Yamaha Y8950

The Yamaha Y8950 is a sound chip, produced in 1984. Essentially a Yamaha YM3526 with an ADPCM encoder/decoder added on, it is also known as MSX-Audio as it was designed for inclusion in an expansion cartridge for the MSX personal computer.

Y8950

This chip was introduced in three cartridge models:

Features
  • Compatibility with the Yamaha YM3526
  • Nine voices of Yamaha FM
  • Two sound-generation modes available: Simultaneous sounding of nine tones or 6 melodies and five rhythms (Compatible with the Character and Pattern Telephone Access Information Network (C.A.P.T.A.I.N.) system and teletex).
  • Built-in vibrato and AM oscillators
  • Built-in accelerated 4-bit ADPCM speech analysis/synthesis circuits
  • Possibility of connecting an external 256-kB RAM plus 256-kB ROM
  • Built-in 8-bit input/output ports for keyboard scanning
  • Built-in 4-bit general purpose I/O port
  • Two built-in general purpose timers
  • TTL compatible input/output
  • Si-gate CMOS LSI
  • 5V single power supply
  • 64-pin SDIP encapsulation (the same thing was used on the V9938)

Software Support

The Y-8950 is supported by almost all software which contains music composed in SoundTracker, (Moonblaster, Oracle, Super Music Editor or Magic Music Module Combi, etc.). All these editors support the ADPCM sample unit. Other software which makes use of the ADPCM sampler. such as Trax Player by NOP (a program to play songs (samples) directly from disk, while loading). A lot of Compile games were MSX-Audio compatible although they didn't use the ADPCM part.

References
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