MASMPegDevice V1.4
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Finally there is a commodore standard device for Dirk Conrad's  MAS  Player
(mpeg layer 2 and 3 hardware decoding using the MAS3507D chip) which can be
used in conjunction with AMPlifier (www.katodev.de,  included  with  OS3.9)
and other software that supports the mpeg device class (Frogger, MPEGMovie,
etc.).

The masmpeg.device is based on the framework of  the  melodympeg.device  by
Thorsten Hansen. This software is Freeware. Comments appreciated though.


Requirements
~~~~~~~~~~~~
You will need the pro version of the MAS Player, the  standard  version  is
not supported. A 68020 CPU is mandatory, I have not tested if a 68020@14MHz
will suffice, but probably not.


Installation
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Just copy the masmpeg.device file into your DEVS: drawer. Give this  device
name  for AMPlifier etc. (for Frogger, use the "AD MAS" option). Currently,
only use unit 0. The  MAS  hardware  must  be  connected  to  the  internal
parallel port.


Included Extra Stuff
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
LoadModule by Torbjörn Andersson:
  This can be used to install the masmpeg.device as a romtag at boot time.

  Example:
  LoadModule >NIL: DEVS:masmpeg.device ; Safe to use before SetPatch

BootupMP3 by Chris Hodges:
  Can be used in conjunction with LoadModule to install an MP3 jingle very
  early at every bootup.

  Example:
  BootupMP3 EndSequence.mp3 ; Installs the romtag, safe to use before
                            ; SetPatch
  BootupMP3 REMOVE          ; Removes the resident tag from memory
  BootupMP3 BREAK           ; Stops the music from playing

MASPlay by Thorsten Hansen:
  Simple CLI tool to play back an MP3 file. Slightly modified for MAS.

  Example:
  MASPlay EndSequence.mp3

EndSequence.mp3 by Chris Hülsbeck (truncated and encoded with low bitrate).


Tech Bits
~~~~~~~~~
The device does not allocate a CIA timer for its interrupt. It does all its
transfers  during  a  soft interrupt. This means that you should be able to
use your internal  serial  port  in  case  you  connected  the  power  plug
somewhere  else. Moreover, all hardware resources are allocated in a system
friendly way, so there should not be any interferences with  other  conform
software trying to use the parallel port in any other way.


Known Problems
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- There is no detection if the MAS player is connected or not. If  you  try
  to  play  something and the hardware is not connected, it will drain lots
  of cpu power (it will not crash though).

- Sometimes the sound is interrupted for a short period. Seems to be a  bug
  in  the  timer.device  that  sometimes causes interrupts to be delayed. I
  tried very small intervals, but it still remained, so I guess it's either
  a bug in timer, or the system interrupt load causes high latencies.


History
~~~~~~~
V1.4 (17-Jun-01):
  - Changed the init sequence to support  new  MAS  Player  revisions  with
    G10/G12 MAS chips.

V1.3 (21-Apr-01):
  - Removed the dynamic interrupt interval stuff  as  it  caused  too  much
    troubles for most users. Interrupt interval is now at 5.5 / 4ms.
  - Fixed a missing AbortIO() call in BootupMP3.

V1.2 (05-Apr-01):
  - Very big thank you must go to Dirk for supplying me a free MAS-Player!
  - CMD_RESET left MAS in an uninitialized state, therefore  AMPlifier  and
    probably also Frogger had problems playing back MPEG2.5 streams.
  - Fixed initial volume to 100% (sorry).
  - Volume is now logarithmic.
  - Removed CBM parallelport device stuff,  as it  is  never  going  to  be
    supported by any device. Much time wasted. But before I waste more time
    on implementing support for IOBlix or HyperCOM, it would be nice to get
    feedback on the demand of these modes. It is already evident that using
    HyperCOM instead of the internal parallel port reduces CPU load a lot!
  - Included the extra stuff.

V1.1 (xx-Feb-01):
  - Interrupt interval is now shorter and adapts  itself  to  the  bitrate.
    Hopefully, this will eliminate any remaining drop out effects.

V1.0 (24-Jan-01):
  - Initial public release.


Contact address
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Any mail, comments or donations welcome:

Chris Hodges                    Account: 359 68 63
Kennedystr. 8                   BLZ    : 700 530 70
D-82178 Puchheim                Bank   : Sparkasse Fürstenfeldbruck
Germany
Tel.: +49-89/8005856            WWW: http://www.platon42.de/
Email: hodges@in.tum.de         IRC: platon42 on EfNet

 PERMSSN    UID  GID    PACKED    SIZE  RATIO     CRC       STAMP          NAME
---------- ----------- ------- ------- ------ ---------- ------------ -------------
[generic]                  860    1636  52.6% -lh5- 2cd4 Jan 28  2001 MASMPegDevice.info
[generic]                 1305    1920  68.0% -lh5- 53eb Apr 21  2001 MASMPegDevice/BootupMP3
[generic]               115516  115516 100.0% -lh0- 3ca0 Apr  7  2001 MASMPegDevice/EndSequence.mp3
[generic]                 5116    7604  67.3% -lh5- b7d0 Apr  6  2001 MASMPegDevice/LoadModule
[generic]                 2931    4300  68.2% -lh5- f592 Jun 17  2001 MASMPegDevice/masmpeg.device
[generic]                 2263    4672  48.4% -lh5- 7441 Jun 17  2001 MASMPegDevice/MASMPegDevice.readme
[generic]                 4009    5992  66.9% -lh5- 0732 Apr  7  2001 MASMPegDevice/MASPlay
---------- ----------- ------- ------- ------ ---------- ------------ -------------
 Total         7 files  132000  141640  93.2%            Jul 12  2001