Used in the Nintendo WII game MadWorld (2009) developed by Platinum Games.

Module packer for Amiga. Created by Slammer/Anarchy.

Files created by software developed by Tjeerd Sietsma.

Microsoft's proprietary digital audio/digital video container format, especially meant for streaming media. The most common filetypes contained within an ASF file are Windows Media Audio (WMA) and Windows Media Video (WMV).

8SVX is a subformat of the Interchange File Format (IFF: originally introduced by the Electronic Arts company in 1985). The subformat is for 8-bit sampled sounds, supports both mono and stereo streams as well as loops; commonly used as a basic audio sample format on Amiga computers for many years. 8SVX uses PCM encoding, optionally with lossy Fibonacci-delta compression (halving the data rate). Audio File Library only supports PCM encoding.

Tracker for DOS coded 1995/96 by Conqueror.

Audio file format created by id Software for the AdLib sound card for use in their video games. The format is similar to MIDI, in that it defines musical notes, and does not support sampled digital audio for sound effects. Some games using IMF music include: Duke Nukem II, Wolfenstein 3D, Corridor 7 and Commander Keen 4-6.

File format created by Arnaud Carré. Similar to the normal YM-files but only contains samples.

File format created by Arnaud Carré. A YM-file is composed of YM2149 registers dump generated by the original play-routine (from the original machine: ATARI, AMSTRAD, SPECTRUM and all kind of machine with an Yamaha YM2149 sound chip).

Atari SAP music format is a format that stores music data from Atari 8-bit (Atari 400/800/XL/XE) computers that uses the famous Atari POKEY sound chip.

The format was co-developed by Apple Computer in 1988 based on Electronic Arts' Interchange File Format (IFF, widely used on Amiga systems) and is most commonly used on Apple Macintosh computer systems. The audio data in a standard AIFF file is uncompressed pulse-code modulation (PCM). Initial release 1988.

Lossless Macintosh audio file format; can be 8 or 16-bit and contain 1 or 2 channels.

The Berkeley/IRCAM/CARL Sound File Format (bicsf) was developed during the 1980's and represented the merging of several earlier header formats. It is used extensively in academic computer music centers, and is the default file format for several sound synthesis packages such as MIT's Csound.

Tracker created by Daniel Eschbach 1997 with interface similar to Scream Tracker.

CMC Rzog - CMC with modified bass sounds

The first 8 channel digital composer/player for the PC. Requires a A Sound Blaster or a Sound Blaster Pro sound card. It's for DOS and was created by Tran (a.k.a. Tomasz Pytel) of the PD demo group Renaissance in 1992.

Audio Interchange File Format with various defined compression codecs. This is unlike a standard AIFF file which uses uncompressed pulse-code modulation (PCM). Initial release 1988.

Video Game Music File compressed with Gzip.

Synthesised music file format rfom the early 1990s, similar to MIDI, designed by Creative Labs for use with their Sound Blaster cards. The format actually stores its song data in MIDI format but it differs in that while MIDI instruments are standardised, CMF instruments are stored in the file itself in the same manner as MOD files.

Tracker for DOS coded by ZiGGY / Hector / SHI / Overlord 1997.

Commerical tracker program for AmigaOS. Based on DigiBooster it was first released 2002. It is still being developed. Features: 128 channels, 256 samples, 1024 patters and 1024 positions. Sample format loading: IFF 8SVX, IFF 16SV, RIFF WAV, AIFF, MP3 (CBR) in both 8 and 16-bit.

Created by The Silents (1991).

Tracker for DOS coded 1995 by R. Verhaag.

CMC with 6502 routines executed at double rate of the original CMC

The Farandole Composer is a 16 channel digital composer for the Gravis Ultrasound card. It supports 8 and 16-bit samples and the GUI is styled after Tran/Renaissance's Composer 669 Composer. The Farandole Composer is for DOS and was coded by Daniel Potter and released 1993. Shareware.

FastTracker 2 was one of the most widely used trackers for DOS. Version two which introduced the XM-format was first released 1997.

Tracker for DOS created by Lasse Öörni (Faust).

An audio format similar to MP3, but lossless, meaning that audio is compressed in FLAC without any loss in quality. Initial release 20 July 2001.

A synthetic music editor for Commodore Amiga created by Supersero/Superions in 1990, based on Jochen Hippel's routines.

Created by Andreas Tadic (1989). This format is based on the Old SoundTracker format.

