Re: [NTLK] Regarding ModPlayer

From: Jim Witte (jswitte_at_bloomington.in.us)
Date: Mon Sep 06 2004 - 13:02:45 PDT


> Also, has anybody noticed this, if you downsample a Mod to 22kHz before
> pkg'ing it, it tends to sound better/smoother and results in a smaller
> file.

   That's not surprising - it lowers the amount of calculation that the
assembly routine has to do. The way it's written, the assembly code
runs in the same 'task' as the newtonscript, so you can't have the
assembly routine decoding more MOD data while the NS program is
stuffing samples into the sound channel. This is the same reason why
MP3's at high bit-rates dropped out with MadMax 0.8. And is the
advantage of the codec solution.

> Speaking of playback, it is worth replacing the Newton's internal
> speaker
> with a new one? There are better quality speakers available today
> within the
> same size. Would it improve the sound quality? Would I void my
> warranty? ;)

   Probably. I think it's just a standard 8 ohm speaker. An idea I
thought of for the WWDC would be to take one of the Hardon-Kormon
speakers out of my iMac DV (the round ones), and then design some kind
of Newton case with a (comparatively) HUGE bulge on the bottom.. <g>
"What the HECK is that!" "A good speaker"..

> everything the iPod can, and much more. Should've seen the look on his
> face
> when I demo'ed the MP2K (it got worse when he saw the 'Apple' logo).

   Did you happen to have any MP3s around to show him? Actually, in all
fairness, the iPod can *technically* do more (the PortalPlayer chip, 2
ARM cores, FW and USB built in, maybe (hopefully) bluetooth in the next
incarnation), but nobody knows how to write software for it. And of
course, the iPod has that eensy-weensy screen (do I dare even *call* it
a screen), no touchscreen, no PCMCIA slots, no nicely accessbile
bytecode langage.

   But, now that Einstein is in the open, porting it to the iPod (yeah,
it would look horrible) would be I think very interesting. Especially
when it was shown off at an Apple Store (pending legal review). And it
should be faster than the demo at WWNC, since the iPod is based on the
ARM.

Jim

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