Feature Card/Yamaha FB-01

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Reply 240 of 263, by bjwil1991

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I hooked up my AWM device to my Roland UM-ONE and it's working. Thanks.

Discord: https://discord.gg/U5dJw7x
Systems from the Compaq Portable 1 to Ryzen 9 5950X
Twitch: https://twitch.tv/retropcuser

Reply 241 of 263, by Scali

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bjwil1991 wrote:

I hooked up my AWM device to my Roland UM-ONE and it's working. Thanks.

Did you try running some games? And how did it sound? 😀

http://scalibq.wordpress.com/just-keeping-it- … ro-programming/

Reply 242 of 263, by bjwil1991

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Sounded better than the Adlib cards and some of the Sierra games I've bought from GOG.com work with it as well. I also installed the FB01 driver on there to see how it works since some of the games require MIDI channel 1 to be the main one.

I got the real unit today as well and that works with it, too. Even the battery is still good (not bad for a 30+ year old device).

Discord: https://discord.gg/U5dJw7x
Systems from the Compaq Portable 1 to Ryzen 9 5950X
Twitch: https://twitch.tv/retropcuser

Reply 244 of 263, by Scali

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Here is a blog with a history/overview of this project so far, and the first release: https://scalibq.wordpress.com/2019/03/26/the- … d-yamaha-fb-01/

http://scalibq.wordpress.com/just-keeping-it- … ro-programming/

Reply 245 of 263, by awgamer

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MAME just added the Yamaha MU80(non working,) first XG module(1994,) compared to the DB50XG(1995,) 32/64/729/21 vs 16/32/676/21(parts/poly/tones/drums,) and already has the SC-55(non working) ~scc-1, though not the SC-55mkII/scc-1a.

Reply 246 of 263, by Scali

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I released a simple music disk for the IBM Music Feature Card at Revision this weekend:
https://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=81106

I made sure that my code is compatible with the DOSBox and AMAME setup that I posted a few weeks ago.

Let's say it was fun to hear that IMFC blasting through the huge speakers in the party hall, and hundreds of sceners listening to an IMFC for the first time 😀

http://scalibq.wordpress.com/just-keeping-it- … ro-programming/

Reply 247 of 263, by Scali

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Here's a blog with some background info on the music disk for the IMFC:
https://scalibq.wordpress.com/2019/05/01/just … -revision-2019/

http://scalibq.wordpress.com/just-keeping-it- … ro-programming/

Reply 248 of 263, by Trembyle

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Scali wrote:

Excellent, so IBM Music Feature Card emulation is now officially a thing in DOSBox 😀

On your blog you mention that your custom build will work for all Sierra games. Is that by using loopMIDI (because Sierra doesn't send large enough SysEx commands to crash it)? Or does it require you to use a physical loopback cable at the moment?

Any recent progress on the emulator? I'm hoping that the loopback functionality can be incorporated into the application, so that it's as easy to use as Munt.

Would IMFC / FB-01 be a selectable feature? Or would a supported game need to be patched to recognize one or the other?

Reply 249 of 263, by Scali

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Trembyle wrote:

On your blog you mention that your custom build will work for all Sierra games. Is that by using loopMIDI (because Sierra doesn't send large enough SysEx commands to crash it)? Or does it require you to use a physical loopback cable at the moment?

I was talking only about the DOSBox part there, which only emulates the IMFC hardware, and sends/receives MIDI data.
You still need an FB-01 at this point, either real or emulated. And the only emulated one I know of currently, is the MAME one, which afaik still has the bug that it won't work with loopMIDI for large SysEx commands.
The Sierra games I tested with, send entire voicebanks, which are SysEx commands of about 6k in size.
So if you want to use the MAME FB-01, you'd still need a physical loopback as far as I know.

Trembyle wrote:

Any recent progress on the emulator? I'm hoping that the loopback functionality can be incorporated into the application, so that it's as easy to use as Munt.

There hasn't been any progress lately, but yes, the idea is to create an FB-01 module similar to Munt, which won't require any loopback.
I actually based my virtual FB-01 driver on Munt, and the MIDI stuff works. The part that doesn't work correctly yet is the actual synthesis.
But the MAME FB-01 emulator is a workable temporary solution.