Two files that needs to have the extensions .gsb and .gsp

Created by Heatseeker/Cryptoburners (1991).

Two files that needs to have the extensions .str and .sth

Tracker from 1993/1994 for DOS created by Christian K�ndig and Adrian Studer.

An open source chiptune tracker written by kometbomb

Created by Kris/Anarchy.

Tracker for Windows created by Yannick Delwiche and first released 1998. Support for VST instruments.

MPEG-1 Audio Layer II is a lossy audio compression format. While MP3 is much more popular for PC and internet applications, MP2 remains a dominant standard for audio broadcasting.

MPEG-1 Audio Layer 3, more commonly referred to as MP3, is a patented digital audio encoding format using a form of lossy data compression. First software to play MP3-files was released 1995.

Multitracker is a music editor created by the American PC demo group Renaissance. It was released late 1993 and was the first tracker having support for 32 channels.

Music ProTracker - without samples

MPT with 6502 routines executed at double rate of the original MPT

An industry-standard protocol defined in 1982 that enables electronic musical instruments such as keyboard controllers, computers, and other electronic equipment to communicate, control, and synchronize with each other.

Music rips of PC Engine / TurboGrafx games. The HES sound format was devised by Takashi Mamiya in 1999.

Similar to the NSF-format, but it contains instructions for the Nintendo Gameboy.

Sound data file containing instructions for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) sound hardware. An NSF file is a modified NES ROM image with the game code, data, and graphics removed, leaving only the music engine and data.

Extended Nintendo Sound Format is like the NSF format except that it allows for individual track titles and timings. It can also alter the order of tracks, as well as mark tracks that should be ignored by the player. It allows NES music to output in Stereo. 2 Square Waves, 1 Triangle, 1 Noise and for later games PCM. Japanese games also used an extra channel (on the Famicom Disk System) that the NES music didn't have.

Module packer for Amiga. Created by Twins / Phenomena (1990).

Module packer for Amiga. Created by Twins / Phenomena (1991).

In 1989, some of the limitations of the Ultimate Soundtracker were improved upon by two Swedish programmers, Pex “Mahoney” Tufvesson and Anders “Kaktus” Berkeman, which released a version known as NoiseTracker, which allowed for thirty-two instruments and was more open in terms of channel usage. Later versions of the program used the MOD file format, which stored both instrument samples and the tracks in the same file.

Sound tracker for the Commodore Amiga, written by Teijo Kinnunen. The first version, 1.12, was released in 1989 under the name MED, which stands for Music EDitor. In 1991 the first version with the name OctaMED was released, so-called as it could replay eight independent channels on the Amiga's four-channel sound chip.

Vorbis is a open source project which produces an audio format specification and software implementation (codec) for lossy audio compression. Vorbis is most commonly used in conjunction with the Ogg container format and it is therefore often referred to as Ogg Vorbis. Initial release May 8, 2000.

Oktalyzer is an eight channel music editor for the Amiga by Armin Sander (TIP/The New Masters) from 1989.

File format used in the freeware PC platform game Cave Story developed by Daisuke Amaya

Two files that needs to have the extensions .str and .sth

Module packer for Amiga. Created by Azatoth / Phenomena. Also called ProPacker V1.0 by NoiseConverter & Exotic Ripper. Also called HanniPacker and/or StrangePlayer.

Proprietary format of Sony for compressed audio files. It's used on the PS1, PS2 and PSP. 4-bit compressed using ADPCM (Adaptive Differential Pulse Code Modulation) encoding.

Created by Franck Hulsmann (MC68000/Masque).

Module packer for Amiga. Created by C Estrup / Static Bytes (1991).

Module packer for Amiga. Created by C Estrup/Static Bytes (1994). Extremely similar to ProPacker 2.1.

Created by Cosmos/Sanity (1992).

Created by Cosmos/Sanity (1992).

File format is used for the music in Jazz Jackrabbit (1994) and possible others. There are currently three file types that use the extension .PSM; they seem to be related to a certain extent, though how is currently unknown. The three formats are: PSM New Format, PSM 16 and PSM Old Format. Currently the most common PSM is the new format.

The MIH file contains information at what rate the MIB file should be played. It can be played without it though, although you don't know what the real rate is.

Created by Psi (Sami Tammilehto) of Finland's Future Crew. Versions prior to 3.0 created STM files. The last version of Scream Tracker was 3.21 released in 1994. Can handle up to nine FM-synthesis channels on sound cards using the popular OPL2/3/4 chipsets, and, unusually, can play digital and FM instruments at the same time. Scream Tracker 3.0 and later supports up to 100 8-bit samples, 32 channels, 100 patterns & 256 order positions.

