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Yamaha CX5M
MSX Computer Cartridges
When Yamaha CX5M MSX computer came to market it followed the MSX standards that had been agreed by the Japanese computer manufacturers. The computer came to market with a tape interface, a cartridge slot and an optional disk drive to enable you to load software.
Yamaha issued a number of dedicated music cartridges. Some of these cartridges were for specific use on the Yamaha version of the MSX platform, because they needed the built in Yamaha SFG01 / SFG05 synthesiser and MIDI interface to run correctly. Other cartridges were more generic and could be used on other MSX computers produced by Yamaha and other MSX computer manufacturers. These Yamaha cartridges can be found on the second hand market for about £60.
In addition to the cartridges release by Yamaha, the Yamaha CX5M could also load cartridges from other software manufacturers.
The cartridges that have been released by other manufacturers were mainly games but there were some music dedicated titles as well as some business software. These cartridges can be found on the second hand market with costs ranging from £40 - £200.
Here are some videos I created relating to the cartridges running on my Yamaha CX5M.
In videos made this week I used the CX5M Music Computer to demonstrate how to set up the video to allow it to be recorded on a computer.
While I was doing this I thought is was a great opportunity to walk through the cartridges that I have acquired over the last few years to work with this CX5M Music Computer.
To be honest I have actually done very little with this music computer since I acquired it because of the other stuff that has been going on around me and also I wanted a clean way to capture video that was not holding a camera inform of a TV screen.
This is a quick view of each cartridge.
Click anywhere on the image or title to see the work undertaken on this music computer.
The YRM-104 FM Macro Cartridge for the CX5M is designed to allow the MSX computer to programatically play the synthesiser without having the synthesiser module open in the computer user interface.
In this video I go over the basics of the YRM-104 FM Music Macro cartridge and how to programme the SFG-05 synthesiser in my CX5M computer.
Click anywhere on the image or title to see the work undertaken on this music computer.
In this video I explore the basics of the CX5M Music Computer running the software supplied on the Yamaha YRM-101 FM Composer cartridge. The first of many cartidges to be released by Yamaha to take advantage of the SFG-05 (in the case of the CX5M II / 128 model).
Click anywhere on the image or title to see the work undertaken on this music computer.