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Pre-AdLib PC sound

Not sure if the already mentioned Tecmar Music Synthesis System / Music Magic Synthesizer is the same than this Tecma ACPA (Audio Capture and Playback Adapter):

https://scientific-solutions.com/archives/ssi_history.html

The audio card designed for IBM (the ACPA) featured CD quality 16-bit digital audio recording at 44.1Khz stereo or 88.2Khz mono, 16-bit stereo playback with 2x oversampling, and real-time DSP hardware based compression/decompression (if desired). The card also featured the ability to download algorithms for the on board 10 MIPS digital signal processor (TMS320C25). Typical downloadable algorithms provide for interpolation or decimation filters to effectively provide different sample rates and MPEG/JPEG hardware assisted image decompression. The 320C25 DSP also provided for MIDI music synthesis. Incidentally, the 16-bit stereo ACPA sound card with the 10 MIPS C25 DSP was released several months before the 8-bit mono SoundBlaster product which utilized an 8051 microcontroller instead of a true DSP. IBM decided to market the sound card to the business audio market, and not to the then emerging computer-based game market.

and seems there is one on eBay:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/TECMAR-ARPA-PC-STEREO-BD-940749-REV-C-Vintage-RARE-1989-Sound-Card-ISA-/263320477253?hash=item3d4f1f9e45
 
vwestlife said:
Its MIDI synthesis is strange. It doesn't sound like either FM or wavetable.
Click to expand...

The main component on the card appears to be the TMS320C25 DSP.
This DSP has its own memory, and the DSP can be programmed.
My guess is that they have implemented a simple 'software wavetable' synthesizer on the DSP itself, in order to play MIDI.
This reminds me of the PC-Engine game console: it has a wavetable synthesizer, but since it is very limited in terms of sample size, it doesn't quite sound like what we're used to from a GUS or Sound Canvas or such. It sounds more like the chiptunes we know from Amiga and such, with very short samples.
 
How very strange. I think Scali may be onto something with the suggestion that it's using short, looped wavetable sounds, but possibly with a resonant lowpass filter added in as well, which would make it sort of a poor man's Korg DW-8000. The drums in particular sound like they sampled the OPL2/3 percussion sounds of all things.
 
Just to be clear -- the synth music at the beginning of the video is not from the IBM M-ACPA's synthesizer -- it's from an audio recording of this video, played by the M-ACPA as a WAV file:

 
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