Where do you guys get the sound for the psg/sn channels from?

Is there like a sound pack for those channels?

I've noticed the fm channels can use tfi files and it's easy to find rips from games.

But how do you all work with the other psg/sn that usually emulates a hi hat or help the fm channels to finish a chord or add more depth to the melody?

Thanks in advance :)

Ah I see :).

IIRC deflemask has some shitty bug where if you play a pulse in SN channel 3 then you can't have noise in SN channel 4 :(

Pulses come from noise channel, so of course you cannot have both at the same time. Now if you mean just tones then there must be a mode where you can have 3 predefined noise/pulse pitches on 4th along with tone on 3rd channel like how most SMS games do their schit. 4th channel can steal freq from 3rd if more than 3 pitches is needed, nothing on the chip prevents one from doing sound on both 3rd and 4th channel, though the combination is normally not useful musicwise.

If you have your own copy/rips of Sonic the Hedgehog, play it in an emulator and mute all of the FM tracks. That's the basic way to use it.

Really high notes on the pulse channels sound like a triangle. I can make a better sounding triangle in FM, but then I'd lose an FM channel.

White noise can be made to sound like a hi hat if you have a fast attack (try 8 4 0 as the volume envelope) or a shaker/cabasa (try 1 2 3 4 5 4 3 2 1 0 )

It's all about being able to listen critically and getting to know what your chips can do as instruments.

Thanks :). I'm understanding the psg/sn channels better now!

Puke7, it is not a bug, it is just like how the chip works.
The noise channel have only 4 independent frequencies, but also it can "steal" the frequency register from channel 3 but turning it off.

Those modes can be set by using the effect 20xy - Change Noise Mode. It is explained in the manual!

Ch3 doesn't get turned off if 4th uses its freq (but using both at the same time doesn't sound all that great either for the most part).

Delek lives

Delek is right though - the same issue happens in VGM MM - it's a quirk of the chip sadly.

This is false. Ch3 does NOT turn off when Noise freq is set to CopyC.

with clever manipulation through Sneventracker you can also play different frequencies between CH3 and CH4; as the frequency value command of CH4 seems to be "pay attention" or "ignore" CH3.

I finally found the source of my confusion (and it's mostly because I didn't read it correctly). From the manual:
"A maximum of 4 notes can be sounded on the SN76489 if the noise mode is not in the special mode, if it is, a maximum of 3 notes can be sounded."

I misinterpreted this somehow as there are 4 default pulse channels and noise mode is something special which is not the case. It also doesn't state that the 4th channel IS the noise channel. But I should know that already instead of being a n00b.

The SN76489 datasheet

says nothing about the 3rd channel going mute when the noise channel references it. That would have cost more during fabrication and it would make sense for Texas Instruments not to include it.