Impulse Tracker User's Manual — IT.TXT (summary)

The manual shipped with impulse-tracker: introduction and technical limits, running the program, the pattern editor with the complete effect list, order list and channel settings, samples and sample functions, instruments (envelopes, NNAs, duplicate checks), song variables, a "for Scream Tracker 3 users" chapter with the S3M-saving rules, hardware notes for GUS/Interwave/AWE32, and Pulse's closing words.

Key claims#

• Origin: written in 100 % assembler by jeffrey-lim "on and off during 1995", mostly finished in the summer holidays of 1996 — over 100,000 lines; it runs entirely in text mode with remapped characters. It "began simply as an extension to Scream Tracker 3" and deliberately keeps ST3's "simple and QUICK interface" while adding everything FastTracker 2 offered (envelopes, 16-bit samples, samples >64 k, proper stereo panning) "and more".
• Limits: 99 samples, 99 instruments, 200 patterns of 32–200 rows, 256 orders, 64 channels under direct control, up to 256 virtual channels; 8/16-bit samples up to ~4 MB with none/forward/ping-pong loops and sustain loops, sample vibrato, default pan; 25-node volume/panning/pitch envelopes, pitch-pan separation, volume/panning swing, MIDI macros. Loads MOD/669/MTM/S3M/XM/IT, saves IT and S3M; imports S3I/IFF/WAV/ITS/RAW/PAT/KRZ samples and XI/ITI instruments. A GUS plays 32 channels, an AWE32 30.
• Pattern editor (F2): note · sample/instrument · volume-or-pan · effect. Notes C-0–B-9, middle C = C-5; 1 enters note cut ^^^, ` note off === (releases sustain loops/points); an edit mask decides what a typed note enters. Volume 0–64 is linear; ` toggles pan entry (0 left, 64 right; Xxx takes precedence; cheaper in file size than Xxx). IT 2.08+ volume-column effects: Ax/Bx fine volume up/down, Cx/Dx volume up/down, Ex/Fx pitch down/up, Gx portamento, Hx vibrato. Effect memory: 00 repeats the last value; groups share memory — (D/K/L), (E/F/G), (H/U), I, J, N, O, S, T, W. Effects are the only hex numbers in IT.
• Effects: Axx speed (frames per row, default 06; "50 frames a second"), Bxx jump to order, Cxx break to row (hex), Dxy volume slide (with DFx/DxF fine, D0F/DF0 every-frame for S3M), Exx/Fxx pitch slides with EFx/FFx fine and EEx/FEx extra-fine, Gxx portamento to note (can change sample; starts it from the beginning), Hxy vibrato, Ixy tremor, Jxy arpeggio ("an effect similar to old C-64 chords"), Kxy/Lxy dual commands, Mxx channel volume (0–40h; "convenient for making echoes"), Nxy channel volume slide, Oxx sample offset (SAy high byte), Pxy panning slide, Qxy retrigger every y frames with volume change x (table), Rxy tremolo, S3x/S4x/S5x vibrato/tremolo/panbrello waveform (sine, square, ramp, random), S6x pattern delay in ticks, S70–S72 past-note cut/off/fade, S73–S76 NNA for this note, S77/S78 volume envelope off/on, S8x pan (obsolete), S91 surround, SAy high offset, SB0/SBx loop point / loop x times (per channel), SCx note cut after x frames, SDx note delay, SEx pattern delay in rows, Txx tempo (20h–FFh; frames per second = 0.4 × tempo) with T0x/T1x slides, Uxy fine vibrato, Vxx global volume (0–80h, affects all notes), Wxy global volume slide, Xxx pan (00–FF), Yxy panbrello ("a word that I coined late one night"; with the random waveform the speed is a delay between random positions).
• Editing: Ctrl-Backspace 10-stage undo; Alt-B/Alt-E block, Alt-L column (twice = pattern), Alt-D mark by row highlight, Alt-C/Alt-P/Alt-O/Alt-M copy/paste/overwrite/mix, Alt-Q/Alt-A transpose, Alt-F/Alt-G double/halve block length, Alt-J volume amplifier, Alt-K slide volumes (twice removes them), Alt-X slide effect values (twice erases), Alt-S set instrument, Alt-V/Alt-W volumes, Alt-Y swap blocks, Alt-Z cut, Alt-N multichannel, Alt-I templates (a copied block is stamped, transposed, whenever you enter a note — octaves, stereo pairs, effect sequences), skip value Alt-0…9 (0 = advance to the next channel, "easier to enter chords"), Space re-enters the previous data, 4/8 play note/row, Ctrl-F6 play from row, Ctrl-F7 playback mark.
• Order list (F11): --- ends the song, +++ is skipped; N enters previous + 1; initial channel pan/volume live here, Space mutes, S = surround. Muted channels still process Axx Bxx Cxx SBx Vxx Txx Mxx Nxx.
