store2@ihuxi.UUCP (01/15/87)
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ANTIC PUBLISHING INC., COPYRIGHT 1987.
REPRINTED BY PERMISSION.
Atari at The Winter 1987 CES
Software and Wrap-up, Part 1.
NOTE: I'd like to personally apologize to those of you waiting to get an
CES update on Saturday, as we promised. What our people at CES and our people
back at Antic had was, in the words of Strother Martin from "Cool Hand Luke," a
"failure to communicate." CompuServe's Marty Isaacs and Ron Luks of the Atari
SIG enabled us to update on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, although a
misunderstanding on my part resulted in our article not appearing on Saturday.
Therefore, our Saturday report on new software and hardware is now part of this
CES wrap-up, and should conclude tomorrow.
I'd like to thank Ron Luks, and most especially Charles Jackson, Antic
Online's Editor, for their valiant efforts in keeping the Atari community
informed. For their part, they are blameless.
Jon A. Bell
Editor
START
THIRD PARTY HARDWARE AT CES
By Matt Loveless
Consulting Editor
START
12/Jan/1987
Hybrid Arts Inc., the software and hardware with a reputation for putting
out the best MIDI software in the industry, showed one of the most exciting new
products in the Atari world: The ADAP Soundrack. ADAP stands for Analog to
Digital Processor. It's a $2000 hardware plus software system, built in
conjunction with Nilford Laboratories, Inc., for the Atari ST, designed to
replace equipment costing over thirty times as much. The basis of the ADAP is a
racey black rack mount box with sound input and output lines, plus an interface
box which plugs into the cartridge port of a one- (or more) megabyte machine.
What does it do? Digital sampling. And it does it well.
Digital sampling is a process where sound is converted into digital
patterns which a computer can store, manipulate, and play back at will. Compact
discs have been using this technology for years now. Sound enters the ADAP box
from virtually any sound source (such as a compact disc player) and is converted
into digital signals in the ST's memory. Once the sound is in the ST, it appears
as a digital waveform in a window in the center of the screen.
You can examine the waveform by zooming in or out on either the X or Y
axis, or even both. You can scroll along the waveform to see its entirety, or
even sample more than one sound and switch between them.
Hybrid Arts claims the system can sample at a rate of 44.1 Khz with 16 bits
of resolution -- that's compact disc quality! It even samples in stereo. Once
a sample is made, it can be played back at the push of a button. The sound is
phenomenal. But ADAP doesn't just let you record samples. You can also edit
them. You can cut, copy, and paste portions of a sample. You can even do
mixing, looping, or modify the actual waveform freehand.
The ADAP system replaces some super-sophisticated musical sampling
equipment by allowing you to "play" the samples from your MIDI keyboard,
polyphonically, with up to eight voices going simultaneously.
- On a one-megabyte machine, allows 80 seconds of sampling at full 16-bit
linear resolution at 10 Khz. Allows 20 seconds at 44.1 Khz.
- Fully MIDI compatible
- Polyphonic
- Storage of up to 64 multi-samples in memory for instant playback.
- Real-time digital effects processing (delay, echo, reverb, etc.)
- Real-time oscilloscope
- Direct from compact disc, digital to digital sampling.
- Multi-sample keyboard splits.
- Compatible with the new MIDI digital sample dump data standard. Will
work with data from other MIDI sampling devices.
- 19" black rack-mount case.
- Suggested retail price is $1,995.
When asked why they chose the Atari ST as the host sytem, Frank Foster,
president of Hybrid Arts, replied: "It's not like we actually 'chose' Atari. It
simply couldn't be done on any other machine. Not on an Amiga. Not on a
Macintosh." Now that's a compliment.
Other music news: Electronic Music Publishing House has MIDIPLAY, a
real-time MIDI record/playback system which supports all 16 channels of MIDI
information. List price is $49.95, and a demo disk is $5. They also have
Musidisks, a series of pre-recorded data disks of everything from Bach to the
Beatles. List is $19.95.
We will be covering the exciting world of MIDI, music software and the ST's
role in music composition in future issues of START.
STEREO 3-D GLASSES PLUS NEW SOFTWARE TITLES
The Catalog software division of Antic Publishing was showing, center stage
at the Atari Booth, the 3-D StereoTek Liquid Crystal Shutter Glasses along with
some spectacular demos of upcoming software. The new releases include Wanderer,
a point-of-view space game, CAD-3D 2.0, CyberMate, the much anticipated stereo
modeling and animation system, a molecular modeling program, and Stereo Maps &
Legends. Certainly the most impressive demo was the world-premiere of Tom
Hudson's SteelyBoink!, a stereo ray-tracing demo illustrating a simulated depth
of 8-10 inches into the ST's monitor. START Magazine will be presenting a
version of the SteelyBoink! demo which does not require the StereoTek glasses
on Antic Online in February. This will highlight Tom's ray-tracing article in
START #4 (available in March).
