Retro Yamaha Music Computer - Testing out the CX5M
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- čas přidán 21. 10. 2020
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The Yamaha CX5M is a curious machine full of promise, but also with plenty of shortcomings as I discover with my very limited musical abilities.
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Thanks for watching the show! Did anyone out there have one of these? Did you make a hit record? Let me know!
A special thank you to the Museum of Computing (www.museumofcomputing.org.uk/) for loaning the CX5M II machine to make this a more complete video.
Neil - RMC
Cool - best i had was the awful Music Maker cartridge and 'keyboard' for the C64. Next thing I used was somewhat of a step-up Sibelius on the Archimedes at school. Would be good to see that running - can't remember if that was connected to a keyboard or just used through the GUI. Must have had midi, I'm sure.
Never ever came got my hands on one but I was told they were awesome fun. Legendary machine but rare in the UK.
I own one, got it in 2012 infact I had two but gave one to my childhood friend who makes music
the ads shown at 3:00 are from South Korea as can be inferred from the glyphs used
I spent much if my time in the FM voicing program. FM synthesis has a lot of parameters there were maybe 50 different numbers on screen. Much improved from a Dx7 with one parameter at a time from a small 2 line LCD. I used the Music Macro to program it to be an alarm clock, waking up to multi-timbral music in the morning. There was system call that make it say a Japanese phrase not sure if this needed the Music Macro cartridge or even the SFG-01, could it have been a standard MSX easter egg thing?
That outro: "I'm playing all the right notes, but not necessarily in the right order."
It made it worth the last 30 seconds.
Now I’m curious how many will get the reference.
@@tech34756 Andre Previn would 😉
@@MrJozza65 And I’m sure John Eric Bartholomew would as well ;)
@@MrJozza65 Don't you mean Mr. Andrew Preview? :)
My middle school in South London had one of the CX5M MSX computers in the music room. about 1984 ish. We used it a lot and I learned to play the piano on it with the piano teacher.
"I've got the musical ability of a banana", before proceeding to blast out a recognisable tune on the keyboard. I want the kinds of bananas Neil eats.
jajajjajjajjajjjajjjajjajjajja plays like a pro
@@pamparitas He certainly plays keys better than i do lol
@@BertGrink i keep playin guitar lol
@@pamparitas Thanks to the onset of what may be arthritis i find it increasingly difficult to play guitar (i'm 67yo for the record) 😥😢😢😢
@@BertGrink :( sorry bro my mom have arthritis. try if you can cannabis oil in your hands she is really bether with that and some masages and love
With my software VGMPlay for MSX you can play VGM recordings from many of the arcade games you mentioned straight on the CX5M! (You do need a SD / CF / HDD interface cartridge with extra memory.)
Actually the CX5MII that I bought off eBay from an Italian person was the machine that brought me back into the MSX scene after several years of inactivity, and its YM2151 sound chip prompted me to make VGMPlay, so I hold it dear to my heart :). The CX5MII is almost an MSX2 by the way: it has the MSX2 VDP and a 128K memory mapper. But it lacks sufficient Video RAM, the RTC and the MSX2 BIOS. The CX7M is its full MSX2 successor, but it was only released in Japan.
hi valleybell
@@The_Mister_E Ha no I’m not ValleyBell, he made VGMPlay for PC, I made the MSX player :D.
@@grauwsaur oh
whoops
@@The_Mister_E :) I had a good chuckle when you called Grauw (his MSX nick) ValleyBell :) ValleyBell and Grauw have done a lot for openMSX sound chip improvement.
@@The_Mister_E rip
Nishi told us that MSX stood for "Machines with Software eXchangeability" at a European computer conference in the early 2000's
First I knew was Microsoft Software Exchange
Super interesting video. The FM module in these has more in common with the DX21, DX27, and DX100 synths. The DX7 has more envelopes and algorithms and 16-voice polyphony.
I own an DX21 and absolutely love its nostalgia stirring sound.
OMG, the Outrun music! Takes me back to skipping college to go to the arcade in 1988...
Great video, I still have my old cx5m 2 up in the loft, I may just get it down to have a mess with 😀
This made my day. 😂 loved your playing us out! Another top notch, fascinating, informative, but not too heavy, humorous look at past tech. Thanks Neil. BRILLIANT!
Well said, sir; it sums up my own sentiments pretty accurately.
I had the pleasure several years back of meeting Dr. John Chowning, originator of FM Synthesis, which all of the chips (particularly Yamaha's) you mentioned use. He was the proverbial father of the DX line of synthesizers, and therefore 80s pop and beyond. My mint condition DX7 Mk I, purchased for $1650 US in Nov. 1985, just sold for $500 last year.