• Samples (F3): default volume, global volume (scales every use of the sample — the way to attenuate 8-bit samples), vibrato (speed 0–64, "best around 24–48", depth, rate = how quickly it sets in), loops, sustain loops (looped only until note off, then the rest of the sample plays — "fingers lifting off guitar strings"; keep them under ~1/20 s), frequency = bytes per second for C-5 (Alt-± octave, Ctrl-± semitone). Rip with Alt-O; Alt-A/Alt-Q signed/16-bit conversion, Alt-B/Alt-L pre/post-loop cut, Alt-G reverse, Alt-E/Alt-F resize with/without interpolation, Alt-M amplify 0–400 % (default = max without clipping), Alt-X/Alt-S exchange samples. Copyright warning about ripping.
• Instruments (F4; enable "Instruments" under Control on F12): a note-translation table maps each note to a (note, sample) pair — drum kits or multisampled pianos in one instrument; instrument files carry their samples. Fadeout applies on NNA fade, at the end of a volume envelope, on note off without an envelope, or with the envelope's normal loop on. Envelopes: nodes over ticks, loops and sustain loops by node number. NNAs: cut, continue ("put a bass drum in the very next row after [a snare] — the snare will still complete playing"), note off, note fade; warning that fade 0 or continue on looped samples can hang a machine. DCT/DCA duplicate checks (off/note/sample/instrument × cut/off/fade) limit active channels and model a guitar's strings. Channels are freed at sample end, envelope end at 0, silent fadeout, duplicate cut, note cut, or background + volume 0. "I sincerely hope that these options do not cause the death of brilliant 4 channel music … There is truly an art in making a decent sound in as few channels as possible!"
• Song variables (F12): initial tempo/speed, global volume, mixing volume, separation (128 for close speakers, 80 for far apart, ~40 for headphones), Old Effects (ST3-style vibrato: twice as deep, per non-row tick; offset past end plays from the end), Control samples/instruments, mono/stereo, pitch slides Amiga vs Linear (linear: F08 at speed 5 always raises exactly a tone; intervals stay constant; transposing a pattern needs no slide edits), directories saved to IT.CFG.
• For ST3 users: F1/F11/F12 moved, block functions of any shape, no chord edit feature ("a bad influence on new trackers"), patterns 32–200 rows, Alt-F10 solo, sample libraries on Ctrl-F3/Ctrl-F4; global volume now affects playing notes; Cxx in hex; Xxx 0–FF. Saving S3M: Amiga slides, channel volumes 64, no instrument functions, ≤100 patterns of 64 rows, 16 channels, notes C-1–B-8, no sustain/ping-pong loops, no sample vibrato, sample global volume 64, Old Effects on; unsupported commands M N P S5x S6x S7x S91 SAy W Y.
• Hardware: GUS quality rises as active channels drop (14 channels = 44.1 kHz with 16-bit interpolation); GUS has 16 pan positions, Interwave/AWE32 256; Ctrl-G reloads GUS samples; surround plays centred on hardware mixers.
• Credits: Psi (introduced him to tracking with ST3), Purple Motion ("When the Heaven's Fall" is the best S3M), Red Haze (responsible for ping-pong loops), Chris Jarvis (demo songs Firestorm, Pale Dreams, Firepower, Sidewalk, Fallen World with versions 1.00–2.01), psibelius ("the nice friendly Epinicion founder"), ZaStaR (ITF font customiser, ITTXT), Emmanuel Giasson (MMCMP module compressor), AMD (an Interwave card). Freeware for non-commercial use; contact pulse@cyburbia.net.au; "RTFM" for questions answered in the manual; upload songs to ftp.cdrom.com/pub/demos/incoming/music/songs/it.

Relevance#

The authoritative source for the impulse-tracker page (now a full reference), it-format, new-note-actions, instrument-envelopes, volume-slides, sample-looping, multisampling, stereo-panning and the IT sections of most technique pages.

Pages touched#

impulse-tracker, it-format, jeffrey-lim, scream-tracker-3, fasttracker-2, psibelius, tracker, new-note-actions, instrument-envelopes, sample-looping, multisampling, volume-slides, stereo-panning, vibrato, pitch-slide-and-portamento, chord-arpeggio, sample-offset, retrigger, randomization-and-probability, chip-samples, fake-echo, octave-bass, sidechain-pump, semitone-math, melody-writing, diatonic-chords, levels-and-headroom.