Supersoniqs Soundstar offers 6 stereo sound channels

The new MSX hardware extension named Soundstar, delivers 6 channels of unprecedented stereo tone generated audio to the MSX system. Housed in a Konami sized cartridge, this unique piece of hardware is now available at the Supersoniqs shop.

Leave it up to MSX device manufacturer Supersoniqs to bring XO and unique MSX hardware to the table. If you're not familiar with them, have a look at the current arsenal of 8-bit electronics they have on display in their shop. Ranging from slot expanders to audio extension cards, their products are certainly one of a kind. And with their latest offering called Soundstar, Supersoniqs continue on that path.

Soundstar is a new small sized cartridge that houses true 6 channels of stereo tone-generated audio capabilities. Based on the Philips saa1099 sound chip, this monster adds layers of raw square waves to the MSX system. The SAA1099 audio chip is known for its use in the 8-bit SAM Coupé computer system. The sound chip has a lot of similarities with the PSG, but runs on steroids.

It delivers 6 frequency generators with eight octaves and 256 tones per octave, two noise generators, channel mixers, balanced amplitude control per channel with stereo enabled output, two envelope controllers, and it fits nicely in any MSX generation's cartridge slot. It runs independently and uses its own output connector. Have a listen at the songs in this playlist to get convinced of it's power. And to get you running, Soundstar has a built-in ROM with a player from Laurens Holst (Grauw) offering a collection of 6-channel tunes crafted by David Sanders (aka Pyramex)

Currently the last versions of Roboplay and VGMPlay support the Soundstar, accompanied with a load of existing SAA1099 tracked songs. As this device has a pure nostalgic feel that really fits with our 8-bit system, expect more music software to support this awesome extension.

The Supersoniqs Soundstar is available worldwide and costs 70,00 €, ex shipping. For that you get the physical cartridge boxed in a full color case included a booklet.

relevant link: Soundstar product page at the Supersoniqs shop

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Comments (23)

By nitrofurano

Champion (304)

18-05-2023, 15:26

both vgm format and Furnace Tracker supports it!!!

By Grauw

Ascended (10820)

18-05-2023, 19:32

Promo video of the SoundStar’s built-in Boombox player, with tracks from Pyramex for the Philips SAA1099 sound chip (originally made for the Sam Coupé):

SoundStar Boombox promo (YouTube)

Enjoyed working on this a lot, I really like Pyramex’s music and the SAA1099 sound. Cool sound chip!

By ToriHino

Paladin (925)

18-05-2023, 23:20

Indeed, very nice sound chip. For me it is positioned somewhere between the PSG and the SID of the Commodore 64 (although this one of course has more channels and is in stereo).

By NYYRIKKI

Enlighted (6091)

19-05-2023, 06:37

Nice!... Out of curiosity: Does this work in I/O only "slot" ?

By ToriHino

Paladin (925)

19-05-2023, 07:25

The sound chip itself is I/O only so yes that works. There is a rom which is used for detection by the players (and next to that it also 'resets' the chip and has a demo application with a number of songs), I know at least Roboplay will still work although it states that the chip is not detected.

By ren

Paragon (1947)

19-05-2023, 08:59

Very nice/cool team effort!

Who's responsible for the artwork?

By jlemos

Resident (60)

22-05-2023, 04:17

Amazing hardware and sound!

By ro

Scribe (5059)

22-05-2023, 08:04

I was wondering if openMSX emulates this awesome thing..

By Grauw

Ascended (10820)

22-05-2023, 15:40

I have work in progress openMSX emulation, which I used to help me develop the software. However it isn't finished yet, code is still messy and it doesn't support reverse and debugging properly yet.

By defdanny

Scribe (391)

23-05-2023, 06:48

Are there any music tracker programs (for PC, like Arkos tracker or MSX native) that would allow to create music for the Soundstar?

By david.sanders

Supporter (11)

23-05-2023, 11:55

Furnace Tracker supports SAA1099 and exports VGM export, but I don't think there's anything that would give you something optimised for MSX yet.

By Grauw

Ascended (10820)

23-05-2023, 20:08

The online SAA1099Tracker supports export to a binary format + player for the Z80.

Additionally, I could add SAA1099 support to re-play VGM converter/player if there is a demand and concrete project someone wants to use it for. In addition to a more compact data format, I recently also started looking at dictionary compression again which should make for files that are a lot smaller than plain VGM files.

p.s. Hi David! I see you mention in another thread that you bought an MSX2, cool!