Wow, it must have been a thrill to encounter Chowning.
Thank you for showing some love for the MSX! The MSX scene is still alive and kicking, but usually doesn’t get much love from the CZcamsrs 😊
This is so cool! I absolutely love things like this, so many instruments and musicians were very ahead of their time computing-wise in this era. It has never ceased to amaze me how forward thinking MIDI is as a standard. I still use MIDI cables to load patches into my Yamaha SY77, and that thing is from 1989. It's so amazing being able to create patches in a modern desktop environment and seamlessly load them into the synth's memory without even having to use the synth's onboard floppy drive, or use the synth as a virtual instrument in a modern DAW like FL studio.
Brilliant video. I love the history of msx computers in particular - never heard of them. Keep up the good work!
I had one of these, sold it, watched your video, 2 beers, bought another!
Great video! Thanks for taking me back! I owned a CX5M and the keyboard - it was my first computer music setup, and I learned a lot about sequencing. Step entry from the keyboard was great because I also am not a great perfomer! The next kit I got was a Roland MT-32, and the combo of the Roland LA synthesis, sampled drums and the Yamaha FM sound was a great combo at the time! When I moved on from this, it was to the Atari STe which you also discussed :) It was a great way of getting into music. Thank you!
Notice that in European philips provided the same. In my time we had our own software to write music. We could combine FM sounds with samples which made the possibilities endless. . . Still got my setup.
I once owned three of these, liberated from storage in a school that was closing down. I have even less musical ability, so I sold them on eBay to someone that could hopefully make better use of them. I did notice that the documentation with them had evidence that the plug-in modules had been upgraded, this video finally solves the mystery of why!
Other school music department equipment I've rescued (then later sold) have been an Electromusic Research MIDI interface for the BBC Micro, several Atari STs and STEs, and three Acorn A4000s with MIDI podules and Sibelius.
This is freaking awesome, great work!
The 8-bit guy must be drooling over both
He would probably Dremel it, then blow a fuse.
Let him drool in his love for Commodore 64.
@@lukasperuzovic1429 Jezz, give the guy a break.
@@Riskteven No
I actually offered to donate one to him a while back. He didn't seem to give a shit, so I still have it. Having seen his sloppy hardware hackery since, I consider it a lucky turn of events.
Really enjoyed the synth sounds. You could really imagine this being used for grand external shots in a scifi movie.
The very first brass sound you played immediately brought the original Wing Commander to mind.
I've definitely heard the storm sound effect in something before. It was great to hear other very familiar sounds coming from this computer and keyboard setup. Your ability to play is certainly better than mine.
Awesome! Glad to see some MSX coverage.
Incredible Content. Love this Channel!
Love it! Big MSX fan here :-) Tks for the video!
what a lovly machine Niel. i used to own back in the days should never have sold it and all the cartridges and the keyboard.
This was MPC One of its time. Thanks for the great overview.
Awesome video brother!!!
👍
This is cool gadget for your retro collection, I originally used atari st with 2 meg upgrade with Cubase. I later switched over to the Amiga with midi interface for music x. Some of my best days that got me creative were because of this wonderful technology we had in England. When technology was changing very fast, unlike today.
That was an educational video, I knew very little about synths, I will give it a go in the future as I enjoy this type of music. thanks.
Love IT!! You are a true musical genius. I was given a Yamaha C1, which I started to repair. It had 8 Midi ports in the rear. The hard drive froze up unfortunately. I then moved continents and had to leave the machine behind. The only thing I have left of it is a floppy disc with the OS and possibly music software. One of my sad retro tales, would loved to have got it running.
One forgets how impactful effects are on sounds like these. You add a little reverb, and it changes everything.
Well this is quite frankly EPIC thanks Neil!
One of my friends still uses the Roland Sound Canvas midi files as background audio for his live guitar gigs.
As always a great and interesting show!
The CX series are some of my favorite MSXes, I own a YIS-604/128 MSX2 (essentially a differently labeled CX7M/128) and it’s a heavy beast of a machine.
One important thing to note: You didn’t HAVE to purchase an SFG-05 if you had an -01. Yamaha offered a factory ROM upgrade from the 32k original to the 64k updated ROM for US$40. No need to buy a second keyboard either.
Mate, that out run tune is so sweet, brings back good memory's of being in the arcades with my parents as a kid.. Good old days
I am really keen to see your new cave in near future.
