Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!bonnie.concordia.ca!uunet!ogicse!pdxgate!eecs!brians
From: brians@eecs.cs.pdx.edu (Brian Smith)
Newsgroups: comp.music
Subject: Re: SoundBlaster under UNIX [was Re: doing midi on a Unix box]
Message-ID: <2841@pdxgate.UUCP>
Date: 10 Jun 91 03:59:41 GMT
References: <16262@helios.TAMU.EDU> <283D0BEF.6122@marob.uucp> <10869@chorus.fr> <2810@pdxgate.UUCP> <10966@chorus.fr>
Sender: news@pdxgate.UUCP
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mir@opera.chorus.fr (Adam Mirowski) writes:

>In article <2810@pdxgate.UUCP>, brians@eecs.cs.pdx.edu (Brian Smith) writes:

>%% You can get the driver in comp.sources.misc, I just posted it there.  It
>%% also includes some user apps to play and record samples.  CMF files are
>%% really buggered, so I only included a program which mostly interprets them.
>%% I don't think that CMF files are important anyway.  It is mainly there to
>%% show how to drive the FM chips.  Axel-f plays OK.

>Watch your mouth! The CMF format is the same as the Midifile track format,
>except for the header, containing instruments' description. And (someone said)
>the Midifile format has been conceived on Usenet... :-)

OK, OK, so the CMF format is only partially buggered. :-)  The technical
reasons are ambiguity.  The midifile format is great, as far as I'm
concerned, but Creative Labs made a poor specification of their adaption.
Most CMF files use the 6 voices and 5 rhythm sound mode of the Sound
Blaster.  In the technical documentation, the 5 rhythm sounds are
suppossed to be the last 5 channels.  But they aren't!  I haven't figured
out *where* the division lies, or if there is one.  Also, some CMF files
have undocumented control changes.

Brian

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