Testers wanted for NSF player

[Chaoswing]

I tested this on my iPod Nano with great results with the nsf files for Dragon Warrior, MegaMan II, MegaMan III and Faxanadu.

However, when playing nsf files from 2A03.org's NES music sound archive, songs often pause every 1 to 3 seconds for a split second.

[Adam]

Some of the songs from 2A03.org (more than the proportion in actual games) use expansion chips, which, while mostly supported by the player, require a lot of extra processing and haven't been the subject of much optimization yet.

[Adam]

A new build, from the latest CVS, is now up.

[Sherv]

Hey Adam, I was wondering...if you haven't added it already, would it be possible/easy to turn on or off the different channels (Square 1, Square 2, etc) while/before playing an NSF? Some of the harmony tracks are just awesome (e.g. Flashman's in MM2 [track 3]) and it's also pretty useful in terms of learning parts. Word!

[Adam]

It would be quite easy to program that, but how would you control it?  The interface is the sticking point for me.

[Sherv]

Hmm, good point. Well, since there are 6 channels maybe a way of toggling them on or off could be controlled via button combinations? Or just have a menu tree?

[BigMac]

Amazing patch. I expect to see this in the CVS very soon. I truly hope your next addon is NSFE files because that was a Necessity to me.

[Adam]

NSFE is supported, just not the "playlist" functionality (which I may be getting around to later today).  And titles will probably never be supported, as I can't think of how to get rockbox to display changing track titles.

[BigMac]

No titles are fine, the playlist functions however are crucial.
Keep ROCKing on!

[adam917]

Hmm, good point. Well, since there are 6 channels maybe a way of toggling them on or off could be controlled via button combinations? Or just have a menu tree?

Well, the NotSoFatso Winamp plug-in has tickboxes: one for each channel, and an invert tickbox as well. You can control where in the stereo signal the channel is as well. Maybe a menu would be in order for this kind of control. ;-)

[Llorean]

As it's a codec, not a plugin, you really don't have a way to give the user individual control of it.

[Adam]

Right, Llorean's point is ithe important one, a (rockbox) codec doesn't really have a user interface.  Potentially there could be a configuration file that the codec checks, or maybe a full NSF player plugin that could do everything you want.  I'd prefer a reasonable default behavior, though, so I probably won't be doing anything along those lines myself (which of course doesn't preclude someone else from doing so, I'd be happy to look over potential additions, or you could wait until everything is clean enough for CVS).  The only exception is my special treatment of "repeat one", since I consider both playing forever and with track limits equally valid, with a format that is intended to loop forever.

[Llorean]

I think a standalone plugin version of it with the ability to turn various instruments/channels/whatever (not really familiar with the format) sounds like the best additional option to me, at least.

[Adam]

New version of patch (0.20) and builds up:
http://hcs64.com/rockbox/
Doesn't really add much functionality, but do please test it to let me know if I've broken anything.

[Adam]

New version (0.24) up.  Much better speed, NSFE playlist support.

The build page now has old versions as well, so if something sounds off in 0.24 see if it sounded right in 0.20 or 0.17.

I noticed something odd, when playing FF3 straight through (from the NSFE), the 23rd track is missing percussion.  0.25 is my attempt to fix this by reinit'ing the nsf core for each track.