By ducasp

Paladin (712)

23-05-2023, 23:42

What IO ports are used? Perhaps I can implement it on second gen ocm devices in my firmware

By Grauw

Ascended (10820)

24-05-2023, 02:00

I would suggest to allow this new product to sell and recoup the investment first…

However, the information is no secret:

Quote:

SoundStar Boombox firmware ROM

The firmware serves three purposes; to allow for detection of the SoundStar, to initialise the SAA1099 sound chip after a reset, and to give a demonstration of SoundStar’s capabilities. The Boombox music demo lets you listen to some great tracks created by David Sanders (Pyramex), one of the sound stars of the British Sam Coupé scene.

On boot the firmware ROM resets the Philips SAA1099 sound chip, to silence it in case the computer is reset while it was playing, since the chip has no reset input pin of its own.

Software can detect the presence of SoundStar by checking for the SAA1099 ID string at address 4010H in one of the slots. When found, the SoundStar can be accessed on I/O ports 04H (data) and 05H (address). Refer to the SAA1099 application manual for technical information and the register description.

To run the Boombox player, either keep RETURN or joystick 1 button A pressed while booting the computer or call _SOUNDSTAR from MSX-BASIC.

In the Boombox player, you can use the following controls:

Cursors or d-pad to select track / side
SPACE or A to play / pause track
BACKSPACE or B to stop track
CAPS LOCK to enable autoplay
SELECT to toggle frequency
ESC to quit

By ducasp

Paladin (712)

24-05-2023, 13:21

The idea would be to offer a firmware (which currently less than 20 persons use my custom firmware) for those who have a SX2 / SM-X (not for OCM or Zemmix Neo) just the chip at the I/O address, probably a reset audio feature made on the chip itself but no bios of any kind, would you think it would hurt sales of this product? If so, I'll respect your opinion and not release it in the following months, just thought this could help a little promoting this sound chip and I like having a build with multiple extra sound chips (like now I have one w/2XPSG and 1X SN76489), this seemed like a nice and easy addition to that line of build I have fort SM-X and SX2, but don't want to hurt anyone business if you think that this is the case.

By Grauw

Ascended (10820)

24-05-2023, 17:01

Well idk, but it seems something to consider. You can ask SuperSoniqs what they think, I just made the software . However I appreciate the enthusiasm!

By david.sanders

Supporter (11)

24-05-2023, 17:32

Good to see you Laurens. Yes I'd already got myself an AX350 II before you guys emailed me about SoundStar, which was a massive coincidence

By defdanny

Scribe (391)

07-06-2023, 18:38

Thanks David. Just want to give you praise for this bomb tune "High Color"! Surely for your other stuff, too!
Found it in the demo song repo of the SAA1099 Web Tracker (@grauw thanks for pointing me to this tracker). Ah, and its the first track in the boombox player. This is more than justified!

The SAA1099 sounds like the PSG deluxe, like its mature brother. So cool. Really would like to do some stuff with it.

By ToriHino

Paladin (925)

07-06-2023, 20:06

This song, together with a large number of additional songs, is also added to the RoboPlayStarterPack under the ETC (E-Tracker) folder to enjoy on the SoundStar.

By Robosoft

Expert (115)

05-07-2023, 14:20

Received mine yesterday. Works great, and sounds great!
One problem when also using a Carnivore2, the Soundstar has to be in a cartridge slot before the Carnivore2, otherwise it blocks the booting of the CF card.
On my Turbo-r this means slotexpander with Soundstar in slot 1, Carnivore2 in slot 2.

By david.sanders

Supporter (11)

10-07-2023, 12:01

Thanks for your support

The SAA is one clock-reset mechanism away from being perfect IMO - I just wish I could make every replay of a track identical, but the phase difference for frequency modulation isn't deterministic.

By -Neo-

Champion (399)

14-09-2023, 20:14

I was looking at vgmrips for some vgm's for this chip but only saw 4 collection registered for it. Are there other places with more vgm tracks for the soundstar?

By Grauw

Ascended (10820)

15-09-2023, 17:34

You can search the ZXArt music database by Sound Type SAA to find a lot of ETC / COP / SAA files (those are all extensions used for ETracker music), and play them with RoboPlay.

I haven’t found many VGMs for the SAA around unfortunately, although there’s no technical reason they can’t be made, someone needs to do it and that seems like that has not occurred very much.

Supersoniqs Soundstar offers 6 stereo sound channels

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