A SMATTERING OF NEW ST SOFTWARE
The following represents only a few of the many ST programs shown at the
Winter CES. New products information and reviews of both these and any omitted
programs can be found in upcoming issues of Antic and START.
Firebird, of Ramsey, New Jersey has several new programs for the ST.
Universal Military Simulator lets you create your own combat scenarios, or even
enter in the parameters of real battles and then modify them "to explore the
'what if' possibilities." Tracker is a shoot-em-up arcade game which combines a
huge playfield with artificial intelligence routines. Your deadly enemies, the
Cycloids, remember your play tactics and try to prevent you from using them
again. Golden Path is a new animated illustrated graphics adventure game. You
use the mouse to control your character through 45 screens of graphics and
animation. All three games should retail for $44.95.
WordPerfect, the best selling and highest rated full-feature word processor
for the IBM PC, is now a reality on the ST. WordPerfect Corporation was
demonstrating a prerelease version of the product at the Atari booth.
The Atari version of WordPerfect features the best of both worlds: it is
GEM based, using menu bars and windows, but it also supports the full array of
keyboard commands familiar to users of the IBM version. Additionally, users
moving from the IBM to the Atari version will also benefit from full file
compatiblity with WordPerfect 4.1.
The program uses high-speed assembly language routines for ultra-fast
response times. I gave it the acid test and found it faster than any other word
processor for the ST, faster even than ST Writer, the venerable speed-demon.
WordPerfect supports footnote and endnote compilation, full keystroke
macros, automatic calculation of numeric tables with the built-in math mode,
complete database merge capabilities, an outline feature, a nine-keyword sorting
facility for alphabetizing lists, a 115,000 word dictionary, including legal and
medical terms, a five-level table of contents and index generator, a five
newspaper-style columnar display, a sophisticated thesaurus, a three-level undo
capability, and a virtual memory data system, allowing data to flow onto disk
when computer memory is full.
This will clearly be the most sophisticated word processor for the Atari
ST, taking full advantage of the new one, two, and four megabyte machines.
WordPerfect for the Atari is scheduled for release second quarter, 1987. The
suggested retail price is $395, although a representative from WordPerfect
indicated Atari users should be able to purchase it in the low $200s.
Timeworks has released their three powerful productivity software for the
ST: Word Writer ST, a word processor, Data Manager ST (covered in the Brian
Lee's Database Overview in START #4. out in March), and Swiftcalc ST, a
spreadsheet. The Timeworks programs are designed as an integrated package.
Suggested retail is $79.95.
A QUICK LOOK AT THE 8-BIT FIELD
Although not as numerous or as flashy as the new ST software, there were
several companies showing software or distributing information for the 8-bit
Atari line. These companies shared a half-dozen XE computers, which sat
alongside the new XE [game and computer] System, the new 8-bit 3 1/2 inch drive,
and Atari's 1200 baud XE modem (which will also work on the STs). Prices on
this hardware have not yet been set.
New from Hi-Tech Expressions is AwardWare, a program allowing you to
custom-design and print awards, certificates, ribons, tickets, coupons and
checks. The program includes templates for your forms -- just type in your
message and you're ready to give someone that special greeting! Retail price is
$14.95. Also from Hi-Tech is CardWare, an animated birthday card, for $9.95;
PartyWare, card and party design kit with database of friends and events, for
$14.95; HeartWare, an animated greeting disk and love note maker (let a machine
do the mushy stuff for you), $9.95; and WareWithAll, which includes colorful
stationery, envelopes, stickers, markers, and disk labels, for $14.95.
ICD, Inc. was promoting their large array of 8-bit Atari products, such as
P:R Connection, an interface allowing your XL or XE to run a large variety of
disparate printers and modems; the Printer Connection, a "smart" cable which
will make your 8-bit Atari compatible with any Centronics parallel printers;
Multi I/O, a box which gives you a RAMdisk, parallel printer interface, serial
printer and modem interface, a printer spooler, and a hard disk interface; an
80-Column Adapter, which plugs inside of the Multi I/O case; US Doubler, a chip
set which gives your 1050 drive true double density and an accelerated I/O rate;
SpartaDOS Construction Set, ICD's custom DOS; SpartaDOS X, a cartridge-based
DOS; R-Time 8; a piggyback cartridge clock; and RAMBO XL, a program enabling
your 800XL or 1200XL to make use of 256K of RAM (you supply the DRAM memory
chips).
Zobian Controls was promoting RAOS (Rat Actuated Operating System), their
operating system giving your XE a GEM-like OS, including pull-down windows, a
mouse-controlled arrow-pointer, and icons. Zobian also has improved their
mouse, originally called the Rat. The SuperRAT is now a two-button digital
mouse, which works in conjunction with the Zobian DESKTOP program Z-DOS
(included in RAOS). The SuperRAT/RAOS combination sells for $99.00.
NEXT: WRAP-UP, PART 2.
Kit Kimes
AT&T--Information Systems Labs
1100 E. Warrenville Rd.
Naperville, IL 60566
...ihnp4!iwvae!kimes