PIC Sampler

[Captain_Hastings]

I picked this up from the EM411 forum: http://centauri.ezy.net.au/~fastvid/picsound.htm

If i have lots of time... with these PIC16F877's lying around...

;D

[Nomical]

Looking at this picture makes me wonder if it is worth the effort of making it:

Both sample signals don't even come near resembling the real signal. Isn't sampling about recording a signal as how you hear it? What is the use of sampling something when it comes out all shitty in the end. It seems to me when using speech, it comes out like Stephen Hawking's voicemachine. This could be bad as well as good fun though.

Also, the used sample rates are very strange. Maybe i overlooked something but i can't find any specs of the sampler.

Quote from the site:

I think this software and algorithm may be very useful as it allows a convenient conversion from a sound file into bitstream data or PIC assembler code. I hope if you need to add sound to your project or product you will make use of this work and that it may save you some effort. I know many PIC (and other embedded micro) developers make products for the handicapped and visually impaired. It should be very easy to add speech or sound to your products.

I see the advantage now of the system, press a button and you'll hear a sound. That's a cool addition. But i still can't believe that it would be very usefull to make an actual sampler out of it that can sample high quality violin strings or something similar..

Correct me if i'm wrong.

[Captain_Hastings]

I don't expect it to be high quality at all, but for me it seemed fun enough to try it out someday.

[d2k]

But i still can't believe that it would be very usefull to make an actual sampler out of it that can sample high quality violin strings or something similar..

Of course not! eheh. Howzabout a gritty drum machine with a mios frontend tho? cud tie in nice with the new seq perhaps...

On a dif note, those new emu pci sampler cards look pretty damn nice :)

Best

Dan

[Nomical]

On a dif note, those new emu pci sampler cards look pretty damn nice :)

Best

Dan

Lets build a PCI slot extension for MIOS... ;D

[der.warst]

woooo,

this really could be fun! I really like the idea of building a PIC Lofi Sampler. And think about the possibilities of mangling a Sample live with a Midibox-interface together with the MBseq2 playing loops and stuff. ;D

Wouldbe some nice companion to MBSID

I love Samplers that add their own flavour to the sampled sounds, the dirtier, the better.

It would be great if this could be integrated in MIOS somehow, but since i don't have any clue about coding and no one seems to be really interested, I guess it will stay a dream...  :'(

Warst

[moebius]

Hi.

Very interesting topic, really.. but no coding skills here :(

I think that a BTc type of encoding is too "low end" for any musical use.

But what 'bout cheesy, gritty, wwery 80's style 8bit sample playback (drum) machine?

MIOS controlled, with an external flash or SRAM (something like 62256's) for samples, and DAC(s)? MIOS app. would take care of a sample playback logic.. and receive (SDS) / write samples to external memory ;D

DIY dope for elekTRoheadz..

Bye, Moebius

[pilo]

mmm shouldn't be hard to do, but where to store the sample? I though about a beatbox with mios, but the pic18f452 isn't fast enough for sound mixing.

But if you just it to play sound, it can be easy :)

the DAC side can be "stand alone", always reading the same adress in the memory, the pic just have to handle mem copy, not too hard to do.

[moebius]

I was thinking 'bout something like 62256 SRAM (32Kx8, 3-state i/o) for storing samples, it's small, but more could be added (and something like LinnDrums original samples seem to all be 4kB size). And something like Maxim MX7228 (8bit, 8 channel dac, individual data latches/chan.) for audio out.

So Pic has to handle sample saving to external ram, maintain sample address table and take care of playback addressing/timing ect.

Of course some external analog prosessoring should be done, filtering, volume envelopes ect.

Is this too far fetched?

Bye, Moebius

[der.warst]

yay, a beatbox with your own favourite sounds in raunchy 8-bit format!

would be cool if some live-controllability was possible, like pots or encoders for pitch, envelopes, whatever...

but who will design it?

[pilo]

mm a maxim DAC? I though about a pcm or I2S dac, maybe better for audio, with his own memory and clock system, to keep a good sync (hard to do with one pic). Making a hardware ring buffer shouldn't be hard. When the half of the buffer has been outputed, it make an interupt, handle by the pic which fill it with the new samples.

So we have a lot of "time" to handle a user interface with the pic and why not some mixing?

For example with the 18f452 (10Mips), we can make about 200 instruction for each data @ 48Khz.

yeah, seems doable :)

designing it shouldn't be a real problem too.

[moebius]

Ok, pilo, you had a bit different concept in mind..

I'm thinking just a bit updated (non dedicated voice channels, RAM, MCU controlling playback addressing/speed) 80's concept.

That maxim dac would give 8 note polyphony/ voice channels.. no mixing involved.

As I started to count address/ data lines, I figured out that another core is needed for dedicated control surface. (And maybe for AOUT, giving control over analog filtering/ VCA's)

Tired/outta here, Moebius

[pilo]

oki I see what you mean ;)

I can help you with coding if you want

[der.warst]

please keep me updated with efforts on this issue!

Would it be possible to integrate some rater unusual controls like extreme pitch alterations or an abillity to play a Sample backwards? Weird stuff in general...  ;D

I mean it's Lofi allright, but it could get a lot more interesting than only rebuilding an 80s drummachine.

But you are the guys who know how to do this, so you decide what it's gonna be like.

der Warst