I still have my Sony MSX HitBit. Back in the mid 80s I wanted to use the Yamaha sound Module used on the CX5M with my HitBit, and luckily enough there was a project in a magazine that showed how to make a PCB to link the CX5M sound module with other MSX computers. Amazingly it worked and I still have the working HitBit and Sound module today. Also, I'd forgotten about the DMS cartridge which you mentioned, what a revelation that was! Thanks for bringing back great memories with this CX5M video.
You could buy the sfg05 separately and it just fitted into the cartridge slot of another brand of MSX. I had a Sony Hit Bit, I think the FitBit is a smart watch
@@JesterEric The SFG05 couldn't fit into the HitBit without creating a PCB that acted as a spacer. Thankfully I had a Maplins nearby and got it all up and running.
@@JesterEric PS Thanks for pointing out FitBit/HitBit mistake, I'll blame it on autocorrect!
@@mthraves Yamaha made an adaptor so you could use the sfg01 and other expansions designed for the Yamaha slot on any MSX. www.msx.org/wiki/Yamaha_UCN-01
That is probably what you made yourself
Never sell yourself short. I still listen to your hauntology remix you released a while ago. Keep at it. I think you'll make a fine muso. 😊🦾
Great that you put MSX in the spotlights! I grew up with it in the early 90's, easy to program for and fun to work with. To my knowledge MSX stands for "Machines with Software eXchangeability", which would actually make the most sense, since software was exchangeable on the platform, no matter who built the hardware. It was a real visionary project, that had to iron out the software chaos in the early 80's. But, too little too late, even in 1988 they marketed the 8-bit MSX2+. By that time faster and better 16-bit computers dominated the market and it stood no chance against what competitors offered.
Want to try out a webbased MSX emulator? See webmsx dot org.
Haha Neil, your outro sounded like the keyboardist for Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood was drunk at the wheel! Maybe you don't have the playing ability but your music knowledge is better than most. I was impressed that you knew what an LFO does. Some "musicians" don't know that. Though I've never seen one of the Yamaha PC's before, the font definitely looks like a DX7 board. Another great video from RMC!
The Yamaha YM2151 was also used in most Williams pinball machines from the mid-80's to the MID-90's. It was one of the three sound sources in their games (the others being simple PCM samples via an 8-bit DAC and compressed speech via a Harris CVSD chip). The same with Bally pinballs from the late 80's to mid-90's when Williams acquired Bally.
I loved this video thank you sir !
Excellent job with the toejam and earl riff :3
Very nice choice of Headphones there!
Your face when you played that bit from Star Wars. Wonderful
Given who owns the rights to that universe these days, just those few notes was a risky undertaking.
Highly enjoyable, thanks.
Neil... Your doin grrrreat as it would say in Space Harrier one of my fav tunes and games to play in the arcades back in the day. If I knew about this set up back in the day it would have been awesome to ownen one for less than £500 I bet it could hold its own even today in the right hands brilliant video thanks for sharing...
That was awesome!
Awesome! I could never afford a MSX computer back in the day, which was my dream (Gradient Expert MSX, in Brazil), let alone that music computer which I didn't even knew existed until now. I'm a big fan of your content! 👍🏻
Now this is my thing!! Always wanted to mess with one of these back in the day but ended up with a 520stfm.
Excellent video
Neil the only thing missing from that haunting outro (and I use the word haunting in the "Japanese The Ring" sense) was a cheesy grin over the shoulder . I was a jobbing studio musician for 20 years, no hits but a few near misses, and that FM synthesis was ever present in all studios I worked in until of course the rise of the sampler. But even then there would be a Yamaha somewhere in the room. And mate, anyone who can play Toejam and Earl is alright in my book.
Your humor is hilarious 🤣
But I really enjoy seeing the European MSX in action too, especially with those MIDI capabilities!
It's such a rarity which I'm not used to and it looks like a great machine but then again... I grew up with the Commodore 64 and NES myself, so... SID be friend!
Oh oh I have this Yamaha CX-5 and this soft wear still now this CZcams is amazing
You need to find the Yamaha C1 too! I made so many compositions on mine! I graduated from the CX5M back in 1983 :)
My first yamaha keyboad at the age of 6 was a PSS-30 and my Dad had a PSR-36. The last one I had was a PSR-320 in 1995 and it was terrible compared to the older ones. Thanks for all of the reminder sounds, they take me back.
24:05 this is what mario on the MegaDrive would sound like.
