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[Horla]

hello,

i am looking for an alternative to deliplayer. it really served me well over the years, especially when converting exotic amiga formats to wav. but since it became more and more difficult to run under win7 without weird problems, i need an alternative.

so i tried xmplay on converting some mods to wav, but they sound a bit different than the old deliplayer ones.

i prefer the sound to be original crisp and pure without any optimization.

in deliplayer i therefore turned off all optimization and set bypass sfx plugins before converting. i already set off the 3 mixing options in the mod tab of xmplay, but there is a lot more settings.

maybe some 'experts' can help me and have some hints for me on the correct settings in the options/plugins for xmplay.


ps: can i use deliplayers amiga players in xmplay?

[saga]

You can use the xmp-delix plugin, but it will only cover the formats not natively supported by XMPlay (that is, ProTracker MOD would still be handled by XMPlay). I found the best options to go with oldskool MODs would be turning of interpolation and ramping, sounds good enough for me. Most of the time, two mod players will never sound quite the same, so the fidelity might differ. Maybe you should provide an example file and how you would want it to sound like, so that we can give you a proper recommendation.

[Horla]

You can use the xmp-delix plugin, but it will only cover the formats not natively supported by XMPlay (that is, ProTracker MOD would still be handled by XMPlay).

will outputs with delix plugin then sound more equal to exotic mod wavs i converted with deliplayer?

I found the best options to go with oldskool MODs would be turning of interpolation and ramping, sounds good enough for me.

so there is no other settings to check if you want the pure unaltered amiga sound?

Most of the time, two mod players will never sound quite the same, so the fidelity might differ. Maybe you should provide an example file and how you would want it to sound like, so that we can give you a proper recommendation.

i'm on a slow connection atm, therefore a bit difficult.

ps if i want the max support for old amiga formats, what plugins should i look for besides oldskool and delix? and will there be no conflict between them, when supporting a format twice?

[Dotpitch]

... i already set off the 3 mixing options in the mod tab of xmplay, but there is a lot more settings.

Take a look at the Illustrated Manual.

will outputs with delix plugin then sound more equal to exotic mod wavs i converted with deliplayer?

I guess so, since...

XMP-DELIX is a plugin for XMPlay for playing music from many various (and often exotic) file formats from the Amiga computer. DELIX works like a wrapper that allows XMPlay to use EaglePlayer and DeliTracker plugins (known as eagleplayers and deliplayers). (link)

Though that's obviously no guarantee .

[saga]

so there is no other settings to check if you want the pure unaltered amiga sound?

If you disable interpolation and ramping, and also leave any other DSP units (reverb/EQ/etc.) untouched, you will get absolutely raw, unprocessed sound, however this raw sound will of course not incorporate the same colouring that the Paula chip might introduce. It will sound similar, but since there is no special filtering being done, it will probably not quite sound 100% the same. This will give you a clean digital sound, I wouldn't call the Amiga output "pure" or "unaltered" for that reason. You may try increasing the stereo separation to have true 100% left/right channels, but that might just hurt your ears and not actually sound better.

ps if i want the max support for old amiga formats, what plugins should i look for besides oldskool and delix? and will there be no conflict between them, when supporting a format twice?

Native XMPlay plugins are always preferred over Winamp plugins, so XMPlay will first check if Delix can play a tune, and if it can't, Oldskool may try to decode the file.

[Horla]

thank you for your kind help.

Native XMPlay plugins are always preferred over Winamp plugins, so XMPlay will first check if Delix can play a tune, and if it can't, Oldskool may try to decode the file.

ok but when recording, there is no way to see which plugin has been used for converting? for now i use these plugins - oldskool, delix, modplug and modpacker. is there also a priority among these?

just a quick question, maybe i overlooked it in the manual, but is there a chance to resize the xmplay main window skin/font. i use the bs2000 skin which i like very much, but actually it is very tiny.

ps forgot to ask, what mod playback mode should i select best, normal?

[saga]

ok but when recording, there is no way to see which plugin has been used for converting?

While the song is playing, open the settings dialog and go to the plugins section - the currently active plugin will be highlighted.

for now i use these plugins - oldskool, delix, modplug and modpacker. is there also a priority with these?

Plugins are ordered by format, then file name, so in this case it should be delix, modplug, oldskool. I'm not sure at which step archive plugins like modpacker are applied, I would guess either before or after all other plugins have been tried.

just a quick question, maybe i overlooked it in the manual, but is there a chance to resize the xmplay main window skin/font. i use the bs2000 skin which i like very much, but actually it is very tiny.

