Amiga.org

Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: mrmoonlight on March 02, 2013, 09:08:11 AM

Title: Connecting cd player
Post by: mrmoonlight on March 02, 2013, 09:08:11 AM
Hi my controller for my cd player arrived a couple of days ago and even though it was well packaged it arrived faulty ,no blame on the seller ,some things dont travel well which was a real shame ,any way i am still left with a problem ,how to get my cd player /rom connected to my Amiga 1200 because i cant find or buy an interface that will give me this option,and im sure there must be a few ways ,but i dont know them ,so if any one as a clue what to do ,i would be very grateful if someone would let me know what i need ,very best wishes Brian.:D
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: danbeaver on March 02, 2013, 03:05:41 PM
Are you saying you bought an interface for your CDROM drive? That it is broken (how)? And that you need an interface (repaired vs replaced) to connect it to your A1200?  Further you would like help?

Perhaps a few more details would help us help you.  What type of interface, what is broken, whether you want help fixing or replacing, and how much you are willing to spend on the fix?
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: Ral-Clan on March 02, 2013, 03:10:06 PM
Isn't there a way to just hook the CD player to the internal IDE connection of the A1200 (i.e. by hanging a ribbon cable with a second header outside of the A1200's case)?  You could then use the controller already included with the A1200.

I don't have an A1200, but most IDE interfaces support both a master (the hard drive) and a slave (in this case the CD-ROM drive). You'd need to power the CD-ROM drive with an external power supply, though (i.e. laptop power supply with altered power connector or a PC power supply or external drive case).
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: mrmoonlight on March 02, 2013, 04:09:41 PM
Quote from: ral-clan;727989
Isn't there a way to just hook the CD player to the internal IDE connection of the A1200 (i.e. by hanging a ribbon cable with a second header outside of the A1200's case)? You could then use the controller already included with the A1200.
 
I don't have an A1200, but most IDE interfaces support both a master (the hard drive) and a slave (in this case the CD-ROM drive). You'd need to power the CD-ROM drive with an external power supply, though (i.e. laptop power supply with altered power connector or a PC power supply or external drive case).
Yes you right there used to be a buffered interface like the one that the cf card uses with a extra connection for the cd ,and then you ran the the ribbon cable out side the amiga and then connected it to a power supply ,its just that i dont have a buffered interface adapter ,but i could as you say buy a double connector ribbon ,but would it be ok that it would not be bufferd?
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: Ral-Clan on March 02, 2013, 04:11:30 PM
Quote from: mrmoonlight;728002
Yes you right there used to be a buffered interface like the one that the cf card uses with a extra connection for the cd ,and then you ran the the ribbon cable out side the amiga and then connected it to a power supply ,its just that i dont have a buffered interface adapter ,but i could as you say buy a double connector ribbon ,but would it be ok that it would not be bufferd?


I have no idea - I've never owned an A1200 - only worked with PC IDE interfaces and Amiga SCSI interfaces.  I just assumed the A1200's IDE connector on the motherboard was the same as a standard PC one - just use a double headered ribbon cable.

I'm not sure what a buffered interface is!
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: Dr.Bongo on March 02, 2013, 04:13:40 PM
Quote from: mrmoonlight;728002
Yes you right there used to be a buffered interface like the one that the cf card uses with a extra connection for the cd ,and then you ran the the ribbon cable out side the amiga and then connected it to a power supply ,its just that i dont have a buffered interface adapter ,but i could as you say buy a double connector ribbon ,but would it be ok that it would not be bufferd?


AFAIK you're only supposed to connect one device to the A1200 without an interface. Amigakit sells them -

http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=42&products_id=194

I have exactly that one, works a treat and if you cut a thin slot on the left side of the miggy the IDE cable looks really tidy.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: mrmoonlight on March 02, 2013, 04:19:41 PM
Quote from: danbeaver;727985
Are you saying you bought an interface for your CDROM drive? That it is broken (how)? And that you need an interface (repaired vs replaced) to connect it to your A1200? Further you would like help?
 
