MacAmp Mp3 Experiment on PB1400c/166

[Snial]

Obviously an interesting exercise for retro Macs is to recreate the experience of doing more modern computing using old technology. In this case, how did we create MP3s at the beginning of the streaming era?

On an old CD archive of stuff I had from 1998, I found a folder containing a freeware MP3 encoder and separate player (MacAmp). I also found a guide on how to do encoding, since I thought ahead, 26 years ago on how I might use the apps, long after I'd forgotten about them! The guide's at the end.

I imported Enya's WaterMark title track from a proper Enya CD of mine. It's 2.5 minutes long and took about 24 minutes to encode at 44.1kHz Stereo! Crazy slow!



At the end I had a 2.5MB file (about 10% of the .AIFF track).

It wasn't hard to play it back on MacAmp (though I had to create a playlist first... of that one song!)


Amazingly, the PB 1400c/166 didn't grind to a halt during playback ;-) !

 

[twelvetone12]

I remember encoding MP3s on my PPC-upgraded PowerBook 520c, it took forever but I would play them with MacAmp too! Wow MacAmp sure brings out memories!

 

[Snial]

I remember encoding MP3s on my PPC-upgraded PowerBook 520c, it took forever but I would play them with MacAmp too! Wow MacAmp sure brings out memories!

Yes. In my "MakingMp3sOnAMac.txt" document I remarked that a Performa 5200 was the minimum MP3 spec, but isn't the PPC upgraded PB 520c even slower? Anyway, here's MPecker and MacAmp as cpt.hqx archive.

 

[twelvetone12]

I'm curious now, I remember it worked, when I have a second I will give it a try with your archive.

 

[Snial]

I'm curious now, I remember it worked, when I have a second I will give it a try with your archive.

I'm curious too - I wonder if there's also a Performa 6200/5200 or PMac 6100 user willing to test it out!

 

[LaPorta]

I still have v 1.0b3 of MPecker sitting around in my files, as well as MPEG Audio Player for playback (I do recall having MacAmp as well). In the period, I would have been ~13-14 years old when I used these. All the files are dated 1998. The program CD to AIFF is also located in there.

 

[Snial]

I still have v 1.0b3 of MPecker sitting around in my files, as well as MPEG Audio Player for playback (I do recall having MacAmp as well). In the period, I would have been ~13-14 years old when I used these. All the files are dated 1998. The program CD to AIFF is also located in there.

Cool! I found movie player would copy a cd track to disk as an aiff file (that’s what my instructions say). I’m still hoping a PPC5200/6100/6200 owner will check it out!

 

[LaPorta]

Cool! I found movie player would copy a cd track to disk as an aiff file (that’s what my instructions say). I’m still hoping a PPC5200/6100/6200 owner will check it out!

For comparison, mine ran on a Performa 6300...before a Bondi iMac.

 

[LaPorta]

Interestingly, I cannot find MPecker 1.0b3 anywhere on the Garden or elsewhere.

 

[3lectr1cPPC]

I typically use Mpegdec - plays back MP3s just fine on systems as slow as the PowerBook 540c.

 

[Byrd]

WinAmpMac - the one and only beta release - is my go to program for playback on lowly PPC MP3 playback, it also works well with VBR and other oddly encoded MP3s which early versions of iTunes, SoundJam can have some difficulty with.

https://macintoshgarden.org/apps/winampmac

 

[Cory5412]

I have both a 6100 and a 6200, as well as a 1400/166, I should take a look at some point.

Back in the day, my iMac/233 did "basically fine" with MP3s. I don't know if I'd say "trivial" -- especially on the /233, and especially with so little RAM as I had, but on a machine really set up well for OS 9 (G3, 256M of RAM), iTunes should be fine.

I've seen reports of some (usually well-upgraded) 68ks doing MP3 handling, but basically at the expense of anything else. I don't remember the properties but I do remember my IIsi playing "pretty good sounding" AIFFs with no real trouble. Of course, it wasn't until a few years after MP3s really gained in popularity that storage started to become big-and-cheap enough for keeping lossless copies on the computer to make any real sense.

