tROMbone
12/25/2000 - v0.11 - by mutewitness
===================================

Release Notes
-------------
v0.11:
- Christmas release! Fixed a few bugs...
v0.10:
- added ziprom support you can just double click a zipfile and it should
automatically start spitting out .wav files
- you can change the dir where the converted files go (if you dont set a dir
it will default to the dir the roms are in)
- a bunch of internal cleanups and speedups
v0.05: 
- Initial public release!
v0.05 RC:
- Just added option to halt .wav playback because 2 minute .wav files
  can get annoying if you cant stop them :)
- Started prelim list of roms to use, these will be added internally
  at a future date.
v0.04: 
- Format list actually works now, if you pick an unimplemented format 
  it tells you its not finished
- Added "press enter to play .wav file" just press enter in the file
  list on a .wav file (should'nt try to play any file thats not .wav
  also)
- Added option to show all files (roms and everything) or just .wav
v0.02:
- Writes proper .wav files now instead of raw .pcm
- Double click filename to convert/play
- Plays .wav files instead of trying to convert them now :)
- Update button for dir/file lists
- Fixed gal's panic oki6295 clock rate, its really 12000hz not 11025hz
v0.01:
- Just got the damn thing working, nothing special

Program Info
------------
tROMbone is a utility for converting sound roms from various arcade games into 
playable .wav files.  It is not an emulator, so it can run fine even on a 486.  
Currently tROMbone only decodes games that used an OKI6295 ADPCM chip for 
voice/music.  TROMbone can also be used as a simple .wav player, as it can play 
.wav files from the file list.

"Why the need for something like this?!" I started a program like this because 
most (expensive) sound studio programs like cool edit or soundforge do a 
relatively poor job at converting sound roms (particularly adpcm ones).  Also 
its fun to listen to all the game voices/samples/music and use them for other 
fun things, like putting "sho-ryu-ken" into Half-Life :).  

TO USE: tROMbone should preferably run in its own directory.  Copy some zipped up
roms to the tROMbone directory or you can just work on your mame rom directory if
you select a output directory.  Select the supported you wish to convert in the 
file list and double-click the file or press "Convert" to convert the rom.  
If you work with unzipped roms (i.e. zipfiles not supported but you know how 
to use them manually) ROMbone will prompt you if you wish to proceed if all goes 
well you should see a new .wav file after it finishes.  Double-clicking or pressing 
Enter in the file list will automatically play .wav files.  Please use caution to 
not convert anything that isn't a rom, unless you want to create .wav files that 
sound like a bug zapper :).
    Currently the only extras is the ability to show only .wav files in the 
file list.  Just check the "Show only .wav files" box and it will automatically 
update.  To manually update the file list (unzipping more roms while the program 
is running) just hit the Update button.  The Stop Sound button will halt any 
.wav file currently being played, as some games can go on for almost 2 minutes 
for each rom(!).

Implemented
-----------
- "VOX" ADPCM & OKI6295 - Basically all CPS1, Data East 16-bit games, some Atari, 
Kaneko/Comad pr0n games, Capcom "Mitchell" games, some Toaplan games, various others. 
Compression ratio is 4:1.
- PCM 4/8/16 bit - Some SEGA System 16, Taito F3, many Konami, a few others,
QSound samples also and Pole position.  I didnt have time to add these as ziprom so 
youll have to mess with these manually.
- Ziprom support (finally!) Currently supprots 103 MAME style roms (for clones
use the parent set since the sample roms are usually duplicated, splitmerged or
merged sets dont contain the samples)

Things to do!!!
---------------
Planned sound formats (in order of priority):
- "TMNT theme" music
- CVSD - Sinistar, Smash TV and a few others but ALOT of older pinball games
- TMS5520 - Many Atari, some others
- YM2610 ADPCM - NEO-GEO, some Taito and quite a few others. might require 
emulation for proper decode.  Personally i'd REALLY like to get this working.
- Midway DCS - Mortal Kombat 2 and modern pinball. Requires emulated ADSP2105.

Sound formats that will probably will not make it:
- VLM5030 - Track and field, Punch Out and others (emulated cpu needed?)
- uPD7759 - Some SEGA System 16, some Konami, a few others (emualted cpu needed?)
- any DAC based game that relies on a sound CPU (Rampage, Demolition Derby)
- any weird analog speech board (Berzerk, Q*bert, Wizard of Wor) just use the 
samples instead ;)

Other useful things that are needed:
- "Scanner" will search your hard disks/cdroms for supported games and automate 
the conversion
- Extract individual samples instead of the entire rom, i.e. "fatality.wav" for 
the "FATALITY" in Mortal Kombat and others like "SONIC BOOM" from Street Fighter 
2.
- ??? more stuff as its brought up

System Requirements
-------------------
- Windows 95/98/NT/2000
- 486 and above
- 16MB RAM
- 10-200MB hard disk space depending on how many roms you wish to convert
- Some roms of course, but please do NOT e-mail me for roms because you wont get any!!!

Acknowledgements
----------------
- Antiriad for initially helping me out a long time ago with converting Darius
- freeweed for the name tROMbone (I am terrible at these things)
- All the beta testers for thier help/comments, freeweed, MikeDX, Rep, AmeX68, GreyBrain, BladePro
- Most importantly YOU for using my program :D