Perhaps a few more details would help us help you. What type of interface, what is broken, whether you want help fixing or replacing, and how much you are willing to spend on the fix?

THE controler is a
Telmex CDROM Controller
and it is faulty as it does not work at all,the psu is ok but there is a very small cicuitboard inside the controller that also has the cd inside its a very simple unit ,there is a cable that then comes out of the controller and in to the pcmia slot ,and if it were cheap enought to have repaired then this is what i would do ,so a interface seems the best option.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: mrmoonlight on March 02, 2013, 04:25:10 PM
Quote from: Dr.Bongo;728006
AFAIK you're only supposed to connect one device to the A1200 without an interface. Amigakit sells them -
 
http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=42&products_id=194
 
I have exactly that one, works a treat and if you cut a thin slot on the left side of the miggy the IDE cable looks really tidy.
Hi i am not sure what you have ,i have spoke with Amigakit and i am awaiting a reply to see if the item they have is actualy the one i need ,as they spoke of soldering resisors on and two cables ,which sounded to me as if this was to just play a cd for the music ,thats not what i want ,i need to install my os 3.9 which is on cd ps just checked and that is the one they offered me ,so can you use yours to input a os ,because if you can i will go and order that .
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: klapdeur on March 02, 2013, 04:27:41 PM
Quote from: mrmoonlight;727961
Hi my controller for my cd player arrived a couple of days ago and even though it was well packaged it arrived faulty ,no blame on the seller ,some things dont travel well which was a real shame ,any way i am still left with a problem ,how to get my cd player /rom connected to my Amiga 1200 because i cant find or buy an interface that will give me this option,and im sure there must be a few ways ,but i dont know them ,so if any one as a clue what to do ,i would be very grateful if someone would let me know what i need ,very best wishes Brian.:D



You can buy a 2.5" to 1x2.5" and 1x.35" so you can have a internal 2,5" hdd cf or whatever, then the lead with the 3,5 " going outside your case and connect a cd-rom only you have to see it gets its power there are power cabels adapter also ask amigakit about it, they will know what i mean.

i did that trick a longggg way back with mine a1200. and use idefix software  and ready to play.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: Ral-Clan on March 02, 2013, 04:28:32 PM
Quote from: mrmoonlight;728009
Hi i am not sure what you have ,i have spoke with Amigakit and i am awaiting a reply to see if the item they have is actualy the one i need ,as they spoke of soldering resisors on and two cables ,which sounded to me as if this was to just play a cd for the music ,thats not what i want ,i need to install my os 3.9 which is on cd

Just an idea - but is there any way to copy the contents of the OS3.9 CD to a PCMCIA card on a PC computer and then move it over to the A1200 and install it from that?  I know the OS3.9 CD checks for the presence of a special file (for copy protection) so I'm not sure if it would work if the contents of the disk were moved to another medium.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: Dr.Bongo on March 02, 2013, 04:32:33 PM
Quote from: mrmoonlight;728009
Hi i am not sure what you have ,i have spoke with Amigakit and i am awaiting a reply to see if the item they have is actualy the one i need ,as they spoke of soldering resisors on and two cables ,which sounded to me as if this was to just play a cd for the music ,thats not what i want ,i need to install my os 3.9 which is on cd ps just checked and that is the one they offered me ,so can you use yours to input a os ,because if you can i will go and order that .


Yep, it's quite simple. The interface I mentioned (and have) allows you to connect a hard disc and cd-rom. It comes with software on a floppy disc that installs the cd-rom into the system and once a CD is inserted it appears on your workbench allowing you to open and use it.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: mrmoonlight on March 02, 2013, 05:20:39 PM
Quote from: ral-clan;728012
Just an idea - but is there any way to copy the contents of the OS3.9 CD to a PCMCIA card on a PC computer and then move it over to the A1200 and install it from that? I know the OS3.9 CD checks for the presence of a special file (for copy protection) so I'm not sure if it would work if the contents of the disk were moved to another medium.
LOL  Afew years ago i am sure i had the same problem and if i remember we spent a lot of time trying to do just that and never quite sorted it ,lol good thinking though.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: mrmoonlight on March 02, 2013, 05:23:09 PM
Quote from: klapdeur;728011
You can buy a 2.5" to 1x2.5" and 1x.35" so you can have a internal 2,5" hdd cf or whatever, then the lead with the 3,5 " going outside your case and connect a cd-rom only you have to see it gets its power there are power cabels adapter also ask amigakit about it, they will know what i mean.
 
i did that trick a longggg way back with mine a1200. and use idefix software and ready to play.