Trembyle wrote:

Would IMFC / FB-01 be a selectable feature? Or would a supported game need to be patched to recognize one or the other?

For DOSBox it doesn't make a difference really.
The IMFC is basically an alternative MIDI interface, which exists side-by-side with the MPU-401.
If games support the FB-01 directly, they normally support it via MPU-401.
So if you have an FB-01 connected to DOSBox, it should receive data both from software using the IMFC and software using the MPU-401.

http://scalibq.wordpress.com/just-keeping-it- … ro-programming/

Reply 250 of 263, by lchiocca

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Hi guys,

It's been a while since I posted any updates. I have completed the first (and major) part of the full IMF emulation in dosbox 😀. It currently allows you to play (probably) all the sierra games purely in dosbox. As you might have already read between the lines, it's not compete yet. There are all lot of IRQ problems that I need to sort out (IRQs to dosbox and IRQs from the ym2151 chip to the IMF), but they will be addressed in the near future. You can also find a couple of mp3 of space quest 3 and silpheed recorded directly from dosbox using my emulation.

If you want to try it out yourself, the just download the files below and add a "[imfc]" section in your dosbox config file to enable the emulation. I haven't made anything configurable right now, so it will listen on the default IMF ports and will use IRQ 3.
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1DlTUI … a23?usp=sharing

Another thing is: I want to thank scali for all the help he has provided me to make my version possible! I don't think I would have had the motivation to continue what I had started without his moral support, time and effort! Big shoutout to him!

Reply 252 of 263, by JohanL

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Cool, I stumbled on this thread as I finally found my old IBM MFC , I thought it got thrown away by misstake. I will install it in an old IBM5170. Have not used it since early 1990 I would think. I never had an MT-32 myself, but I remember that Sierra games sounded a lot better on those... I will for sure compare the emulator with the real card.

Reply 253 of 263, by Pierre32

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Scali wrote on 2018-01-22, 08:56:

Another update for SoftIMFC: https://www.dropbox.com/s/1qorqr9ppyorod6/SoftIMFC.zip?dl=0
This time it should really work on MPU-401. In the earlier version the init code was never called, so it never switched the MPU-401 into UART mode. Which meant it only worked if the MPU-401 was already in UART-mode, which it isn't on powerup.

Hey Scali. Is this link the latest?

Reply 254 of 263, by Pierre32

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Pierre32 wrote on 2020-05-28, 13:05:
Scali wrote on 2018-01-22, 08:56:

Another update for SoftIMFC: https://www.dropbox.com/s/1qorqr9ppyorod6/SoftIMFC.zip?dl=0
This time it should really work on MPU-401. In the earlier version the init code was never called, so it never switched the MPU-401 into UART mode. Which meant it only worked if the MPU-401 was already in UART-mode, which it isn't on powerup.

Hey Scali. Is this link the latest?

Question doesn't matter now. This version is fine.

I got my new FB-01 working yesterday, driven by my new 386 build courtesy of SoftIMFC. I'm loving the exploration of different versions of game soundtracks, hearing which ones sound kinda like quick ports to the IMFC, and which ones really took advantage of it.

Thank you Scali for SoftIMFC, and to everyone for their research and contributions.

Reply 255 of 263, by Trembyle

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Scali wrote on 2019-03-16, 14:33:
It looks like LoopBe1 doesn't suffer from the same issue that loopMIDI has: https://www.nerds.de/en/loopbe1.html […]
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It looks like LoopBe1 doesn't suffer from the same issue that loopMIDI has:
https://www.nerds.de/en/loopbe1.html

With this virtual MIDI loopback, it looks like DOSBox and MAME are working properly.
However, it doesn't sound entirely correct... Perhaps it just filters out large SysEx message. I don't get the 'dump/received' message on the display either.

Somehow I missed the move from loopMIDI to LoopBe1. Everything does indeed sound much better this way. Has the large SysEx message issue been figured out yet?

In addition to DOSBox, I've also been testing this in ScummVM's FB-01 mode for the SCI engine (midi_mode=1). It seems like there are some stability issues here, but I don't know if they are related to the emulation or just FB-01 bugs that need to be resolved. I have a developer that I can work with on this.

