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The arrangement of the chunks in the song ROM is likely visually linear - basically first 64 bits of the data is bit 0 of the whole song, then next 64 bits are bit 1, and so on (there is binary decoder to the left from the mask ROM field, and its control lines seem to be parallel). So it should look more like:

1000001001111101000000100111110100000100111110111100010001000001
1101010110100100110101011010011010101011010011000011101110111110
1000000110000010100000011000001000000011000001000011010011011110
0111110011010000111111001101001011111001101001011010100101101010
1111111110111111011111111011111111111111011111101111111111110110
1111111111110111111111111111011111111111111011110111011101111111

This way it really looks like the duration is encoded in the two bottom rows (two top bits).

A note on this issue regarding to 1tracker. Most engines will survive a quick and dirty fix. You can open a *.1te file with a text editor, find there 'out (#fe),a' line, and add a 'and 16' line just before it. It will work in most cases, although a couple of engines may break. The downside of this fix will be a bit reduced pitch and play speed.

Some engines can have pitch issue corrected, although not all of them - find a definition of 'cpuTime', and subtract 7 from the value. If there was a few 'out (#fe),a' lines, add 'and 16' to each of them, and subtract 7 for each one as well.

This is a temporary solution, as it is uncertain if/when we will be fixing the issue. At least I'll add a note for each engine that is currently not compatible with +3, I guess.

I recall some years back there was a guy who was talking a lot about this possibility of getting four output levels on the classic 48K beeper, and proposed to use it somehow in a beeper engine. However, as they're pretty close to each other on the extreme ends, no one figured out any useful application for such a feature.

Actually, even if there was a true 2-bit DAC with proper evenly spread levels, I'm not too sure what advantage it could have over 1-bit - a two-channel engine with 'lazy' mixing perhaps, but that wouldn't give a major speed advantage, or extra opportunities for more unusual synthesis techniques. Maybe I'm wrong.

Curious little quirk, nevertheless.

There is export for this SquatM engine, but it only exports an assembly source with DBs. I sure would like to eventually get to a proper support, with a built-in 6502 assembler and XEX export.

As for porting other engines, we'll see. I think it is a good to bring some more of the finest ZX developments to the Atari platform.

Thanks, guys!

Yeah, better to keep 1tracker up to date to use newer engines. Not that it changes terribly, but it does get updates and fixes time to time (now as I'm using it by myself more often).

Sent my GTIA entry to SV, Grey responded it is the only one so far. So if anyone up to it, would be nice to have more!

Spoiler, it is a Squat tune, so there is a 6502 port now, and you can have it. Looking at you, utz!

Can also port some other engine if someone got a tune for an engine that hasn't been ported yet, but there is too little time, so hurry up.

Yes, it has been done a long while ago, can't even remember how long. A decade or longer. The thing is that it is not an improved Z80 engine, it is just a PC based rendition that uses original music data and recreates original synthesis algorithms. MATLAB powered even, if I remember correctly.

I did finish code for PET, VIC, and C64, but integration failed on the last mile - something conflicted or glitched, and my code didn't work in PET and C64 versions inside actual game by reasons unknown. As the integration was done on binary level (not source level), and I don't have a real PET or C64, and available debuggers leave a lot to be desired, and the game was already released anyways (first copies were done without sound), we're ended up with only using VIC-20 part for sound effects. David opted to do his own sound code and even a native tracker for PET instead.

As for music, initially it was supposed that I'll compose it all, to the strengths of my sound code, but as its development was lagging behind a lot, it was decided that Noelle will do SID music in goattracker, and I'll have to convert it for PET/VIC, which didn't work well, of course. So none of my music was used, and that's why I decided to release it as a standalone album.

I covered up the story in my Patreon blog, there is a few posts, you can follow it up by the 'pet robots' tag. Planning to do two more, one on the music editing process (1tracker this time) and data format (pretty compact, the songs 1000-1500 bytes large each), and another one on making of the album itself.

Those were mostly produced by the Battle of the Bits gang, when beeper stuff was a novelty to them. I guess they're tired of it, and we're still not provided them with good enough tools to spark interest for newer engines. Like, both 1tracker or bintracker certainly isn't as easy to use as Beepola, and more recent engines don't have an XM converter either.

Thanks for report. Yeah, just noticed there is still issues with that, even though it does not do segfault to me. Damnit. Alright, more work to do!

Robin of the Wood game is from 1985, Follin started to do his stuff including Vectron the same year, so it is difficult to say, but it is sure one of the earliest. Also features kinda unusual channel mixing with a single out per loop, take a look (guess that's where ZX-3/10 and Squeeker roots are?).