HI and thanks very much ,very grateful,Brian.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: mrmoonlight on March 02, 2013, 05:35:40 PM
Quote from: Dr.Bongo;728013
Yep, it's quite simple. The interface I mentioned (and have) allows you to connect a hard disc and cd-rom. It comes with software on a floppy disc that installs the cd-rom into the system and once a CD is inserted it appears on your workbench allowing you to open and use it.

Well thats good enough for me ,but i cant help wondering why i was told to be soldering wires lol i will go and order it ,thanks very much ,Brian  
 Hi just one more thing was there a cable supplyed to connect the EIDE'99 buffered interface  to the motherboard.Brian
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: Dr.Bongo on March 02, 2013, 06:20:44 PM
Quote from: mrmoonlight;728019
Well thats good enough for me ,but i cant help wondering why i was told to be soldering wires lol i will go and order it ,thanks very much ,Brian  
 Hi just one more thing was there a cable supplyed to connect the EIDE'99 buffered interface  to the motherboard.Brian

As long as you're ordering the one I linked, you don't need one. The interface in socketed and plugs onto the IDE pins on the motherboard and stands up with an IDE interface either side. Right side 44pin for a hard drive and left with a 40pin for a CD-rom cable.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: mrmoonlight on March 02, 2013, 06:53:06 PM
Quote from: Dr.Bongo;728023
As long as you're ordering the one I linked, you don't need one. The interface in socketed and plugs onto the IDE pins on the motherboard and stands up with an IDE interface either side. Right side 44pin for a hard drive and left with a 40pin for a CD-rom cable.
Hi thanks thats what i orderd and a cd cable and a 300watt power pack for the Amiga and easy net is on the way ,and now im broke lol ,thanks again and best wishes Brian.:banana:
 
Is it ok to use a cf card as a harddrive with this set up .
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: Dr.Bongo on March 02, 2013, 06:55:10 PM
Quote from: mrmoonlight;728034
and now im broke lol


Welcome to the Amiga :)
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: danbeaver on March 02, 2013, 07:19:59 PM
The internal IDE to External route is the easiest and least expensive for an A1200.

And no you cannot copy OS 3.9 to a CF card as the install is copy protected to run from the CD.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: mrmoonlight on March 02, 2013, 08:10:22 PM
Quote from: danbeaver;728041
The internal IDE to External route is the easiest and least expensive for an A1200.
 
And no you cannot copy OS 3.9 to a CF card as the install is copy protected to run from the CD.

Hi thanks for your help ,i remember going over this with Franko a few years back and we never managed it then ,but i have to admit i cant remember half of what i learnt as its a few years since i sold my first Amiga and missed it straight away ,now i just want to get back on the net ,i know its slow ,and my friends keep telling me ,that i already have a very fast pc but it bores me to tears so on we go ,broke but never bored lol best wishes my friend Brian.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: rdolores on March 03, 2013, 03:08:51 AM
Quote from: mrmoonlight;728009
Hi i am not sure what you have ,i have spoke with Amigakit and i am awaiting a reply to see if the item they have is actualy the one i need ,as they spoke of soldering resisors on and two cables ,which sounded to me as if this was to just play a cd for the music ,thats not what i want ,i need to install my os 3.9 which is on cd ps just checked and that is the one they offered me ,so can you use yours to input a os ,because if you can i will go and order that .