No, skins aren't resizable.

[Horla]

While the song is playing, open the settings dialog and go to the plugins section - the currently active plugin will be highlighted.

that is very interesting. i did check the input tab after playing various amiga formats and the delix plugin was always highlightened. when playing mod, it was the cd audio plugin.

in my case the oldskool plugin becomes absolutely useless.

i was curious to see differences with the output of delix and oldskool, so i converted some mods. with delix there is no options to make, but with oldskool i changed to filtering (never).


here are the results:


thalion.fc13

delix: 5:03
skool: 2:26


paranoimia msx2.cust

delix: 6:16
skool: 6:16


walkman.fc14

delix: 6:16
skool: 1:17


the sound of deliplayer, delix and oldskool differ a little bit, and the process to record took very long with oldskool compared to delix. also the length of the fc13 + fc14 mods is different. strange that the deliplayer wavs is just as long as the oldskool ones, i expected the delix to be comparable with them?

so after all, it seems the oldskool plugin is more accurate concerning the length (maybe also for sound?)

it would be great to deactivate a plugin, because i had to delete the delix plugin so to record with oldskool.

[Dotpitch]

it would be great to deactivate a plugin, because i had to delete the delix plugin so to record with oldskool.

On the Input Plugins page of Options and stuff, you can define so-called 'Priority filetypes' per plugin. For those extensions, the plugin will have preference over other plugins (and even over XMPlay internal decoder).

[saga]

when playing mod, it was the cd audio plugin.

That's because MOD isn't played with a plugin, so the first entry is highlighted.

in my case the oldskool plugin becomes absolutely useless.

It's also old and probably not worth using anymore. XMPlay has better alternatives, like Delix.
Since Delix actually uses actual Amiga replay code, I would expect it to be more accurate that the oldskool plugin.

[Horla]

On the Input Plugins page of Options and stuff, you can define so-called 'Priority filetypes' per plugin. For those extensions, the plugin will have preference over other plugins (and even over XMPlay internal decoder).

good to know, anyway, a plugin deactivate button would be fine to have

That's because MOD isn't played with a plugin, so the first entry is highlighted.

yes i thought so.

It's also old and probably not worth using anymore. XMPlay has better alternatives, like Delix.
Since Delix actually uses actual Amiga replay code, I would expect it to be more accurate that the oldskool plugin.

well, i also favour delix, although wished (if possible?) it would play all mods only one time + without interrupting somewhere. so you are not always 'forced' to edit the wav later.

[Fraggie]

As far as I can remember delix does not have any song end detection implemented, so basically it's supposed to play forever. I'm not sure who's interrupting your recording at 6:16 

[Horla]

hello sebastian,

must have been some friendly spirit, otherwise waiting would have taken ages 

in fact i tried with more mods, and delix will mostly stop converting at 6:16? so far that is the maximum i get 

so with this song end detection missing there is no (controlled) way to record a mod just for one time, i guess?

[Dotpitch]

If you play the songs instead of converting them, how far does it get? 6:16 as well?

[Horla]

tested the mods and they will play beyond 6:16, when not converting.

[Jimmy Neutron]

This reminds me of an issue I had with SHN files a while back.

The file would play the entire length but would not convert or write to disk using XMPlay (or any other tool) beyond 5:41.

http://www.un4seen.com/forum/?topic=12648.msg87803#msg87803

I gave up on the issue and figured it wasn't meant to be.  Don't know know if this could be related.  The time is different, but maybe there's a header or memory issue somewhere or something.

[Dotpitch]

Are you using the WAV-writer? What is the filesize for that 6:16 file?

[Horla]

im using wave writer normalize and the size is 66.920.044 bytes. i actually tried wave writer for the first time which will record beyond 6:16.

regarding the song end detection in delix, would it be a hard task to add that feature? or could the global track loop setting in xmplay be changed to have control in that case?

[Fraggie]

I have no interest in digging out the old code, sorry.
It's better to spend the time on delix/ng. (I know you don't believe me it's in progress, but it really is! )

[Horla]

ok i see. please take your time, but im ready to get surprised!  

any suggestion on how to convert a bunch of mods (as with delix) now, without having to edit the wavs length later on?

(oldskool has some trouble to play them correctly)