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Donkey Kong on MAME - sound quality not accurate
SavannahLion:
--- Quote from: BadMouth on March 29, 2011, 11:31:47 am ---The question for the Devs would be - What did they use for reference, the signal from the board or the sound from the speaker?
--- End quote ---
In all likelihood, the signal from the board. Can't see much incentive for any MAMEDev to emulate the speaker itself.
boardjunkie:
+1 on the suggestion to add some sort of audio EQ-ing....even if its just simple passive (cut only) bass and treble controls. Newer games don't generally need attention here, but the older games used cheap speakers with limited bandwidth, 'specially in the high end. This actually worked to an advantage....it rolled off high end not needed by the game sounds and the nasty audio artifacts that came from the rudimentary D/A converters. For an example, fire up Galaxian and route the audio thru a good home stereo.....ick. You don't hear the odd noises on the real game because the speaker can't reproduce it. Or its at least attenuated enough that you don't notice it.
So it would be great if the dev's would include audio eq adjustment overall, and on a game-by-game basis in the tab menu.
newmanfamilyvlogs:
What we need is support for VST/DX effects >:D
If they're already using DirectX for sound output
There are tons of speaker cabinet modeling software that would probably liven up the sound of the emulation. A touch of reverb would probably add a good bit too.. just enough to simulate being in a large arcade with a few subtle reflections bouncing off the nearby cabs.
Here's a page with a simple host and some code:
http://www.hermannseib.com/english/vsthost.htm
javeryh:
I honestly don't know the difference even though I played DK in the arcade a ton (25+ years ago!). I use MAME .119u4 or something like that and I think I like the sound better than when you used to use samples - it's less annoying/softer, IMO but I honestly don't care at all - I can't tell and so far no one that's played on my cab can tell either. :cheers:
Paul Olson:
I think there have been recent changes to the driver (since maybe .130 or so) that have made it sound worse. I saw a bug report about DKJr sounding muffled on Mametesters from .130.
these games all used the Sanyo EZ monitor which has an audio board on it. This could explain the difference if MAME is now emulating the DK PCB, but not the monitor board. I have a DK; I will try to record it this weekend.