Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!hplabs!hpda!hpcuhc!edwardm From: edwardm@hpcuhc.HP.COM (Edward McClanahan) Newsgroups: comp.dsp Subject: Re: Introducing a DSP board for the Amiga (LONG) Message-ID: <9630003@hpcuhc.HP.COM> Date: 5 Mar 90 05:02:29 GMT References: Organization: Hewlett Packard, Cupertino Lines: 73 Tom Limoncelli writes: > WARNING: This is really long because I wanted to include a lot of > detail. I'm really excited about this product. No kidding... > Amiga sound stores 8-bits for every "number" when it digitizes or plays > sound. A CD player uses 16-bits (or 18 ...depending on how you think > about it) per number. A CD player plays at 44.1MHz; this means that it > records 44.1 million numbers per second! Now you understand why a DSP > has to be able to do fast math. If you have an equation that will > lower a sound 2 octaves and you want to do it in real-time; you need to > do that equation 44.1 million times per second. Um... I'm obviously not going to be the only one to point this out but CDs contain 2 16-bit samples (not 18!) at 44.1KHz, not MHz. That makes that equation need to be recalculated 44.1 thousand times per second (and probably twice, once for each channel). Still, this is a lot of computations and it would be nice to have a fast DSP to do it... > Applications: > ------------- > ... > Audio processing & manipulation (could be a VoiceMail processor). > Sound synthesis (voice or music) -- Roland synth. quality. > ... > VERY high-end audio -- More than CD-quality, so use an Amiga with a > lot of RAM and a large hard drive as your audio studio. When you are > done, submit it to a CD-manufacturer for pressing. > ... Oh, does the board include any A/D or D/A? > Price: > ------ > Native Development Kit is $500 for the software. This does everything > on-chip. Results are echoed back to the Amiga. > > Amiga Development Kit's price is unknown. This lets you compile, etc. > on the Amiga and download code to the DSP. It will include a .library > for accessing the DSP so that all languages can access it. 1/2 a CRAY > accessible from AmigaBASIC! > > The boards themselves will run from less than $1500 (1 DSP with no > external RAM) to $4000-$5000 (2 DSPs with 512K RAM). No prices on > "personality modules" or "daughter boards" yet. > Implications: > ------------- > The NeXT has a Motorola DSP 56001; which is inferior to the AT&T model. > The AT&T chip is the chip-of-choice for serious research. It's faster > and it's floating-point. This means the NeXT has one sophomoric DSP > while your Amiga could have 2 superior DSPs. The NeXT DSP is supplemented by a host of hardware (such as D/A, A/D, etc...), hence an Apples-to-apples comparison is difficult. Also, as many will mention, The NeXT has the advantage that EVERY machine contains the DSP. For this reason, the board Tom describes will probably be used by individuals running homebrew software. Still, the price/performance ratio sounds good. I wonder how it will compare with a NeXT/96001 combination (rumored to be in the pipes). > This article is 100% Copyright 1990 Tom Limoncelli. Re-print and > copying permission granted only from me. Permission granted to copy > throughout Usenet/Bitnet/Internet/FidoNet. Correct me if I am wrong, but the very fact that Tom posted here makes what he says non-copywritable... Anyway, had I an Amiga 2000 (or better), I'd be chomping at the bit right now... It looks good! Ed "waiting for the day when DSP is as common as FPU" McClanahan