Another option to install 3.9 to your IDE hard drive would be to take out the hard drive and attach it to a PC via one of those cheap IDE-to-USB adapters.  Then use WinUAE to install 3.9 to your hard drive.  You can also install other programs on it from ADF files.  Then put the hard drive back in your Amiga.  That is how I put 3.9 on my A1200's hard drive.  Worked like a charm.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: mrmoonlight on March 03, 2013, 07:20:45 AM
Quote from: rdolores;728082
Another option to install 3.9 to your IDE hard drive would be to take out the hard drive and attach it to a PC via one of those cheap IDE-to-USB adapters. Then use WinUAE to install 3.9 to your hard drive. You can also install other programs on it from ADF files. Then put the hard drive back in your Amiga. That is how I put 3.9 on my A1200's hard drive. Worked like a charm.

LOL Thanks for the idea but i would not know where to start with  WinUAE ,but i do have a question ,why would anyone want to run Amiga Games and all the rest on a pc ,when theres loads of Amiga 1200,s 500,s 600,s all over the uk ,spain, America every week for sale ,week in and week out ,Ebays full of them ,and each of us must have at least three each and a pile more in a hide away up the Attic ,i bet theres not one of us here who own an Amiga can put there hand up and say that they have only the one ,so i am confused as to why the use of a pc to play Amiga ,taking in to account that this is what WinUAE is used for and the Amiga certainly does most things brilliantly ,i do have to say that maybe the cost may come in to it ,as the running costs of an Amiga far exceedes any thing i ever spent on my x wife  which probally explanes why i now live alone lol with my beloved Amiga,lol lol ,good idea though my friend,best wishes Brian.;);)
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: rdolores on March 03, 2013, 02:13:45 PM
Quote from: mrmoonlight;728102
LOL Thanks for the idea but i would not know where to start with  WinUAE ,but i do have a question ,why would anyone want to run Amiga Games and all the rest on a pc ,when theres loads of Amiga 1200,s 500,s 600,s all over the uk ,spain, America every week for sale ,week in and week out ,Ebays full of them ,and each of us must have at least three each and a pile more in a hide away up the Attic ,i bet theres not one of us here who own an Amiga can put there hand up and say that they have only the one ,so i am confused as to why the use of a pc to play Amiga ,taking in to account that this is what WinUAE is used for and the Amiga certainly does most things brilliantly ,i do have to say that maybe the cost may come in to it ,as the running costs of an Amiga far exceedes any thing i ever spent on my x wife  which probally explanes why i now live alone lol with my beloved Amiga,lol lol ,good idea though my friend,best wishes Brian.;);)


Most people have PC's at their places of work.  With WinUAE, they could sneak in an Amiga game at break or lunch on their machines.

Also, for pure performance, an emulated Amiga on a modern machine, runs circles around the fastest fully loaded A4000's.  This could be useful using 3-D rendering applications.  Using SysInfo, my Quad-core PC reports being 90 times faster than an A4000-040.  The speed of my dedicated 2.5" IDE drive is reported at 17,096,347 Bytes/Sec.  This is faster than any of my SCSI drives on my real Amigas.  I can also set it up with 8 MB of ChipRAM.  Only 2 MB is possible on my real Amigas.  I don't have retargetable graphics card on any of my Amigas, but on WinUAE, I can use P96 to do 2-D and 3-D acceleration and get resolutions up to the max of my PC.  I have done 1920x1080 full screen with WinUAE.  It is rock stable and fast, although practically, I would go no higher than 1280x1024.  It's a great resolution for desktop publishing like PageStream and Professional Page (especially for viewing dual facing pages).  And with Deluxe Music, I can have multiple scores opened side-by-side for editing and copying and pasting.  Most games don't take advantage of RTG because they mostly use Amiga's native modes, but most productivity packages can.

And of course, as you mentioned there is price.  Most decently equipped A4000's on Ebay will go for over $1000 is the US.  You can get decently equiped PC desktops or laptops for about $500.  Add the $49.95 for the premium edition of Cloanto's AmigaForever, and you have a super Amiga for about half the price.