Created by Psi (Sami Tammilehto) of Finland's Future Crew. Versions prior to 3.0 created STM files. The last version of Scream Tracker was 3.21 released in 1994. Scream Tracker 3.0 and later supports up to 100 8-bit samples, 32 channels, 100 patterns & 256 order positions.

Created by Psi (Sami Tammilehto) of Finland's Future Crew. The first popular version of Scream Tracker, version 2.2, was published in 1990.

The name stands for Genesis YM2612, since the file contains the data sent to the Yamaha YM2612 sound chip in the console Sega Mega Drive/Sega Genesis. First appeared on the emulator Genecyst as a simple raw sound data log. The better VGM file format renders GYM files obsolete.

Soundtracker 2.6 was written by MnemoTroN/Spreadpoint 1990. IceTracker was written by Icepic 1993. They use the same file format, it is closely related to the standard Protracker module format and has each 64-row track stored independently. Basically now a pattern instead of being made up of 4 joined tracks (ie: Channels 1,2,3 and 4 were previously classed as one pattern) are now individual sub-patterns in themselves, that is that now it is possible to independantly call up a single sub-pattern to repeat on a certain track without constantly copying it into every 4-track pattern as was previously required.

Two files named .spt and .spd

A simple audio file format introduced by Sun Microsystems. The format was common on NeXT systems and on early Web pages. Supports many audio encoding formats.

Consists of copy of scores and music data from RAM used by the SPC700 sound chip on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System or Super Famicom. Several SPC-files may be packed in a RAR-archive with the extension RSN.

Tracker for DOS created by Erik Pojar in 1994.

16 channel tracker for DOS from 1994. Made by Twaddler and Dr. Zon of xPose.

Module packer for Amiga. Created by Jarno Paananen (Guru/Sahara Surfers). The only difference with version 4.0 is that in the sample description, the finetune value and the volume value have been reversed, meaning the volume is before the finetune.

Module packer for Amiga. Created by Jarno Paananen (Guru/Sahara Surfers) (1993).

Module packer for Amiga. Created by Jarno Paananen (Guru/Sahara Surfers) (1994).

Module packer for Amiga. Created by Jarno Paananen (Guru/Sahara Surfers) (1995).

Theta Music Composer 1.x 4-channel music

Theta Music Composer 1.x 8-channel music

Module packer for Amiga. Created by Crazy Crack / MEXX (1993-1994).

Module packer for Amiga. Created by Crazy Crack / Complex (1993-1994). It's the same format as the version 2 save for the repacking of the notes. Used in the following games:

• Turbo Trax (1995)
• Wacus the Detective (1997)
• Genetic Species (1998)

and in the following demos:

• Impact DK - In a World of ASCII (1994)
• Polka Brothers - Friday at Eight (1994)
• Polka Brothers - No! (1995)
• Ward - Once Upon A Time (1996)
• Lairfight - A Bit More (1997)

UltraTracker is a module editor from 1993 for DOS and Gravis UltraSound soundcard. It supports up to 32 channels and 8 or 16-bit samples. It was programmed by Marc André Schallehn (MAS of Prophecy).

Module packer for Amiga. Created by Anders E. Hansen (Laxity / Kefrens) 1991-1993.

Created by Anders E. Hansen (Laxity / Kefrens) 1991-1993.

An audio format for multiple video game platforms, such as Sega's Master System, Game Gear, Mega Drive/Genesis, SG-1000 Mark III and possibly others in the future. The normal filename extension is .vgm, but files can also be Gzip compressed into .vgz files.

Module packer for Amiga. Created by Wanton / Bloodsuckers.

A Microsoft and IBM audio file format standard for storing an audio bitstream on PCs. It is an application of the RIFF bitstream format method for storing data in “chunks”. The RIFF format acts as a “wrapper” for various audio compression codecs. Though a WAV file can hold compressed audio, the most common WAV format contains uncompressed audio in the linear pulse code modulation (LPCM) format.

Audio data compression technology developed by Microsoft. Intial release in 1999.

AY files comprise of blocks of raw Z80 code extracted from ZX Spectrum / Amstrad CPC games/demos, joined to a header which stores information such as credits / titles / copyright details etc. The Z80 code remains completely intact. Multiple tunes can be stored in a single AY file.