Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxl!houxm!houxz!vax135!cornell!uw-beaver!tektronix!hplabs!hao!seismo!harvard!wjh12!genrad!decvax!cca!ima!ism780b!paul From: paul@ism780b.UUCP Newsgroups: net.micro.cbm Subject: Re: Music software reviews Message-ID: <54@ism780b.UUCP> Date: Tue, 14-Aug-84 00:28:12 EDT Article-I.D.: ism780b.54 Posted: Tue Aug 14 00:28:12 1984 Date-Received: Sun, 12-Aug-84 00:20:14 EDT Lines: 45 Nf-ID: #R:unc:-749400:ism780b:26500003:000:2414 Nf-From: ism780b!paul Aug 6 22:02:00 1984 I have a couple of C-64 music programs: Music Construction Set (Elephonic Farts) - I feel really stupid for having bought this turkey. There no SID control (11 or so predefined sounds is all you get - pick 1 each for the upper and lower staffs). Music entry/editing is cute but tedious. The display is white-on-black, no other option, which besides being boring is NOT one of the more legible combinations on most TV sets. The controls don't work well. A sloppy port of a toy program. Musicalc (Waveform) - much better, but still not perfect. They call it a "synthesizer and sequencer" rather than a music composer, and that's pretty accurate. You can manipulate all the SID controls to your heart's content while the music plays -- but the music is limited to 240 "steps", where a step is equal to the shortest note time in the piece. You can manually switch between any of 32 240-step "scores" and any of 32 different sound settings (all in RAM at once). Musicalc 2, which I don't have, is supposed to allow linking scores together to make a longer piece. There's a realtime keyboard mode (recording or not), and a graphic score editing mode (which I like better). There is a "modulator" feature for feeding back voice 3 into the SID controls, but aside from that you can't have the program change the waveform for you automatically during a score. The real bad news is that with all these features, every key on the 64 means umpteen different things depending on which mode and submode you're in, and whether the shift and/or Commodore keys are down. It's the most amazingly modal (as in "what mode am I in?") user interface I've ever seen. Let's see, there's sound control mode (with switch and slider submodes), several varieties of keyboard mode, score edit mode, score/preset select mode, mode selection mode.... But you can get used to it eventually. Apologies for posting to news instead of the person asking about music software, but I'm too lazy to figure out how to mail to him. Besides, my opinions are sure to be of universal interest :-). Paul Perkins -- INTERACTIVE Systems USENET: ...{uscvax|ucla-vax|vortex}!ism780!paul ...decvax!cca!ima!ism780!paul MILNET(?): decvax!cca!ima!ism780!paul@ucb-vax Disclaimer: This message is provided AS IS. The reader assumes all risk as to the accuracy of the content and its usefulness for any particular purpose.