My only problem is playing native samples on Deluxe Music.  Often times, the timing is off on some of the more complicated scores.  That may be fixed of time with faster technology and finer tuning on WinUAE.  In the meanwhile, I can compose my music on WinUAE using MIDI output.  Then transfer them to a real Amiga to play using the Amiga chipset.

I still have a ton of Amigas (see my sig).  So for software banging the original chipset (OCS, ECS, AGA), real Amigas are better for now.  But for those that use RTG, AHI and more modern things like IDE, USB, large screen monitors, networking, WinUAE is better.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: Ral-Clan on March 03, 2013, 02:59:10 PM
Quote from: rdolores;728118
My only problem (with UAE) is playing native samples on Deluxe Music.  Often times, the timing is off on some of the more complicated scores.  That may be fixed of time with faster technology and finer tuning on WinUAE.  In the meanwhile, I can compose my music on WinUAE using MIDI output.  Then transfer them to a real Amiga to play using the Amiga chipset.

You can reduce audio latency to almost zero (the same as on a real hardware Amiga) by trying the following:

- in WinUAE's sound settings, reduce sound buffer size to "1".  

This will help a lot.  If it's not good enough, you should choose a low-latency audio driver.

I use the PortAudio ASIO driver for WinUAE, which is available from here:
http://www.winuae.net/files/stuff/portaudio.zip

After you've installed this in you UAE directory, you need to enable the PORTAUDIO checkbox in WinUAE's sound settings, then in the drop down menu at the top of the screen you need to choose:
 
PortAudio: [ASIO] .....etc. etc.....(your soundcard).

In order to do the PortAudio suggestion above, you need to already have installed a low-latency ASIO driver audio card in your PC (if you do any music recording on your PC you probably already have one).  If you don't have a low-latency audio card, you can download an ASIO driver for all generic PC soundcards from here:

http://www.asio4all.com/

Now....I use PortAudio's ASIO driver for WinUAE....and it works great for me.  I get zero latency when playing Amiga audio from an external MIDI controller (or from the computer's keyboard when triggering OctaMED samples) and when playing back music the Amiga's audio sounds are in sync with external MIDI devices.

However, Tony Wilen (developer of WinUAE) told me that the WASAPI driver (Windows low latency audio driver) is better supported in WinUAE than the PortAudio driver.  I can't use WASAPI because I still have a Windows XP computer with an older version of DirectX.  If you run a later version of Windows you can use WASAPI for low latency.

You'll have to google around for how to use that.  I haven't tried it.

Sorry to briefly hijack this thread, but I just wanted to point out that no-latency audio in WinUAE is totally possible, and makes audio/music productivity work under UAE entirely possible.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: mrmoonlight on March 03, 2013, 03:09:45 PM
Quote from: ral-clan;728120
You can reduce audio latency to almost zero (the same as on a real hardware Amiga) by trying the following:
 
- in WinUAE's sound settings, reduce sound buffer size to "1".
 
This will help a lot. If it's not good enough, you should choose a low-latency audio driver.
 
I use the PortAudio ASIO driver for WinUAE, which is available from here:
http://www.winuae.net/files/stuff/portaudio.zip
 
After you've installed this in you UAE directory, you need to enable the PORTAUDIO checkbox in WinUAE's sound settings, then in the drop down menu at the top of the screen you need to choose:
 
PortAudio: [ASIO] .....etc. etc.....(your soundcard).
 
In order to do the PortAudio suggestion above, you need to already have installed a low-latency ASIO driver audio card in your PC (if you do any music recording on your PC you probably already have one). If you don't have a low-latency audio card, you can download an ASIO driver for all generic PC soundcards from here:
 
http://www.asio4all.com/
 
Now....I use PortAudio's ASIO driver for WinUAE....and it works great for me. I get zero latency when playing Amiga audio from an external MIDI controller (or from the computer's keyboard when triggering OctaMED samples) and when playing back music the Amiga's audio sounds are in sync with external MIDI devices.
 
