rockbox/docs
Ryan Billing d0918b98fa DSP Compressor: Sidechain, Exponential Atk/Rls
This is an improvement to the current compressor which I have added
to my own Sansa Fuze V2 build.  I am submitting here in case others
find it interesting.

Features added to the existing compressor:
Attack, Look-ahead, Sidechain Filtering.
Exponential attack and release characteristic response.

Benefits from adding missing features:
Attack:
Preserve perceived "brightness" of tone by letting onset transients
come through at a higher level than the rest of the compressed program
material.

Look-ahead:
With Attack comes clipping on the leading several cycles of a transient
onset.  With look-ahead function, this can be pre-emptively mitigated with
a slower gain change (less distortion).  Look-ahead limiting is implemented
to prevent clipping while keeping gain change ramp to an interval near 3ms
instead of instant attack.

The existing compressor implementation distorts the leading edge of a
transient by causing instant gain change, resulting in log() distortion.
This sounds "woofy" to me.

Exponential Attack/Release:
eMore natural sounding.  On attack, this is a true straight line of 10dB per
attack interval.  Release is a little different, however, sounds natural as
an analog compressor.

Sidechain Filtering:
Mild high-pass filter reduces response to low frequency onsets.  For example,
a hard kick drum is less likely to make the whole of the program material
appear to fade in and out.  Combined with a moderate attack time, such a
transient will ride through with minimal audible artifact.

Overall these changes make dynamic music sound more "open", more natural.  The
goal of a compressor is to make dyanamic music sound louder without necessarily
sounding as though it has been compressed.  I believe these changes come closer to this goal.

Enjoy.  If not, I am enjoying it

Change-Id: I664eace546c364b815b4dc9ed4a72849231a0eb2
Reviewed-on: http://gerrit.rockbox.org/626
Tested: Purling Nayuki <cyq.yzfl@gmail.com>
Reviewed-by: Michael Giacomelli <giac2000@hotmail.com>
2013-12-15 22:24:08 +01:00
..
logo lcd_color/cabbiev2: New iconset in multiple sizes 2011-11-26 16:01:11 +00:00
API
BATTERY-FAQ
BATTERY-FAQ-LIION
CHARGING_ALGORITHM
COMMITTERS Belatedly adding myself to COMMITTERS in alphabetical order 2011-12-12 11:11:29 +00:00
CONTRIBUTING Update CONTRIBUTING to reflect our switch to git on gerrit. 2012-01-24 13:05:25 +01:00
COPYING
COPYING-MANUAL
CREDITS DSP Compressor: Sidechain, Exponential Atk/Rls 2013-12-15 22:24:08 +01:00
gpl-2.0.html Remove duplicated license file. 2010-09-04 18:50:12 +00:00
HISTORY
KNOWN_ISSUES Use crc32 of filename to resume tracks 2013-01-02 08:29:38 +01:00
LICENSES
MAINTAINERS
NODO Remove outdated NODO list from the docs folder. Replace it with a link to the wiki. 2010-05-15 21:54:24 +00:00
PLUGIN_API Remove rockbox 2.6 plugin API doc 2010-07-25 13:54:13 +00:00
profontdoc.txt Make sure files which aren't windows-specific use \n line endings only 2010-06-17 16:59:51 +00:00
README Update instructions in docs/README to change 'Check out from SVN' to 'Clone from git' 2013-04-24 11:11:38 +01:00
sample.colours Make sure files which aren't windows-specific use \n line endings only 2010-06-17 16:59:51 +00:00
sample.icons
TECH
UISIMULATOR

               __________               __   ___.
     Open      \______   \ ____   ____ |  | _\_ |__   _______  ___
     Source     |       _//  _ \_/ ___\|  |/ /| __ \ /  _ \  \/  /
     Jukebox    |    |   (  <_> )  \___|    < | \_\ (  <_> > <  <
     Firmware   |____|_  /\____/ \___  >__|_ \|___  /\____/__/\_ \
                       \/            \/     \/    \/            \/

Build Your Own Rockbox

1. Clone 'rockbox' from git (or extract a downloaded archive).

   $ git clone git://git.rockbox.org/rockbox

     or

   $ tar xjf rockbox.tar.bz2

2. Create a build directory, preferably in the same directory as the firmware/
   and apps/ directories. This is where all generated files will be written.

   $ cd rockbox
   $ mkdir build
   $ cd build

3. Make sure you have sh/arm/m68k-elf-gcc and siblings in the PATH. Make sure
   that you have 'perl' in your PATH too. Your gcc cross compiler needs to be
   a particular version depending on what player you are compiling for. These
   can be acquired with the rockboxdev.sh script in the /tools/ folder of the
   source, or will have been included if you've installed one of the
   toolchains or development environments provided at http://www.rockbox.org/

   $ which sh-elf-gcc
   $ which perl

4. In your build directory, run the 'tools/configure' script and enter what
   target you want to build for and if you want a debug version or not (and a
   few more questions). It'll prompt you. The debug version is for making a
   gdb version out of it. It is only useful if you run gdb towards your target
   Archos.

   $ ../tools/configure

5. *ploink*. Now you have got a Makefile generated for you.

6. Run 'make' and soon the necessary pieces from the firmware and the apps
   directories have been compiled, linked and scrambled for you.

   $ make
   $ make zip

7. unzip the rockbox.zip on your music player, reboot it and
   *smile*.

If you want to build for more than one target, just create several build
directories and create a setup for each target:

   $ mkdir build-fmrecorder
   $ cd build-fmrecorder
   $ ../tools/configure

   $ mkdir build-player
   $ cd build-player
   $ ../tools/configure

Questions anyone? Ask on the mailing list. We'll be happy to help you!