The return of the Hybrid Sid Player by xAD/Nightfall & Gianluca Renzi (RetroBit Lab)

Based on the Project and Hardware Schematic by Markus Gritsch released in the years 2011-2015 on the forum dangerousprototypes. Thanks Markus.

Changelog:

v1.21 – 29/9/2022

Added:

• A new MODE has been added and can be used with the MODE key while you are in TUNEINFO screen.

This mode allows to change the SID model in realtime while the music is playing.

Example:

If a SID music is played with the SID 8580 positioned on SOCKET #1 by choosing the ‘sid’ mode you can with the encoder turning it to the Right or Left choose the SOCKET #2 where for example where is installed a SID 6581. The led placed under the Socket will show the sid you have chosen.
 
An apparently useless option which, however, can be used to experiment the differences in reproduction of the piece of music with two different SID models or choose the most appropriate sid model if the SID not specified the SID to be used.
 
So in summary we have these choice with the mode key while you are in TUNEINFO screen.

- Single Play
- Sequential Play
- Random Play
- Intro Play
- Sid Switch

Updated:

• Source code description.

Fixed:

• Missing the default value of the startSong in the SID Header if this value is missing. The SidPlayer sets 255 and try to play it.

I only found one SID with this strange configuration : Hammer Down by Sean Connoly.  Fixed by setting it to the default value : 1.

• The player freezes while browsing file system folders with many *.sid files.

This happens when the driver scan the file system and immediately after is done the bubble sort routine that takes about 700ms for 512 entries and more for the max entries (800) in one single directory and during this time the sid player freezes.
 
To avoid hearing the annoying last note played repeatedly for this amount of time, i have forced the player to pause and remove it as soon as the contents of the new directory will be displayed.
 
Obviously if you had chosen to pause the song voluntarily with the appropriate button, it will not resume playing after the new directory is displayed.