Re: [stella] Kid Vid Voice Module

Subject: Re: [stella] Kid Vid Voice Module
From: "Russell Babylon" <babylon@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Tue, 23 Jan 2001 20:13:12 -0500
----- Original Message -----
From: Kevin Horton <khorton@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: <stella@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, January 21, 2001 5:55 AM
Subject: Re: [stella] Kid Vid Voice Module


> At 19:36 1/19/01 +0100, you wrote:
> >At 18.58 17/01/01 -0500, Russell Babylon wrote:
> >
> >>The Kid Vid module was a pretty slick way to add voice and music to
Atari
> >>games in the early 80's.  Each tape apparently had a preamble portion
> >>that had a sequence of high pitched tones that were filtered out by the
> >>Kid Vid Module and then sent in binary form to the 2600.  From this
> >>information the 2600 could determine which game on the cartridge it was
> >>supposed to play and then start it.  Once the game was under way the
tape
> >>player was under program control from the 2600.
>
> Actually, the tapes are in stereo.  The "program audio" is on one channel,
> and the feeps are on the other.  Remember too that the tape player is NOT
a
> standard model and has been highly specialized for this.   One could
easily
> make a "cue file" for the 2600 emulator that would simulate the feeps in
> order.  this could allow one to "emulate" the preamble and other
> things.  (heh, someone could go as far to put text in the cue file that
> would be printed instead of the audio :-)

If the tapes are in stereo then why do I hear the feeps very distinctly when
playing the tapes on a non Kid Vid Player?  I assume the channel separation
is not that poor.  I remember the old Worlds of Wonder Teddy Ruskin (which I
believe was founded by Nolan Bushnell) used this technique but you could not
hear the program information for the robotics unless you played the tape on
a stereo tape player and listened to the other channel.  I think the tapes
may have the "feeps" recorded along with the audio information and then have
the Kid Vid extract them using a high pass filter.  This is just my gut
feeling from playing with the Kid Vid for a couple of weeks.

Russ Babylon


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