Yes, I had one of these CX5M and the YK20 keyboard (and the disk drive too). I used it as my primary sequencer for a few years 1985-1988. It was a pretty standard 4-op sound, similar to the other 4-ops of the time (dx9, etc.) No hits with it! :-)
It's basically a Yamaha DX9 in a computer. The DX9 was the little brother to the DX7 and used a 4op FM Synth engine, rather than 6op like in the 7. Even at £599 that's SIGNIFICANTLY cheaper than a DX9, and a DX7 cost several grand in 1983 money. Even if you had to replace the voice card for the upgraded capabilities, it's still cheaper than a stand-alone Synthesizer.
According to a couple of other comments in this section, you could even buy a ROM upgrade for the existing voice card and thus save a fair amount of money.
Thank you for that great Video :)
Don’t forget about the Philips MSX that was popular in the Netherlands
Nice one, again.
Surprisingly a lot of mid to late 80s soviet pop has had one of these somewhere down the line…
I own a DX9 that I bought for £60 from a car boot sale not too long ago, I hope so much that I can come across one of these though its not likely 😅
my first pc in 1987
I learn basic on this.
also i had a game with Olympics from konami.
my piano keyboard was a mini one.
you make my cry.
dat air keyboard :D.
i love msx stuff, the later models are a thing of beauty and they can run amazing software
I still hope a new model will be developed by MS and Philips. Maybe something like a Raspberry, with a ROM-based standard interface that provides functionality on all levels. Screw API's. That's a commercial zoo.
It's a fantastic computer ...
Thanks
You were making better music than anything I ever created on "Music Maker" for the TI99/4A.
That's great, more like this example, please!
Ahh, MSX computers.
As a Brit I was hardly aware on their existence back in the day, but the platform is very interesting if you are a tinkerer... MSX, Spectravideo, Sword, Memotech, Colecovision and ADAM, to name but a few closely related machines. From a hardware perspective it's not that hard to pick one and turn it in to a super-set of the whole lot - I did so with my Coleco ADAM which can now do-ish MSX2+ when it's in the mood, and have been busily butchering an AMSTRAD PCW with the intention of having a CP/M machine that can play along as well.
For another take on such fun and games I can heartily recommend building a RC2014 computer and looking in to all the awesome things that machine can be bent in to performing.
First proper computer I was ever bought was an MSX. Love em to bits!
Picked one of these up earlier this year, with the YK-10 keyboard, in box. Still haven't got around to fully messing with it as we are preparing to move house, but one day I'll crack into it.
I envy your luck 😉 I've always wanted one of those to be honest.
With your legendary musical ears how about a collab. The 7-bit guy actually has a keyboards channel...
I do have someone very talented lined up, but given current lockdowns he is unable to come here right now. Something for a future video for sure, I'd love to see a talented musician play with this
My school in Germany had one. Fantastic 👍
In the United States MSX standard was never adopted, but you could occasionally find the Yamaha CX5M in music stores sold along side Yamaha synths like the DX7 as a semi-dedicated sequencer computer. Once the Atari ST series came along the CX5M disappeared from music stores as well.
What's cool about the styling is that it follows the same design, with green lettering and hexagonally shaped letters, as their professional electronic musical instruments of the time: synthesisers, drum computers, expanders, sequencers, etc. So if you're into collecting those, this one could be highly desirable.
I'm a bit of a Yamaha fanboy myself, with a couple of their synths (EX5S, AN1x), and a musical talent more or less on par of that of Neil. Although, luckily, I haven't gone down the rabbit hole (yet!) with collecting unusual synthesisers from the late nineties, such as the Yamaha FS1r, or the Kawai K5000.
That Roland SoundCanvas has a very nice sound to it!
What a funny video Neil, brilliant sounds on this incredible machine. When is the RMC Album coming out?
Great work.
I had one of these! It's really amazing!!!! They are like gold dust now though.... Wish I'd never got rid of it.
That's so cool. I've never played with or even seen a proper MIDI setup in person. I hope I get to at some point.
Crazy, i was literally JUST reading about this sound chip after being impressed by the sound on the Rastan arcade dfortae was playing on a stream here just the other day.....!!!!!D
DEF want to get something with this chip in it some day, perhaps just one of the more affordable musical keyboards they put them in first, but some day, a Sharp X1, X68000, or MSX to gain access to those amazing game libraries too would be truly amazing.....!!!D
Cool video, Neil!