However, Tony Wilen (developer of WinUAE) told me that the WASAPI driver (Windows low latency audio driver) is better supported in WinUAE than the PortAudio driver. I can't use WASAPI because I still have a Windows XP computer with an older version of DirectX. If you run a later version of Windows you can use WASAPI for low latency.
 
You'll have to google around for how to use that. I haven't tried it.
 
Sorry to briefly hijack this thread, but I just wanted to point out that no-latency audio in WinUAE is totally possible, and makes audio/music productivity work under UAE entirely possible.

  Hey ral-clan ,you feel free to hijack my thread ,between you and rdolores this makes really good reading and we all learn some thing ,excellent ,Brian.:):):)
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: mrmoonlight on March 03, 2013, 03:15:57 PM
Wow rdolores  what a excellent detailed reply i have ever read ,sort of puts a little bit of a dent in the Amiga ,i will be reading this all night ,super reply my friend im off to read it all again ,thanks very much Brian.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: rdolores on March 03, 2013, 10:08:35 PM
Quote from: ral-clan;728120
You can reduce audio latency to almost zero (the same as on a real hardware Amiga) by trying the following:

- in WinUAE's sound settings, reduce sound buffer size to "1".  

This will help a lot.  If it's not good enough, you should choose a low-latency audio driver.

I use the PortAudio ASIO driver for WinUAE, which is available from here:
http://www.winuae.net/files/stuff/portaudio.zip

After you've installed this in you UAE directory, you need to enable the PORTAUDIO checkbox in WinUAE's sound settings, then in the drop down menu at the top of the screen you need to choose:
 
PortAudio: [ASIO] .....etc. etc.....(your soundcard).

In order to do the PortAudio suggestion above, you need to already have installed a low-latency ASIO driver audio card in your PC (if you do any music recording on your PC you probably already have one).  If you don't have a low-latency audio card, you can download an ASIO driver for all generic PC soundcards from here:

http://www.asio4all.com/

Now....I use PortAudio's ASIO driver for WinUAE....and it works great for me.  I get zero latency when playing Amiga audio from an external MIDI controller (or from the computer's keyboard when triggering OctaMED samples) and when playing back music the Amiga's audio sounds are in sync with external MIDI devices.

However, Tony Wilen (developer of WinUAE) told me that the WASAPI driver (Windows low latency audio driver) is better supported in WinUAE than the PortAudio driver.  I can't use WASAPI because I still have a Windows XP computer with an older version of DirectX.  If you run a later version of Windows you can use WASAPI for low latency.

You'll have to google around for how to use that.  I haven't tried it.

Sorry to briefly hijack this thread, but I just wanted to point out that no-latency audio in WinUAE is totally possible, and makes audio/music productivity work under UAE entirely possible.


I tried your suggestion.  I run Windows 7 64-bit on a  Quad-core 4 GB RAM machine.  I changed the Sound Buffer size from 7 (default) to 1.  I also unchecked all the sound drivers except WASAPI.  It didn't make much of a difference.  If you have Deluxe Music you can try it out.  A song with a single sample (accordian) like Cleopha plays fine.  But a song like Passacaglia which uses 2 samples (ElecBass and Piano) gets flusterred.  I generally use multiple samples in my compositions, often times using 4 different samples simultaneouly on the Amiga's sound chip.  I can't understand why this happens.  Playing MODs which also use multiple samples simultaneously never seems to be an issue.  I've only noticed it on Deluxe Music.  I hope to one day figure out how to compose music on a tracker like Octamed, but I'm more familiar with notational software like Deluxe Music.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: rdolores on March 03, 2013, 10:16:12 PM
Quote from: ral-clan;728120
You can reduce audio latency to almost zero (the same as on a real hardware Amiga) by trying the following:

- in WinUAE's sound settings, reduce sound buffer size to "1".  

This will help a lot.  If it's not good enough, you should choose a low-latency audio driver.

