Name¶

bsvplay — convert BASICA music data to PCM

Syntax¶

bsvplay [-i part] [-q part] [-r rate] [file...] | aplay -f dat -c 1

Description¶

bsvplay will convert BASICA binary music data to linear 16-bit raw PCM. Normally, you will be wanting to pipe it into a raw PCM player like aplay(1) to actually output it to a sound device. Consider lowring the system volume beforehand to avoid surprise loud output. Square waves contain odd harmonics and the total power is ~57% higher (1.95 dB). By default, bsvplay mix a square wave rendition with a sine wave rendition 1:1 to reduce the effect of odd harmonics and reduce the power.

Do note that the music data is embedded in BSV/EXE/COM files and needs to be manually located. It is usually very evident from a regular pattern in hexdumps.

Options¶

-q part

Part to mix square waves in (default: 1.0)

-i part

Part to mix sine waves in (default: 1.0). If -q2 -i1 is specified for example, the final PCM output will consist of 2/3*squarepcm + 1/3*sinpcm.

-r rate

PCM sample rate (default: 48000 Hz)

--pianoman

Assume the input is Pianoman MUS.

File format¶

The BASICA format is defined 6-byte tuples of divisor, duration and pause.

	struct bsv_insn {
		uint16_t divisor;
		uint16_t duration; /* in ticks */
		uint16_t af_pause; /* in ticks */
	};

where divisor specifies the divisor value that it directly handed to the x86 PC speaker. The following formula holds:

	frequency = 1193181 / divisor;

See also¶

aplay(1), qplay(1), hxtools(7)