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How much disk space do you think a 10-MINUTES music file with CD sound quality would take? If you're thinking about WAV, the answer would probably be at least a few mega bytes. And a MIDI file? Well, if you're only using a FM type sound card like Sound Blaster 16, you probably wouldn't consider MIDI files as having CD sound quality, even though its file size is really small. But if you've heard about MOD, you should know that as little as 100 kbites would do!. |
What is a .MOD file? A .MOD (module) is a music file format that originated on the Commodore Amiga. It is composed of sound samples in digitized format, arranged in certain patterns to create a song. The .MOD format is playable on any PC with a soundcard capable of handling digitized samples (Soundblaster, Soundblaster Pro, GUS, and others). It has migrated from the Amiga to the PC some years ago, and many .MODs were written using a PC. On the PC, .MODules are decoded and played back using the computer's microprocessor, which puts a moderate to severe drain on CPU cycles. On a faster CPU (486-33 and above), .MODs can be played in the background (while you're doing other things) in Windows or OS/2. Performing really multitasking and a nice background to you.
.MOD files are different from .MID (MIDI) files in that the actual digitized sound samples are contained within the file. This allows much more flexibility than with MIDI files, and each song can sound different than any other. However, it also places far more drain on the CPU than playing back a MIDI file, since a much larger amount of data has to be processed for each note. If you have a slower CPU, you might be better off getting a soundcard with wavetable synth capabilities (which allows digitized samples to be handled by the soundcard rather than the CPU) and sticking with MIDI files (Note that MODs can also be played on a soundcard with wavetable synth built in). Module files come in various formats, among which is .MOD. Other similar formats (evolved from the original .MOD) include .S3M, .XM, .FAR and .669. All of these formats are identified by the extension of the file name (i.e.: wind.s3m). These are all variations on the original .MOD format, and most contain improvements not founded in the first older .MODs .
Now , the first thing that you need to do is to obtain some MOD Players, the best is the so wonderful MOD player for Windows 3.1/95/98 : (MOD4WIN) . Please click here.
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