I use the PortAudio ASIO driver for WinUAE, which is available from here:
http://www.winuae.net/files/stuff/portaudio.zip

After you've installed this in you UAE directory, you need to enable the PORTAUDIO checkbox in WinUAE's sound settings, then in the drop down menu at the top of the screen you need to choose:
 
PortAudio: [ASIO] .....etc. etc.....(your soundcard).

In order to do the PortAudio suggestion above, you need to already have installed a low-latency ASIO driver audio card in your PC (if you do any music recording on your PC you probably already have one).  If you don't have a low-latency audio card, you can download an ASIO driver for all generic PC soundcards from here:

http://www.asio4all.com/

Now....I use PortAudio's ASIO driver for WinUAE....and it works great for me.  I get zero latency when playing Amiga audio from an external MIDI controller (or from the computer's keyboard when triggering OctaMED samples) and when playing back music the Amiga's audio sounds are in sync with external MIDI devices.

However, Tony Wilen (developer of WinUAE) told me that the WASAPI driver (Windows low latency audio driver) is better supported in WinUAE than the PortAudio driver.  I can't use WASAPI because I still have a Windows XP computer with an older version of DirectX.  If you run a later version of Windows you can use WASAPI for low latency.

You'll have to google around for how to use that.  I haven't tried it.

Sorry to briefly hijack this thread, but I just wanted to point out that no-latency audio in WinUAE is totally possible, and makes audio/music productivity work under UAE entirely possible.


I tried your suggestion.  I run Windows 7 64-bit on a  Quad-core 4 GB RAM machine.  I changed the Sound Buffer size from 7 (default) to 1.  I also unchecked all the sound drivers except WASAPI.  It didn't make much of a difference.  If you have Deluxe Music you can try it out.  A song with a single sample (accordian) like Cleopha plays fine.  But a song like Passacaglia which uses 2 samples (ElecBass and Piano) gets flusterred.  I generally use multiple samples in my compositions, often times using 4 different samples simultaneouly on the Amiga's sound chip.  I can't understand why this happens.  Playing MODs which also use multiple samples simultaneously never seems to be an issue.  I've only noticed it on Deluxe Music.  I hope to one day figure out how to compose music on a tracker like Octamed, but I'm more familiar with notational software like Deluxe Music.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: Ral-Clan on March 03, 2013, 10:20:43 PM
Quote from: rdolores;728179
I tried your suggestion.  I run Windows 7 64-bit on a  Quad-core 4 GB RAM machine.  I changed the Sound Buffer size from 7 (default) to 1.  I also unchecked all the sound drivers except WASAPI.  It didn't make much of a difference.  If you have Deluxe Music you can try it out.  A song with a single sample (accordian) like Cleopha plays fine.  But a song like Passacaglia which uses 2 samples (ElecBass and Piano) gets flusterred.

What?  You mean that the audio samples (the four paula voices) even get out of sync with EACH OTHER on playback?  That definitely shouldn't be happening!

I just did a test of Deluxe Music 2.0 in my WinUAE setup and it plays absolutely fine.  No stutter or hesitation even with the tune you suggested.  What version are you using?  If you are using an old version maybe it's simply a WB1.3 / WB3.1 incompatibility.

Note - you not only have to check Wasapi, you have to then select your WASAPI sound output from the dropdown menu at top.  That is, if it's anything like the PortAudio ASIO WinUAE driver.

PS: you also have to do this while the emulation is NOT running in the background (i.e. choose RESTART and then change the settings, the OK to reboot the emulated Amiga).
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: rdolores on March 03, 2013, 10:34:02 PM
Quote from: ral-clan;728184
What?  You mean that the audio samples (the four paula voices) even get out of sync with EACH OTHER on playback?  That definitely shouldn't be happening!

Note - you not only have to check Wasapi, you have to then select your WASAPI sound output from the dropdown menu at top.  That is, if it's anything like the PortAudio ASIO WinUAE driver.

PS: you also have to do this while the emulation is NOT running in the background (i.e. choose RESTART and then change the settings, the OK to reboot the emulated Amiga).


On the drop-down menu on top, "WASAPI: Default Audio Device" is selected.  The other options are "WASAPI: Speakers (High Definition Audio)" and "WASAPI: Digital Audio (S/PDIF) (High Definition Audio)".