I had MacAmp off one of the 1998-1999 MacWorld CDs too, with a bunch of royalty free music so seeing it brings back a handful of very specific memories.

I'm secondarily reminded I've been meaning to pull in a copy of MusicMatch Jukebox to take a look at it, although that'll be on a USB-era Mac for, you guessed it, MD dubbing.

I've popped musicmatch and soundjam onto vtools, I'll have to poke around again later for MPecker although if I remember right QuickTime 4 (Pro) can also encode MP3s so I may just do it that way, and of course both SoundJam and MusicMatch say they can do ripping and transcoding, so, I'll have to see what that's like, maybe on the 6200 for the most possible fun.

Idly, I used to listen to my CD copy of Paint the Sky With Stars on my 840 (+Audiovision 14!) and I actually found another copy at a thrift store last year, so maybe I'll pull some tracks (or just the whole CD, for funsies) off of it.

While I'm thinking about it, I do also have a few CDs with CD-TEXT.

 

[Snial]

Hi folks,

Bulk reply!

Interestingly, I cannot find MPecker 1.0b3 anywhere on the Garden or elsewhere.

It's in an attachment on my earlier post !

For comparison, mine ran on a Performa 6300...before a Bondi iMac.

Getting closer !

I typically use Mpegdec - plays back MP3s just fine on systems as slow as the PowerBook 540c.

Great! I believe that a 68040? MP3 player needs to perform a number of tricks to play back MP3s. Did you have an encoder that ran on the PB 540c?

WinAmpMac - the one and only beta release - is my go to program for playback on lowly PPC MP3 playback, it also works well with VBR and other oddly encoded MP3s which early versions of iTunes, SoundJam can have some difficulty with.

https://macintoshgarden.org/apps/winampmac

Thanks! I wonder if MacAmp is based on it (besides the name)?

I have both a 6100 and a 6200, as well as a 1400/166, I should take a look at some point.

Hey, hey!

<snip> my iMac/233 did "basically fine" with MP3s. I don't know if I'd say "trivial" <snip> especially with so little RAM as I had<snip>

It was designed for G3-era computers, which is why 603-era Macs are an interesting target. Having said that, until the G4, we had the disadvantage of no MMX: MP3 encoding/decoding would have been much easier I suspect with a bit of vector processing!

I've seen reports of some (usually well-upgraded) 68ks doing MP3 handling,<snip> my IIsi playing "pretty good sounding" AIFFs with no real trouble.

@3lectr1cPPC says it plays back fine on his PB 540c. AIFFs are basically just raw samples. 68K Macs should be able to playback AIFF, µ-Law (or A-Law) 8-bit compressed audio & 4-bit ADPCM lossy formats too. Watermark is 2.5 minutes, so at 22kHz, mono 4-bit ADPCM requires 1.7MB, actually shorter than the 128kBits/s of my Watermark.mp3 (though it's 44kHz x stereo).

I had MacAmp off one of the 1998-1999 MacWorld CDs too, with a bunch of royalty free music so seeing it brings back a handful of very specific memories.

Yes, I think that's part of the point.

I'm secondarily reminded I've been meaning to pull in a copy of MusicMatch Jukebox to take a look at it, although that'll be on a USB-era Mac for, you guessed it, MD dubbing.

MiniDisc? I wouldn't have guessed !

I've popped musicmatch and soundjam onto vtools, I'll have to poke around again later for MPecker although if I remember right QuickTime 4 (Pro) can also encode MP3s so I may just do it that way, and of course both SoundJam and MusicMatch say they can do ripping and transcoding, so, I'll have to see what that's like, maybe on the 6200 for the most possible fun.

Keep updated! MPecker is attached in this post.

Idly, I used to listen to my CD copy of Paint the Sky With Stars on my 840 (+Audiovision 14!) <snip> I'll pull some tracks<snip>

Q840, Take that - Puny PowerPCs ;-) !

Hmm, I wonder if a Cray-1 could play back MP3s?

