Monowave debugging.... into DSP's

[ibi sum]

Hi Tom!

First of all .. welcome to Arduino DSP hacking!  For sure you should
check out the Pocket Piano project of critterguitari .. very
definitely the Arduino is capable of making some nice sounds, and you
know what .. you'll learn DSP techniques on the Arduino, easier than
with the Soundbite, since with the Soundbite you have to also learn
Mot56k assembler .. not so fun if you just want to get started.  The
Arduino's C-based projects are a bit easier in that regard, and once
you've built the shield to give yourself audio capabilities I think
you'll agree that its very fun to work on mini-synthesis with the
Arduino.  I know Joost has some words to say about this, maybe .. ;)

I have a Soundbite as well and have been doing some synth sessions at
Metalab .. we used the Soundbite to build a nice little 6-channel
mixer, which was quite easy, and are now working on porting Tonys'
DFM-1 filter to it, which is .. not so easy .. but still a good way to
make some progress since the DFM-1 code (C, linux-alsa plugin) is very
well documented and .. shall I dare say it .. 'sensible'.  So I'll let
you know when the code is ready for public consumption by those who
have Soundbites to work with.

You might already know from the blogosphere that Paul Maddox has
started a project (Qix Synth) to make a Mot56k DSP-based synth using
the Freescale imx51 as a central processor .. maybe check with him if
you want to get involved.  Even though I was involved from the
beginning, I'm not really involved with Qix any more for personal
reasons (troll, troll, troll), so this probably means that you would
be welcome to join their project .. I know they'd like to have more
attention on the DSP side of things, and Paul is certainly going to be
digging into the Mot 56k a bit more deeply, I imagine .. check with
him if that project is right for you.  Could be that project is
perfect for you, especially if you develop something of interest on
the Soundbite that could work on the Qix platform, if and when it ever
arrives.

>From my point of view, though, Mot56k is a tired and *somewhat*
irrelevant platform to be writing DSP code for, unless you're going to
go the full Kemper Digital route and start making your own hardware to
run the code on (Virus) .. more fun is the OMAP-based systems like the
TouchBook, iPhone, OpenPandora console, and so on .. since these
systems are actually shipping and affordable (Beagleboard.org) it
makes a little bit more sense, plus there is the fact that as a
platform, OMAP as a DSP system is wide open .. so there's a chance to
really establish yourself with some nice synth code/effects plugins
and so on.  I'm focusing my efforts, anyway, on OMAP-ARM-based systems
as a DSP platform, since having the DSP on the SOC of the rest of the
ARM core just makes much more sense than imx51+56kDSP hardware
glomming, an approach that might've been clever in the 90's ... Until
imx51 is available like OMAP 3550 and so on, its a safe bet, anyway ..
No more proprietary hardware configurations for me.  Burned on that
twice == still got 8 fingers left for fun.

Anyway, have fun, and do check out the Arduino DSP scene .. Joost,
pitch in here and tell us what you've been doing lately with your
project, I know you want to!  :)


On 8/25/09, Tom Adam <tom.adam at thebigear.be> wrote:
> Hello guys,
>
> After another frustrating debugging session on my Monowave X, I've decided
> not to put anymore time in it.
> This is my second project where I failed to get it finished. (the other one
> was a Marc Bareille dual EG, that worked, but I never got it calibrated
> correctly)
> Anyway...
> Since my modular is as good as done (well, all 100U are spoken for, but alas
> a few modules don't seem to get much use so I will replace these in time) I
> need something new to keep my brain entertained. So I bought an arduino.
> Really nice toy, but it stays a toy (like the MFOS minisynth, it's not a
> synth!).
> Recently I ordered a Freescale Soundbite DSP board that has just arrived. I
> was able to follow the factory check instructions so I got everything
> installed and operational. So now it's time to get into programming.
> Unfortunately, apart of my arduino programming (midi to analog clock & 8
> step sequencer), I have no experience at all. (And as a reference I once got
> a 2/20 for a C++ exam during my engineering studies. I had to redo the test
> and I got an 18/20 that time, but still, that's like 15 years ago.)
> I've been browsing the web for some DSP information, but that's not
> sufficient to get me going. I'm now looking for:
>
> *	good books,
> *	forum's,
> *	other recourses
>
> any recommendations? I think I'm getting up to date with the hardware by
> reading the manual (520pages), but I'm a little concerned about the
> programming itself.
> This feels a bit like when I started building my P3. It was my first project
> ever and I had never touched a soldering iron before... nice;-)
>
> Cheers,
> ToAd
> www.thebigear.be
>
>
>