TZX/TAP to Cassette/Spectrum

[Alessandro]

No need for Winamp or the suchlike, you can "play" tapes with emulators such as Spectaculator, SpecEmu, or programs like Tapir. In this video I demonstrate how to do it with Spectaculator, a laptop and an old PC desktop speaker used as an amplifier.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJMZDgGTlL4

[PootisSpencer]

Yes, it's not working...odd.
I've actually downloaded mine as a bundle with Winamp from an obscure site. And I can't find a link for it now!

I will upload mine somewhere later. It's actually just that .dll that "tap-player" is asking for.

That would be great if you could. Yea as far as I know it's just asking for that file. There may be more it needs but that's as far as it gets when trying to install it.

[PootisSpencer]

No need for Winamp or the suchlike, you can "play" tapes with emulators such as Spectaculator, SpecEmu, or programs like Tapir. In this video I demonstrate how to do it with Spectaculator, a laptop and an old PC desktop speaker used as an amplifier.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJMZDgGTlL4

Tapir really messed with Windows 10. It ran hundreds of instances. I couldn't close them all in taskmanager. Had to reboot.

[Alessandro]

I never had any problems whatsoever with Tapir under Windows 10, or any other Windows for that matter. Which version are you using? Latest is 1.20. Download it from here http://www.alessandrogrussu.it/tapir/index.html

You can still use any emulator which "plays" TAP/TZX files, e.g. Spectaculator (as in the video) or SpecEmu.

[akeley]

I like the Winamp solution because it's the simplest: you just drag & drop a tap file and it's off. Doesn't need any amplifying either, at least on my laptop.

Here's that Winamp plug-in, [mention]PootisSpencer[/mention] https://mega.nz/#!ox9lnRCC!tnH4nRdRxxSt ... LVOhOdv7P8

I might try the Spectaculator for .tzx's though.

[PootisSpencer]

[mention]akeley[/mention] Thanks for that will have a go at getting that to work. I have had some success today though with my phone although I am still tweaking as Im getting the R Tape Loading error on a few games. Im using an volume booster app and PlayZx so hopefully with a bit of tweaking I can get it to work.

[PootisSpencer]

So another update...
Yesterday I managed to loaded quite a few games without any app to boost the volume. No idea why it suddenly worked but it did.
Today I have tried again just to see if was just luck and low and behold it doesn't work again.
Some games I am getting to the loading screen with the picture but most then fail with the r tape loading error. These are the same games I tried yesterday that loaded right up.
Is it possible that the Spectrum has to warm up a bit before it works because for the life of me I can't work out what's causing it? I know it sounds silly but it seems to work better when it's warmed up a bit. I have used the same cable from my phone to the Spectrum and the volume hasn't been touched. Going to buy another audio cable today if I can find one locally because I can't think what else it could be. Do they still sell mono audio cables?
Updates to follow...

[PootisSpencer]

Final update...
Got it all working with the volume booster app set at 60% and full volume on my phone. Every game runs perfect. Guess it took time and a little perseverance to find the sweet spot.

[zx64]

I bread-boarded a simple sound amplifier circuit and so far so good. It works very well, can load anything, no need to do sound editing etc. Will order a PCB and mount it next to the ear input (where RF modulator was before I desoldered it).
Will post a picture when it's done

[akeley]

I've tried a volume boosting app yesterday and it did not help at all. Not sure what the issue is...maybe something with that particular phone? Would have to try it on some other ones, since it seems to be the most convenient method.

[PeterJ]

I thought others may be interested in my further adventures with PlayZX. For those who don't know, this is an Android app which plays tap & tzx files through the headphone socket of your mobile phones.

https://baltazarstudios.com/playzx/

Having tried a multitude of devices and struggling to get enough volume, I started using an Amazon Fire which seems to output at a much higher volume that the phones I have tried (Moto G6, Moto G6, Samsung S5, and Samsung A10). It's worth waiting for an Amazon sale as they often drop these as low as £24.99.

The important thing I found (which I should of thought of before), is you need to turn off system sounds on your device, and delay for as long as possible the screen going off. At least on my devices this causes a 'ping' which often disrupts the loading. As the PlayZX website says, some phones have a do not disturb option. Also it's apparently best not to have your device charging at the same time.

I'm using a cable with a 3.5mm Stereo plug on one end, which goes into the Amazon Fire, then on the other end are two 3.5mm mono plugs which go into the Spectrum.

On PlayZX I set the wave playback volume as 70%, and Mono. I now have 100% success, and even tried 128K games last night (13 minutes) and that loaded fine.

[TMD2003]

The important thing I found (which I should of thought of before), is you need to turn off system sounds on your device, and delay for as long as possible the screen going off. At least on my devices this causes a 'ping' which often disrupts the loading. As the PlayZX website says, some phones have a do not disturb option. Also it's apparently best not to have your device charging at the same time.

An in-built chuntey disruptor? It's just like EightyOne having a "RAM pack wobble" facility.