1972 was a remarkably important year for technology in which, both the microprocessor (the heart of home computers) and the compact disc (the current mainstream source of audio) completed development. In addition the first home games console was released in America, the Magnavox Odyssey. Ralph Baer, its creator, dedicated several years of his life in his basement building what looked like an ugly, brown box. Little did he know that his home-made experimentation of technology would be the foundation for the future of games consoles. The Magnavox Odyssey only consisted of 40 transistors and 40 diodes, because microchips were so expensive at the time. The console had not been designed with sound producing components, however, this was something that could be deve

Sega dominated the early 1990's with the release of their 16-bit system - Sega Mega-Drive (known as the Sega Genesis in America). It had 10 sound channels and a Z80 was used as an audio processor. The hugely successful release of Nintendo's SNES allowed the corporation to once again take control of the business. This was also a 16-bit console but had 8 separate 8-bit PCM sound channels.

In 1976 an American electronics company known as Fairchild released their contribution to the developing game console industry, the Fairchild Channel F. The appeal of this system was that additional games could be purchased in the form of "Videocart" cartridges. This cartridge based method would remain the standard in the video game console industry for one and a half decades.

Over seven or eight years, Nintendo and Sega continued to battle for supremacy in the American and Japanese industry. As the power of the internal processors continued to grow, first from 8-bit to 16-bit and then from 16-bit to 32-bit, the two companies took turns ruling the business. First, the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) crushed the Sega Master System throughout the late 1980's even though the Master System was technically a better machine. The NES had an 8-bit 6502 CPU running at 1.79 MHz whereas the Master System had a Zilog Z80 CPU running at 3.58 MHz. This may sound like the Master System is better than the NES but the difference in chip is the same as the Colecovision and the Atari 5200. The Master System's sound system consisted of a Texas Instruments SN-76596 PCM audio processor and a YM2413 FM synthesis chip which had 3 square wave channels and one noise channel. Sega Master System's noise was very superior when compared to the NES's noise. The NES only had white noise, while the Master System noise can be switched to synchronous noise capable of creating enhanced 8-bit SFX. The only drawback is that the noise channel has to borrow the 3rd tone channel, if it wants to play multiple frequencies instead of the 3 selectable pitches (for explosions, better drums or extra instrument). Even though, the NES has 2 square wave channels, 1 triangle wave channel, 1 noise channel and 1 PCM "sample playing" channel.

The Colecovision and the Atari 5200 both use 8-bit processors, rated at 3.58 and 1.79 MHz respectively. On the face of this you might assume that the Colecovision processor is twice as fast as the 5200, but it's not. The Colecovision uses a Zilog Z80 microprocessor and the 5200 uses a 6502, and their instruction sets and architecture are very different. Even though the Z80 runs faster than the 6502, the latter can do more operations per clock cycle (effectively 2 to 1), so, they are more or less equal. Neither has an edge in processor horsepower. The 5200's sound chips (POKEY) main job is to generate sound and to perform a variety of other miscellaneous functions. The POKEY chip has four separate channels, and the pitch, volume and distortion values of each of these channels can be controlled individually. POKEY is also used to read the position of each of the joysticks, and scans the keypad on each controller for key presses. Its other functions include the random number generator, IRQ handling, and 3 high-speed counters.

Some common words found in the essay are:
Colecovision Colecovision, Nintendo Sega, Zilog Z80, System VCS, Master System, PC Gekko, , Magnavox Odyssey, Sound Processor, MIPS R4300i, sound channels, games console, video game, nintendo sega, master system, sound chip, home computers, game console, video game console, console industry, games consoles, cd based games, chip 5200 sound, colecovision atari 5200, cd quality sound,
Approximate Word count = 2173
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page double spaced)