That EBASS sound is just lovely! It really reminds me of the mighty DX7, from which everyone and their mother used its bass sounds in their eighties hits (Madonna, Whitney Houston, Phil Collins, Billy Ocean, Kool & the Gang and boatloads of other famous artists). Those Yamaha FM synths are really suitable for those warm bass sounds with "metallic" overtones 👍
If you love those excellent Yamaha YM2151 OPM vintage sounds like me check out Texelec's SAAYM sound card for the IBM PC (or compatible).
It's a super cool card which will play all those vintage arcade soundtracks!
I sold my BBc B to buy a CX5M and a drum machine. Got me started on making midi backing tracks, and i even played it live in bands :)
Good sir! That jacket is soo fine!
By the way, on your recommendation, I've just used PCBWay for the first time as I needed to revise the Spectranet PCB to change the footprint for one of the chips. Very impressed so far, they turned my order around very quickly, board looks great. Just a satisfied customer :-)
Excellent video. I still plan on talking about my own CX5M collection that I mentioned to you on Twitter, especially from the perspective of someone who does make music (or did; I am out of practice)... once I finish that collection, of course =P But a few details I'd like to add to your video: The original CX5 that Yamaha released in Japan was one of those with a chiclet keyboard; wait until you check its giant arrow slab! More Yamaha design oversights: the slot expander on the back at 6:45 is actually a male cartridge connector, and you needed the CA-01 gender changer to convert it to the standard female connector; good thing they dropped that on the II, since no other things were ever made for it. I have used this to try Konami's dual-cartridge easter eggs and they do work. There is one non-oversight in this mess though: Yamaha also made a connector for connecting the SFG-01 and 05 (and a handful of other rarer modules) to normal MSX computers via cartridge slot; this is the Yamaha UCN-01. The CX5M and CX5MII were actually released in the US, making them two of the only MSX computers to touch our shores (and the rest were all by Spectravideo, so). Ours had integrated power supplies (typical for Yamaha's professional music production devices of the time). Also your ToeJam and Earl and Star Wars playing are good; are you sure you have banana skills? =P
Had the sampler and FM cartridge for my 64, along with the full-size keyboard.
This video goes public the same week I receive my MSX2!! its not a yamaha though.
Great video as always Neil. Nailed the technical terms.
Some of those sounds are lovely on the 128.
Ahh, imagine playing some Metal Gear or Aleste between recording sessions of your synthpop band.
Channeling the spirit of Les Dawson at the end there 😉
There was a Yamaha C1 Portable Music Computer released in the late 1980s, which for the top model cost $4000; the C1 with 20MB hard disk in 1989 was around £2700. It had 2 MIDI IN and 8 OUTS! Do a quick search for more info.
Earlier versions (SFG-01 to SFG-05) of the CX5M didn't have midi in as you said. MIDI out worked. It is possible to mod the old FM module to activate this if you get a newer EPROM from Ebay and do a bit of soldering rewiring.
I have keyboards coming out of my ears. Which is inconvenient but makes me popular at parties.
This is extremely up my alley! I love it. It's actually pretty incredible value for the time. The Fairlight CMI costed around twelve times as much as one of these kitted out albeit the Fairlight was a lot more capable and was sampled based.
Also as someone who is really into electronic music and old synthesizers you're doing great and getting terminology down perfectly fine!
In 1983, the price of a Series II Fairlight in the UK was £21,500 ex VAT. So, without VAT, the Fairlight was already 35 times the price of the CX5M! I later worked for the distributor (Syco) around 1988. I actually own a Series III Fairlight, which in 1987 was £50k. However, my one would have been closer £60k because of its spec. The CX5M was dreadful. No one wanted to buy them, and they hung around forever in the shops. Atari changed everything...
@@ednasdiscomachine6049 Very cool and thanks for correcting my mistake. I should have Googled better!
Any interesting stories on the distribution side of things? I'd love to hear if so :) Also cool username!
Fine ! I really like this computer.
I still use my YIS503F (French keyboard version), with the SFG01 modified for being use as a SFG05, on my DX7.
You can use a standard low cost midi keyboard with it, the YK10 is not the only way to play with it.
And like with all other MSX, the megaflashrom SD is a solution for low cost access to the musical software.
This is the only MSX computer I remember seeing an ad for in Byte Magazine
Gorgeous fm synthesis
You are a better musician than you give your self credit for Neil! Great demonstration
We had YIS503IIR and YIS503IIIR over here in some Soviet schools, they looked like that CX5MII/128, with serial adapters in that side slot instead of FM and MIDI; they were student machines, and there was also YIS805-something as a teacher's computer, which could host a file server over the serial, daisy chained network of student machines.