Audio downloads

These are audio/hifi programs for Macintosh written with Microsoft QuickBasic in the 1980's and 1990's. I am resurrecting them as freeware because there is so little modern Mac speaker design software available and because emulation technology has made it easy to run them again on today's Macs and even Windows PCs! The user interface (particularly that of LMP Pro) is embarrassingly poor even for the time period, but the programs are still useful.

For Mac download the BasiliskII-bundled emulator MacOS9 or System761. For Windows download MacOS9 on this page. Once you've installed and started the emulator, drop the LMP.hqx and TB.hqx archive files onto the emulator's .app or .exe file. This automatically copies them to the desktop of the emulated computer. Now in the emulation double-click the archives (or you may have to open Mac68K HD > utilities > Stuffit Expander 5.5, and drop the archives onto Stuffit Expander). As noted below, you may have to reduce the emulation's Monitors control panel to 256 colors.

Contact information in these programs and associated documentation is out of date. Instead use this Email.

Loudspeaker Modelling Program

FILE: LMP.hqx

TYPE: binhex encoded Macintosh

SIZE: 137k

DATE: May 11, 1996

LMP (Loudspeaker Modelling Program) Professional is for crossover design. In some ways it is simplistic: you model your drivers by selecting the cutoff frequencies, slope, and Q that best approximate their response curves. Nonetheless there is basic support for modeling diffraction loss (response step) and interdriver time delay. You define the crossover either by providing component values for standard topologies or by entering the transfer function manually, and LMP plots the summed frequency and phase response. The download includes a user manual, but for more technical detail refer to the 3-part 1987 article for Speaker Builder Magazine, An Introduction to Frequency Response and LMP, available here. Did I mention the user interface sucks?

Alternate download of VAX basic source port from Jeff Reyes, for the original non-graphics LMP.

TopBox for Macintosh

FILE: TB.hqx

TYPE: binhex encoded Macintosh

SIZE: 170k

DATE: May 11, 1996

This is the full version of TopBox for the Macintosh, a collaboration with famed speaker designer Joe D'Appolito. It has held up very well since it's inception in the 1990's. It supports 8 different closed, vented, and bandpass alignments and produces magnitude, max SPL, max input, and impedance plots. Joe's formulas enable TopBox to automatically compute optimal box volume and tuning for a given driver. User Manual.

The Listening Room

FILE: Room.hqx

TYPE: binhex encoded Macintosh

SIZE: 215k

DATE: May 11, 1996

The Listening Room is a program for finding listener and loudspeaker positions that minimize the detrimental effects of standing waves and early reflection phenomena. The user moves the listener and loudspeaker positions in 3 dimensions and the program plots axial standing waves and early reflections. The program has an Optimize function that automatically minimizes standing wave activity. Full user manual included.

For anyone interested here are reviews from the time of TLR's release. These refer to Sitting Duck Software founder Bill Fitzpatrick's port of the program to MS-DOS. Stereophile, Audio, Stereo Review.

NOTE: If TLR crashes on startup, try setting the Monitors control panel in your emulated system to 256 colors.