I've been using AMAME still. Should I use SoftIMFC instead? Are there binaries somewhere, and if not, do you have build instructions? Is the Watcom compiler required?

Also, it seems like Nuked-OPM may be useable now. Is there any way to incorporate this into SoftIMFC?
https://github.com/nukeykt/Nuked-OPM

Reply 256 of 263, by Retroit

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bjwil1991 wrote on 2019-03-25, 21:04:

Sounded better than the Adlib cards and some of the Sierra games I've bought from GOG.com work with it as well. I also installed the FB01 driver on there to see how it works since some of the games require MIDI channel 1 to be the main one.

I got the real unit today as well and that works with it, too. Even the battery is still good (not bad for a 30+ year old device).

Sorry for a bumping old post / thread. But I would like to ask you - could you upload drivers and software for Yamaha FB-01 into Vogons Drivers Library? I looked everywhere for drivers and soft for it, but no luck. I'll be very appreciated for that.

Reply 257 of 263, by Pierre32

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Retroit wrote on 2021-10-05, 19:17:
bjwil1991 wrote on 2019-03-25, 21:04:

Sounded better than the Adlib cards and some of the Sierra games I've bought from GOG.com work with it as well. I also installed the FB01 driver on there to see how it works since some of the games require MIDI channel 1 to be the main one.

I got the real unit today as well and that works with it, too. Even the battery is still good (not bad for a 30+ year old device).

Sorry for a bumping old post / thread. But I would like to ask you - could you upload drivers and software for Yamaha FB-01 into Vogons Drivers Library? I looked everywhere for drivers and soft for it, but no luck. I'll be very appreciated for that.

What are you looking to do? Do you have a real FB-01? Are you looking to emulate, or run on a retro PC? Either way, links to what you need (DOSBox/AMAME/SoftIMFC) are scattered throughout this thread.

I've also done some compatibility testing with Sierra games and uploaded the game patch files here. There is also a DOS based sound bank editor.

Agree that it would be nice to get everything in one place. archive.org would the best location IMO, as it's more a collection of software than hardware drivers per se. I'd be happy to put a package together, which would contain Scali's DOSBox and SoftIMFC, if he doesn't mind me rehosting it.

Reply 258 of 263, by Retroit

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Pierre32 wrote on 2021-10-05, 21:45:
What are you looking to do? Do you have a real FB-01? Are you looking to emulate, or run on a retro PC? Either way, links to wha […]
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Retroit wrote on 2021-10-05, 19:17:
bjwil1991 wrote on 2019-03-25, 21:04:

Sounded better than the Adlib cards and some of the Sierra games I've bought from GOG.com work with it as well. I also installed the FB01 driver on there to see how it works since some of the games require MIDI channel 1 to be the main one.

I got the real unit today as well and that works with it, too. Even the battery is still good (not bad for a 30+ year old device).

Sorry for a bumping old post / thread. But I would like to ask you - could you upload drivers and software for Yamaha FB-01 into Vogons Drivers Library? I looked everywhere for drivers and soft for it, but no luck. I'll be very appreciated for that.

What are you looking to do? Do you have a real FB-01? Are you looking to emulate, or run on a retro PC? Either way, links to what you need (DOSBox/AMAME/SoftIMFC) are scattered throughout this thread.

I've also done some compatibility testing with Sierra games and uploaded the game patch files here. There is also a DOS based sound bank editor.

Agree that it would be nice to get everything in one place. archive.org would the best location IMO, as it's more a collection of software than hardware drivers per se. I'd be happy to put a package together, which would contain Scali's DOSBox and SoftIMFC, if he doesn't mind me rehosting it.

I have a real hardware Yamaha FB-01 and what to use all it potential, not just with games. That why I'm looking for software that was with this device (but mine was without any software). I found some modern applications for it. but I need original one.

Reply 259 of 263, by Pierre32

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I'm not sure they even came with software. Back in the day most people would be controlling them with hardware keyboards / sequencers, and controlling settings via the front panel. If you were working with a PC you'd probably be driving it with Voyetra Sequencer. The only period patch editor I've found is the DOS one linked above.