I try playing around with the other settings.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: Ral-Clan on March 03, 2013, 11:08:34 PM
Quote from: rdolores;728186
On the drop-down menu on top, "WASAPI: Default Audio Device" is selected.  The other options are "WASAPI: Speakers (High Definition Audio)" and "WASAPI: Digital Audio (S/PDIF) (High Definition Audio)".

I try playing around with the other settings.

Can you clarify?  Are the paula voices out of sync with each other?  What exactly is the delay your are experiencing?  A delay when you play your Midi keyboard and the sound is emitted by the Amiga?

If the Paula voices are out of sync with each other then it's not a sound card latency issue and ASIO or WASAPI won't fix it, it's some other problem.  If I can get perfect Paula audio on a system much slower than yours, then you should be able to do it too. What version of WinUAE are you using?
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: rdolores on March 03, 2013, 11:11:44 PM
Quote from: ral-clan;728184
What?  You mean that the audio samples (the four paula voices) even get out of sync with EACH OTHER on playback?  That definitely shouldn't be happening!

I just did a test of Deluxe Music 2.0 in my WinUAE setup and it plays absolutely fine.  No stutter or hesitation even with the tune you suggested.  What version are you using?  If you are using an old version maybe it's simply a WB1.3 / WB3.1 incompatibility.

Note - you not only have to check Wasapi, you have to then select your WASAPI sound output from the dropdown menu at top.  That is, if it's anything like the PortAudio ASIO WinUAE driver.

PS: you also have to do this while the emulation is NOT running in the background (i.e. choose RESTART and then change the settings, the OK to reboot the emulated Amiga).


I'm using Deluxe Music 2.0 on a AOS3.9 build almost identical to the one on my real Amiga 1200 (except it has RTG).  I also had the same issue on the AmigaForever configuration.

As a test I went to the CPU and FPU properties of WinUAE.  I changed CPU Emulation Speed from "Fastest possible, but maintain chipset timing" to "Approximate A500/A1200 cycle-exact".  That fixed the timing issue in Deluxe Music playback.  But it was at the cost of performance of the WinUAE emulation.  I'll try to play around with it more to see if I can get the timing right without sacrificing too much performance.  When I has the "Fastest possible" setting, I got 90x A4000-040 on SysInfo.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: Ral-Clan on March 03, 2013, 11:29:41 PM
Quote from: rdolores;728193
I'm using Deluxe Music 2.0 on a AOS3.9 build almost identical to the one on my real Amiga 1200 (except it has RTG).  I also had the same issue on the AmigaForever configuration.

As a test I went to the CPU and FPU properties of WinUAE.  I changed CPU Emulation Speed from "Fastest possible, but maintain chipset timing" to "Approximate A500/A1200 cycle-exact".  That fixed the timing issue in Deluxe Music playback.  But it was at the cost of performance of the WinUAE emulation.  I'll try to play around with it more to see if I can get the timing right without sacrificing too much performance.  When I has the "Fastest possible" setting, I got 90x A4000-040 on SysInfo.


I'm using "fastest possible" and I do not have "cycle exact" checked, and my DMusic runs just fine.  I'm using WinUAE 2.5.1 and OS3.9 set for a 68040/JIT enabled.

I could always send you my config file...but unless you're using the exact same version of WinUAE it probably won't work.
Title: Re: Connecting cd player
Post by: rdolores on March 03, 2013, 11:48:47 PM
Quote from: ral-clan;728196
I'm using "fastest possible" and I do not have "cycle exact" checked, and my DMusic runs just fine.  I'm using WinUAE 2.5.1 and OS3.9 set for a 68040/JIT enabled.

I could always send you my config file...but unless you're using the exact same version of WinUAE it probably won't work.


I'm using WinUAE 2.3.2, but I am planning to upgrade to the latest release which is 2.5.1 as 2.6.0 is still WIP.  I would definitely like to check out your WinUAE config file.