ADX Player Ver. 2.2 by Mstz80ax

It has been 2 years since the Japanese user Mstz80ax, well-known for his amazing ZANAC EX OPLL soundtrack composed for the same game patch, officially introduced his own player called X-PLA and ADX music file format.

Over the past year, Mstz80ax has been experimenting with new techniques such as the addition of PCM samples, stereo FM and double PSG in order to improve the sound capabilities. You can see some nice examples of these implementations with Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, Metroid or Thunder Cross compositions.

It is worth mentioning that the development of this powered ADX file format has been performed with openMSX thanks to its available performances and flexibility. In case we would like to play these songs in real hardware, taking as a reference an MSX computer with built-in FM sound source, and according to the Mstz80ax conclusions we should make significant changes at the hardware level. First of all splitting the PSG and internal FM outputs, also the PCM channel in MSX turbo R computers (the audio fix is well recommended for these computers). After that, these three sound sources should be taken out separately so the sound balance can be adjusted externally with a mixer. The sound output of the built-in FM should be on the left channel and the PSG and PCM sound sources should be on the center channel. Finally the external FM-PAC audio output should be on the right channel. Please check the picture attached from openMSX for a recommended sound balance.

Regarding PSG sound, the tests were done with MegaFlashROM SCC + SD implementation.

This version 2.2 fixes some bugs from previous releases. New functions and features has been added such as the ability to play larger data improving the sound experience.

Thanks to Mstz80ax this new player plus 28 new songs and the Space Harrier and Gradius 2 albums has just been uploaded to our database for your enjoyment. English manual included!

Relevant link: ADX Player download
Relevant link: Mstz80ax on Twitter

Comments (12)

By sdsnatcher73

Prophet (3808)

13-01-2021, 16:00

Very cool stuff. I could not find yet which track supports dual PSG but I am enjoying the stereo FM a lot (for now just on openMSX) have to invest in hardware mods

By Pencioner

Scribe (1530)

13-01-2021, 17:12

I have audio mixer and separate outputs for cards. hope to play around with it at weekend

13-01-2021, 18:21

Well you need to split of the internal OPLL from the PSG, possibly dual external OPLL might do the trick as well on a machine with no internal one. But at least 1 needs to be a real FM-PAC (that keeps I/O disabled if another OPLL is detected).

The trick is to get 2 OPLL on stereo L/R respectively but (both) PSG and PCM on center.

Something to try is see if MMCSD’s PCM (which acts like turbo R PCM) works as well (my MMCSD is out for upgrade but I know Pencioner can try it on his MMCSD )

By ToriHino

Paladin (814)

13-01-2021, 19:25

Very nice player
Sounds like a format which also would fit very well to the OPL4: two times OPLx (except only 1 time the FM drums) with stereo channel selection, PCM channel(s) and most carts already have a separate output from the (internal) PSG.

13-01-2021, 19:05

Just tried this on real HW with 2 external FM-PACs (one in Carnivore2, one original FM-PAC) this seems to work (of course it is not correct for this player because C2 outputs FM to MSX as well), will try with GR8NET later on. I did notice there is an issue in writing the line for the time and repeat info:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/1WwGbypqxRTJYqbY9

This did not happen on openMSX (with a turbo R, I used a Sanyo PHC-35J MSX2+ in this test).

13-01-2021, 19:45

sdsnatcher73 wrote:

3.5MHz Z80 can't handle the turboR PCM timings. So without tR it is useless (well not completely, MMC/SD has some video and audio player which utilizes it without Z80 though, but that's another story)

By Parn

Paladin (815)

15-01-2021, 13:52

I've been enjoying it on OpenMSX 16.0 for some time now, but for the life of me I can't make it work correctly with any Turbo-R configuration. The sound gets messed up, garbled and distorted. I've also tried with a Sanyo PHC-23J(B) (MSX2), a Sanyo PHC-70FD (MSX2+) and a Panasonic FS-A1WSX and they all worked fine. Did anyone else also had this problem?

By Pac

Scribe (6908)

16-01-2021, 17:16

BTW you can listen all the previous ADX files submitted by Mstz80ax with this new command line based player although they don't feature stereo or PCM. More files were uploaded along with his X-PLA graphic player.

17-01-2021, 21:56

Parn wrote:

The sound gets messed up, garbled and distorted.

Just FYI, this seems to be a bug in the new NukeYKT core in OpenMSX. Maybe it doesn't like data sent to it too fast. It could also be related to imperfect emulation since Mstz80ax says it works fine on real hardware. I created some Turbo-R and FM-PAC configurations with it disabled (I presume, since I removed the ym2413-core tag) and it worked fine on OpenMSX. I will report it.

18-01-2021, 13:15

This is super embarrassing and sorry for double-posting, but the issue above was my own fault. A long time ago I changed the default R800 speed in my settings and forgot to reset it back. As we say here in Brazil, the bug was between the keyboard and the screen. I'm very sorry about it.

18-02-2021, 19:12

New version 2.1 uploaded with some bug fixes and a new album (Space Harrier).

25-04-2021, 01:35

New version 2.2 uploaded with some bug fixes, new functions and the Gradius 2 album.

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