E L P M A S - de bi rc se d yli m af s` R E K C A R T P E E B R E T SI

SAMPLE-TRACKER’s family described
by MISTER BEEP
in 20.01.2014.
Do you want to make MOD-like (digital) music? It’s easier than you could imagine. ;)
It’s possible with your 1-bit Beeper of ZX Spectrum 48K! You really don’t need AMIGA to do it!! Ha!
This instruction _should_ be OK for those SampleTrackers:
- SampleTracker 2.0 (tape)
- SampleTracker 2.1 (BetaDisk drive / TR-DOS)
- SampleTracker 2.0d (tape / MB-02+ diskdrive)
- SampleTracker 3T (tape)
- SampleTracker 3D (disk – probably D40/D80 type)
As for me – the best is SampleTracker 2.1 for TR-DOS. Although it requires Spectrum 128K to work - BUT its
final modules can normally work on 48K! Also it has far better octave range - six!! (Well, almost. Five, let’s say,
because Octave 1 is actually only one note: C-1 and it’s as low as hell, so doesn’t sound reasonably. Maybe for
some blast or whatever? ;) ) I recommend rather the Russian version anyway.
If you have no Spectrum 128K, then you can use all the rest of the editors (all of them work with standard 48K
machines but you will have only 3 octaves to use).
I will focus on two the most popular versions: SampleTracker 2.0 (tape) and SampleTracker 2.1 (BetaDisk drive /
TR-DOS).
Controls: QAOP/SPACE.
Moving inside the pattern: cursors + ENTER as DELETE.
R = MUTE NOTE.
1) TAPE: You load all the samples you want to use. Until the RAM if full, probably. :) You do it with “LOAD
SAMPLE” button. NOT: “LOAD SAMPLES”!! The editor will load the first next sample from tape. There
will appear the sample’s name in the “SAMPLE NAME” corner. The samples’ counter doesn’t move
automatically here, so to load another sample you HAVE TO change the samples’ number manually.
2) BETADISK: You load all the samples you want to use. Until the RAM if full, probably. :) You do it with
“LOAD SAMPLE” button. NOT: “LOAD SAMPLES”!! The editor will display DIR/catalogue. You
navigate there with QAOP/SPACE too. There will appear the loaded sample’s name in the “SAMPLE
NAME” corner. The samples’ counter MOVES AUTOMATICALLY up (!) to be ready to load another
sample. When you finished loading samples, press CTRL+SHIFT (left SHIFT+right SHIFT on some
Spectrums) or simply SymbolShift+CapsShift on Spectrums without PC keyboard – you LEAVE the
DIR/catalogue section and you’re back in the SampleTracker’s editor.
3) You can load up to 15 samples. You have 28416 bytes for samples in the TAPE version. You have 28160
bytes for samples in the BETADISK version.
4) To test your samples / to compose music - you have to press “EDIT” button.
5) TAPE: To change OCTAVE press 1,2,3 keys while “EDIT” is ON.
6) BETADISK: To change OCTAVE press 1,2,3,4,5,6 keys while “EDIT” is ON.
7) To exit the “EDIT” mode press “STOP” button. But I hardly do it as the program can be easily in the
“EDIT” mode almost all the time.
8) “PLAY” to play (song). What a surprise.
9) To STOP playing press ANY KEY. And do NOT look for the “Any Key” on keyboard, please.
10) To play pattern press… yes, the “PATTERN” button.
11) ON/OFF channels: A,B,C in the right/upper side of the screen.
12) To change presently edited pattern – “P:01” and up/down arrows (01 is the number of the pattern, 02, 03
and so on).
13) To change SPEED (tempo) you have to LEAVE THE “EDIT” MODE with the “STOP” key. Now you can
change the speed by moving cursors left/right (5 and 8 keys). Possibly with SHIFT, on some machines.
SPEED is 1 to 16 degrees.
14) To change the presently used sample press up/down arrows near to the “SAMPLE” section. IT DOESN
NOT applies to load/clear sample!
15) To LOAD sample into a desired place/number, set the proper number by pressing up/down arrows near to
the “LOAD SAMPLE” section.
16) To CLEAR (delete) sample from a desired place/number, set the number by pressing up/down arrows near
to the “CLEAR SAMPLE” section. When you press the “CLEAR SAMPLE” button, there will be
highlighted two buttons: “BACK” (cancel) and “OK” (do it!). Press whatever you need.
17) COPYING. You can copy only channels, not entire patterns. But the pattern has only 3 channels, so it’s not
too much work, believe me. In the “FROM PATTERN” section set required source pattern (use the
up/down arrows). In the “TO PATTERN” section set required destination pattern (use the up/down arrows).
Set the source channel in “FROM CHANNEL” section by pressing the “A” letter (it will change in the
loop, into B, C, and A again – and so on). Set the destination channel in “TO CHANNEL” section by
pressing the “A” letter (it will change in the loop, into B, C, and A again – and so on). Now press “MOVE
BLOCK” button (copy channel): there will be highlighted two buttons: “BACK” (cancel) and “OK” (do
it!). Press whatever you need. Done. Most comfortable.
18) TAPE: Change the sound-chip used in “OUT” section. Press the “AY CHIP” there (it will change in the
loop, into SPEAKER {Beeper}, D/A OUT {Czech covox}, and AY CHIP again – and so on). Of course we
are interested in SPEAKER (Beeper).
