[Kyle Owen], collector of antique tech, determined to consider his hand at new music arrangement — for the PDP-8 computer, that is (listen to the video clip down below the crack). He’s utilizing a method submitted by Richard Wilson to the Digital Equipment Company Customers Society (DECUS) in 1976, properly named Music. It operates on OS/8 and is prepared in the PDP-8 assembly language PAL8. Using the syntax of New music, [Kyle] organized Gershon Kingsley’s popular Moog synthesizer strike “Popcorn” (the Very hot Butter edition from 1972).
You could recognize the absence of a disk or tape generate in his setup. Which is since [Kyle] is making use of an RK05 disk emulator he wrote back in 2014. It’s working on a Raspberry Pi and connects about serial, which he says is slower than an RK05 but faster than a tape drive. He has linked up a Cordovox amplifier cabinet for this demonstration, but the initial implies of listening to the Music output was an AM radio held in close proximity to the pc (hear the 2nd movie beneath the break). This worked by executing the PDP-8 CAF instruction at a preferred frequency, say 440 Hz.
So, when this instruction is executed, logic all above the laptop or computer goes “zap”, clearing out various registers. Now, if a radio is held close to the computer system, it will choose up some of this vitality, and at 440 moments a 2nd, will deliver a pulse to the speaker. The outcome is that you will listen to a tone from the radio — as a make a difference of truth, you will listen to an A.
You can examine additional about this method and how it operates in the initial method description in the first DECUS submission.