 

[Snial]

It might be worth checking out BladeEnc

https://macintoshgarden.org/apps/bladeenc

 

[Snial]

There's a whole pile of encoders here:

ReallyRareWares - Programs

Including DropMP3, but I'm not sure if it works with a humble PPC603(e) owing to the ALTIVEC reference.

ReallyRareWares - DropMP3 encoder for Mac OS

 

[LaPorta]

Looked like yours was 1.0, not 1.0b3.

 

[Snial]

Looked like yours was 1.0, not 1.0b3.

Ha! You're soooo wrong, mine's 1.0a3 ;-) ! Actually I hadn't properly checked the version !

 

[LaPorta]

Thats great! There's apparently a lot of these floating around...

 

[Cory5412]

My own 840av listening back in the day was just rawdog outputting the CD, which I think similar to the video hardware Macs might be able to pass through without any real effort? I'd have to look, at some pointI got a dedicated stereo because my parents didn't super love me turning on the computer just to listen to CDs.

I did end up on MacGarden on my QEMU-PPC machine last night and I was looking through some of the MusicMatch CDs and those have a bunch of sample files on 'em so I'll have to look.

I don't have the energy to set up hotline specifically right now so the vibes might not be 100% there but this is making me think about setting up a music/MP3s folder on vtools,

I also have a 7200/90 and some 604 machines (incl. a few different cards for my 8500 with a 601/100 installed, lol) so it might be time to putter with that.

I'll end up playing with an iBook or TiBook first because that's actually part of my setup at an upcoming show. (I should make a lounge thread, hmmm).

But it's been too long since I've done anything on beige hardware, and TBH I'm thinking either my 1400 or my 6200 will be first so I can make it an excuse to get out the ET/LT adapter and do some slow file transfers, lololol

EDIT: oh w/re ulaw/alaw/ADPCM I should play around with some of those, but also mono 4-bit ADPCM sounds kind of awful, just.... I've had a 24-kilobit MP3 (maybe I'll put it up on vtools, I keep it around because I'm kind of proud of it in a weird way) and I feel like 64 kilobits is the real baseline for me, but, I suppose playing with some of that will be the fun lolol. As it stands, I think the 6200 retains the 8bit sound hardware from some older machines anyway so I might need ot see what thta's like.

 

[Snial]

My own 840av listening back in the day was just rawdog outputting the CD, which I think similar to the video hardware Macs might be able to pass through without any real effort? I'd have to look, at some pointI got a dedicated stereo because my parents didn't super love me turning on the computer just to listen to CDs.

I guess my earliest setup was similar, I had a PowerCD, which could play to external speakers (as it's an external, portable CD drive) with or without the Mac (so there was a CD application, not the normal Apple CD one which could play music and a remote control and it had more buttons than most).

<snip> MacGarden on my QEMU-PPC <snip> MusicMatch CDs <snip> I'll have to look.

OK!

<snip> vtools.

Still not sure what vtools is.

<snip> too long since <snip> beige hardware <snip> either my 1400 or my 6200 <snip> excuse <snip> ET/LT adapter <snip> slow file transfers, lololol

Oh well, I've found a bit of Olde Schoole mega-slow, LocalTalk networking between a Mac Plus, R-PI & PB 1400 fun!

EDIT: oh w/re ulaw/alaw/ADPCM <snip> mono 4-bit ADPCM sounds kind of awful

I don't know any players for those formats, I just know they're computationally 'easy'. On a Mac, both µ-Law and aLaw can be done with a simple look-up. 4-bit ADPCM is designed for voice-quality audio (e.g. 8kHz == 64kbit/s 8-bit PCM at 8kHz). A 16MHz AVR can do 4-bit PCM at 7812Hz (google AVR336.pdf). SoundApp for 68K can play back ADPCM, but I don't know how powerful the Mac needs to be.

ReallyRareWares - SoundApp

As it stands, I think the 6200 retains the 8bit sound hardware from some older machines anyway so I might need ot see what thta's like.

The Performa 6200 has stereo 16-bit output (mono 8-bit microphone input): so, full-speed ahead & chocks-away dude! https://everymac.com/systems/apple/mac_performa/specs/mac_performa_6200cd.html