19) BETADISK: Change the sound-chip used in “OUT” section. Press the “AY CHIP” there (it will change in
the loop, into BEEPER, COVOX 1 {standard ZX covox – Russian}, COVOX 2, COVOX 4 {various covox
models, including the Soundrive, I presume} and AY CHIP again – and so on). Of course we are interested
in BEEPER.
20) BETADISK: You can change diskdrive with the “DRIVE” button. Default is “A” drive, as usual on ZX
Spectrum with TR-DOS.
21) “CLEAR POSITION” button clears ALL positions of the song - there will be highlighted two buttons:
“BACK” (cancel) and “OK” (do it!). Press whatever you need.
22) “CLEAR PATTERN” button clears ONLY ONE PATTERN – the one you are presently in (possible to
change in the P:01, P:02, P:03 – and so on – section). There will be highlighted two buttons: “BACK”
(cancel) and “OK” (do it!). Press whatever you need.
23) “CLEAR SONG” button clears ENTIRE song, including samples, positions and patterns’ content. There
will be highlighted two buttons: “BACK” (cancel) and “OK” (do it!). Press whatever you need.
24) FREE section shows you free amount of RAM for samples.
25) You can change the sample’s name by pressing “SAMPLENAME” button. Finish editing the name by
ENTER key.
26) You can change the song’s name by pressing “SONGNAME” button. Finish editing the name by ENTER
key.
27) And now. The peculiarity of SampleTracker family: saving and loading your work WHILE making music.
When you have all the required samples’ set, you can save them just ONCE, by using “SAVE SAMPLES”
button. It will save entire set of your samples into one file/block. Later while composing you can save only
your music-data (notes from the tracks) with the “SAVE SONG” button. When you will be loading your
work after some break in composing, you can load the last version of the song with “LOAD SONG” button
and then – “LOAD SAMPLES” button. Et voila – you have your song loaded and ready for further
composing. (We can SAVE anything only with EDIT turned-OFF!!!!! Unlike LOAD by the way).
Another thing is: seems like you must save the song and samples at least once before saving the final
module (compiling) + the player!!
28) TAPE: This is more/less all about the tape version (2.0). It’s because the program is designed for 48K
machines, so there was no RAM to implement the COMPILER (a program that prepares your music to use
in your own program). Here: the COMPILER is a stand-alone / external program: SAMPLETRACKER
SONG COMPILER.
Short USAGE instruction of the COMPILER: LOAD SONG / LOAD SAMPLES / COMPILE / set
SONGNAME / set BEEPER-AY-COVOX device / SAVE FINAL. Ah, and read carefully the
INFORMATION WINDOW because there will appear the instruction how to load, init and play your song
in your own program. I might be wrong here, in some details, as I used the 2.0 version years ago.
29) BETADISK: SampleTracker 2.1 is a program designed to use on Spectrum 128K. Hence – it has the
COMPILER already implemented (the program that prepares your music to use in your own program).
Press the “EXT” button. Press “SAVE MODULE” button. Press “SAVE PLAYER” button (be sure that
earlier you set the BEEPER device in the main window of SampleTracker 2.1!!!!!!). That’s all. Press the
“RETURN SAMPLE TRACKER” button to go back to the main window of the editor.
Remember! Seems like you must SAVE the song and samples at least once before saving the final
module (compiling) + the player!!
I haven’t described here the “Song structure” section because it is rather obvious for everybody who encountered
any tracker before. I assume the POSITION, PATTERN and LENGTH are clear.
Minor (and most annoying) differences in SampleTracker 3T (probably also in 3D):
- Enter to EDIT mode: press “E” key”.
- Exit the EDIT mode: press “W” key”.
- PLAY entire song: press CTRL (probably the SymbolShift, if you have no PC keyboard with your
Spectrum. Could be the CapsShift also, but I don’t think so – you have to test it).
- Devices: AY CHIP, SPEAKER (Beeper), D/A4BIT (some weird transducer), D/A8BIT (the Czech covox, I
presume).
- Many degrees of SPEED here. All the basic values (here: 1,2,3 and so on – to G) have also additional subdegrees: a,b,c,d,e,f,g.
I do hope I’m not wrong here, but that’s how the simplest BASIC player-program should look like, for your Beeper
digital / MOD-like music on ZX Spectrum 48K:
At least that’s how it looks for the SampleTracker 2.1 modules. The CLEAR and RANDOMIZE USR should be
always the same. However if you hear some strange things on your samples, after compiling, then try to make the
CLEAR command lower. For instance into 29200. It helped in my case, anyway.
Here are some examples of the 1-bit/Beeper SampleTracker 2.0 music, recorded into MP3 from real ZX hardware:
http://z80.i-demo.pl/mister_beep-digital_world.mp3
http://z80.i-demo.pl/MISTER_BEEP-1_bit_is_enuff.mp3
http://z80.i-demo.pl/MISTER_BEEP-Cosmic_Escape.mp3 (in this one, the short intro has been made in another
editor – a chiptune one, but all the rest comes from SampleTracker).
© 20 – 31.01.2014 by MISTER BEEP
http://mister_beep.republika.pl/
http://1bit.i-demo.pl/