---------------------- PLAY IT BY EAR DEMO VERSION --------------------- NOTE: This demo version of the program will abruptly terminate after 10 minutes of use. In addition, you are unable to save your option changes. Please refer to the on-line help feature for information on the general use of the program. This file simply covers some undocumented features and emphasizes some important things that you should know before using the program. MOUSE SUPPORT. You MUST have a mouse installed on your computer to use Play It By Ear. USING THE PC INTERNAL SPEAKER. The IBM PC internal speaker hardware was never intended to be used for serious musical performance. The sound quality is adequate and the pitch is accurate. Unfortunatly, this is only true for single voice melodies. Simultaneous pitches, like intervals and chords, are not feasible. We have seen some resourceful programmers make the PC hardware approximate chords, but for the purpose of ear training the results just were not good enough. Therefore, if you do not own sound enhancing hardware, Play It By Ear will arpeggiate, i.e. play like a melody, all interval and chord forms. MORE ABOUT THE INTERNAL SPEAKER. The volume slider has no effect on the sounds coming out of your PC internal speaker. Once again, the hardware is too limited to make this practical. In addition, some MIDI keyboards may not be sensitive to note volume commands. These keyboards will not respond to the volume slider either. To regulate the volume, simply use the keyboard's volume control. COMMAND LINE OPTIONS. Play It By Ear supports HERCULES, EGA/VGA and CGA video adapters. At the start of the program the highest resolution mode of your hardware is detected and used. You may force the program to use a specific video mode by invoking the program as such: EAR C (for CGA) EAR E (for EGA) EAR EM (for EGAMONO) EAR V (for VGA) EAR M (for Hercules). At the end of each exercise drill a message pops up that indicates how you did for that particular response: "OK" or "OOPS!". For you power users a command line option is provided to suppress this feature: EAR X. This option may be mixed with one of the above video options, e.g. EAR C X. The "O" (the letter, not the number zero) command line option may be used to override sound card autodetection and force the program to use MIDI. A diagnostic program, TESTMIDI.EXE, is also included on the program disk to help you, and us, troubleshoot your sound hardware if necessary. Some older MIDI cards, when installed on fast (386, 486) computers, may have trouble communicating with the program. If Play It By Ear does not seem to be responding to your MIDI instrument try running the program with a numerical command line option like 100. If this doen't work, try 1000 or even 10000. For example, EAR 100 EAR 1000 If you changed the I/O port address of your MIDI card from the default (330 hexadecimal) then you must use the 'D' command line option. For example: EAR D3ac Some MIDI setups consist of a separate keyboard controller and sound module. The command line option 'T' may be used to force the program to echo controller data to the sound module. Like so: EAR T SOUND BLASTER SUPPORT. If you own a Sound Blaster card you will need to run the program using the "S" command line option. A convenient BAT file, EAR_SB.BAT, has been included on the master disk that does this for you. So, to make the program recognize your card, type either of the following at the DOS prompt: EAR S EAR_SB SOUND BLASTER MIDI. To use the MIDI Expansion module of your Sound Blaster card you simple need to run the the program with the "SM" command line option: EAR SM If you have changed the I/O port address of the SOUNDBLASTER card then you must use the D command line option: EAR SM Dnnn (where nnn is the I/O port address, 220, 230, etc.) ----------------------- RhythmAce DEMO VERSION ------------------------ NOTE: This demo version of the program will abruptly terminate after the execution of 30 drills. In addition, you are unable to save custom rhythms or your option changes. USING THE PC INTERNAL SPEAKER. The IBM PC internal speaker hardware was never intended to be used for serious musical performance. For RhythmAce, the major problem is the playing of simultaneous sounds. For instance, the metronome and a rhythm at the same time. Because of this, the program will not echo your playback if the metronome is enabled. In addition, two handed rhythms will be played as two sequential single rhythms. MORE ABOUT THE INTERNAL SPEAKER. Volume adjustments have no effect on the sounds coming out of your PC internal speaker. Once again, the hardware is too limited to make this practical. In addition, some MIDI keyboards may not be sensitive to note volume commands. These keyboards will not respond to the volume slider either. To regulate the volume, simply use the keyboard's volume control. COMMAND LINE OPTIONS. RhythmAce supports HERCULES, EGA/VGA and CGA video adapters. At the start of the program the optimum resolution of your hardware is detected and used. You may force the program to use a specific video mode by invoking the program as such: ACE C (for CGA) ACE E (for EGA) ACE EM (for EGAMONO) ACE V (for VGA) ACE M (for Hercules). The "O" (the letter, not the number zero) command line option may be used to override sound card autodetection and force the program to use MIDI. Some older MIDI cards, when installed on fast (386, 486) computers, may have trouble communicating with the program. If RhythmAce does not seem to be playing through your MIDI instrument try running the program with a numerical command line option like 100. If this doen't work, try 1000 or even 10000. For example, ACE 100 ACE 1000 Note: This command line option should follow any others used. If you changed the I/O port address of your MIDI card from the default (330 hexadecimal) then you must use the 'D' command line option. For example: ACE D3ac SOUND BLASTER SUPPORT. If you own a Sound Blaster card you will need to run the SB-SOUND.COM driver before RhythmAce. SB-SOUND ACE If you changed the I/O port address of your SOUNDBLASTER card from the default (220 hex) then you must specify the actual address when running the driver. For example: SB-SOUND /P230 (card address set to 230 hex) ACE SOUND BLASTER MIDI. To use the MIDI Expansion module of your Sound Blaster card you simple need to run the the program with the "SM" command line option: ACE SM If you changed the I/O port address of your SOUNDBLASTER card from the default (220 hex) then you must use the 'D' command line option. For example: ACE SM D230 (card address set to 230 hex) ACCELERATORS. Accelerators are provided for convenient drill control. If you are using the computer keyboard for playback, RETURN has the same effect as clicking the NEXT button. Striking the space bar is the same as clicking QUIZ. With a MIDI instrument, playing middle C is QUIZ and a major third above middle C, E, is NEXT.