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How Old-School Computers Played Sound Samples

The Commodore 64 8-bit home computer of the 80's was the world's most popular home computer. The sound chip known as the 6851 Sound Interface Device or SID would allow composers to create up to 3 voice music with four different waveforms per audio oscillator (sawtooth, triangle, pulse, noise). Out of the box It was not capable of playing Digitized Sound Samples. But by 1984 some games began to incorporate speech and digital samples. In this episode we take a closer look at the SID chip and how a bug allowed for regular PCM audio sample sounds to be easily played on the C64. This is a series where we explore digital sound on old school computers.

English
  • Originally Aired May 8, 2023
  • Runtime 14 minutes
  • Production Code 0xWyLeVnxFU
  • Network YouTube
  • Created May 8, 2023 by
    TVDB-Editor123
  • Modified May 9, 2023 by
    shriek