Ostrich 220 has moved to the monorepo Ostrich != Emu, where it lives with its siblings:
instruments/ostrich-220. New versions and downloads are published there. This repository is archived and stays as it is; its releases remain available.
An emulation of the Roland U-220 RS-PCM Sound Module (1989) as a VST3/CLAP plugin and a standalone program, plus a U-220 driver for MAME. A non-commercial fan project.
The emulation runs the U-220's original firmware on an emulated CPU, with the sound chips emulated after the hardware. Everything the firmware does comes along by itself: voice allocation, the six parts and the rhythm part, MIDI, SysEx, the menus, the display.
You need your own ROM images. This repository contains no Roland data and never will.
Download Ostrich 220 (Windows and Linux; see Download below).
- The U-220 itself. All 128 tones and 64 patches (with the factory data), the 24×2 display and the twelve panel keys, played by mouse. The battery-backed memory is saved with the host session.
- Reverb/delay and chorus, measured on a real U-220 and rebuilt (see below).
- Outputs as on the unit: MIX OUT, DIRECT OUT 1 and DIRECT OUT 2 as three stereo pairs. A part assigned to Dir1/Dir2 sounds there, without effect, once the host's output is switched on; otherwise it joins MIX, as on the unit with nothing plugged in.
- Two PCM card slots for SN-U110 card dumps. Click a slot to insert a card (a dump, or its zip from MAME's software list), the eject button takes it out; the firmware notices either while running ("Checking PCM Card..."). A dump known to be good shows its card's number and name. Dumps with address lines A8–A15 in reverse order (they circulate for every card) are put back in order when they go in. Only the file's path is saved with the session.
- SysEx files: SAVE SYSEX writes the unit's own bulk dump (Data > Bulk > All) to a
.syx; LOAD SYSEX sends a.syxinto the machine. - MIDI OUT: what the firmware sends appears on the plugin's MIDI output.
- HW-EQ: the measured analogue output stage (default on); off gives the raw core.
Formats: VST3, CLAP and a standalone program on Windows (64-bit); VST3, CLAP and a JACK standalone on Linux. No macOS build.
Download the latest version — no compiling needed.
On that page, under Assets, click Ostrich220-Windows.zip (or Ostrich220-Linux.zip)
to download it, then unzip it. The zip contains the plugin, the standalone program and an
INSTALL.txt with the same steps as below. (The "Source code" links there are only needed
for building it yourself.)
-
Copy
Ostrich220.vst3toC:\Program Files\Common Files\VST3\(or%LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\Common\VST3\), orOstrich220.clapto the CLAP folder. -
Load Ostrich 220 in your DAW (or start
Ostrich220.exe). The first time, it asks for the ROM images:
Click CHOOSE FILE and pick any one of your U-220 ROM images, or a zip with them (MAME's
u220.zipwill do; zips beside it, such asu110.zip, are searched too). Ostrich 220 finds the others in the same folder by their contents, whatever their names, copies them toC:\ProgramData\Ostrich 220\roms\and starts. If some are in another folder, click again and pick one of those. Which images you need: roms/README.md. -
Optional: a U-220 factory SysEx dump whose name starts with
U220Factory(.syx) in the same folder (or zip) comes along. A new instance then starts like a unit fresh from the factory, with the 64 factory patches. Without it a new instance runs Memory Initialize, as a unit does that has lost its memory: playable, but with the firmware's default settings instead of the factory patches.
You can also copy the images to C:\ProgramData\Ostrich 220\roms\ yourself. The status
line under the panel says which ROMs were found and where, or which are missing and where
they were looked for. Folders searched, in this order, for "Ostrich 220" and then
"Ostrich": %PROGRAMDATA%\…\roms, %LOCALAPPDATA%\…\roms, Documents\…\roms; on Linux
$XDG_DATA_HOME/…/roms, ~/.local/share/…/roms, /usr/share/…/roms. The environment
variable OSTRICH_ROMS names a folder searched first.
The plugin is played like the unit: click its keys. Everything below is a shortcut and only presses those keys for you; nothing of it is needed.
Computer keyboard. Click into the panel itself first (a click on the DAW's frame or toolbar around it is not enough; until then the keys belong to the DAW):
| Computer key | U-220 key |
|---|---|
| ← → | CURSOR ◀ ▶ |
| Shift + ← → | PART/INST ◀◀ ▶▶ |
| ↑ ↓ | VALUE ▲ ▼ |
| Enter | ENTER |
| Esc | EXIT |
| E, D, M, J | EDIT, DATA, MARK, JUMP |
A key held down is held on the unit too, so the firmware repeats as the unit does. Keys with Ctrl, Alt or the Windows key are left to the DAW.
Mouse wheel over the display: VALUE ▲ ▼ (on the main page, the patches). Over VOLUME: the volume.
Clicks in the display press the keys you would press to get there:
- a field: CURSOR until it is selected (on the main page, a part's column: PART/INST);
- the arrows ◀ ▶ at the row's ends: the next or previous page;
- the title in the first row: EXIT, one level up;
- a double click on a field: select it, then ENTER (opens a menu entry).
The U-220's reverb, delay and chorus come from a dedicated effect processor (IC25, Toshiba TC23SC140AF) whose program nobody has documented. Ostrich 220 does not emulate it: it replaces it with a model fitted to measurements of a real U-220 (decay per octave band, levels, delay times, chorus modulation) and checked by ear in A/B tests. It is close, but it is not the chip. The effect model is one module behind a narrow interface, to be replaced if the chip is ever understood. See analysis/U220-EFFECTS.md.
Individual units may also differ a little, from ageing analogue parts.
- SysEx out of the VST3 does not reach Cubase. The plugin hands the messages to the host; Cubase 15 neither records nor forwards them. Use SAVE SYSEX instead. Other hosts and CLAP are untested.
- No SysEx into the VST3. DPF's VST3 wrapper does not accept SysEx input. Use LOAD SYSEX instead.
- Tested: the Windows VST3, in Cubase 15. The Windows standalone has seen little use. The Windows CLAP and all Linux builds are untested: they build, and an automatic test loads the Linux CLAP once, but nobody has used them yet. Reports welcome.
- In MAME the display exists only as text in the log (the LCD controller's character ROM has never been dumped).
BUILDING.md. The U-220 in MAME: RUNNING.md. What is known about the hardware: analysis/. What is planned: ROADMAP.md.
Ostrich 220 is based on emu110 / Voltaire 110 by
Elliott H. Liggett, an emulation of the Roland U-110. The U-110 and U-220 share the PCM
chips (MB87419/MB87420), wave ROMs A–D and the card format, so this project builds directly
on emu110's work: its MAME device work, its plugin core and its analyses. The starting point
was emu110 commit 5990a16 (.upstream-base).
The history was started afresh rather than forked, because emu110 carries Roland ROM images
in its history; Ostrich 220 contains no Roland file, not even in the past.
tools/sync_upstream.sh shows what changed in emu110 since then,
without its ROMs; with --apply it brings the changes in, for review before the commit.
Submodules:
| Path | Source | What for |
|---|---|---|
mame/ |
Helge666/mame, branch u220 (a fork of emu110's eliggett/mame) |
CPU, PCM chip, the roland_u220 driver, IC25 mixer |
plugin/dpf/ |
Helge666/DPF, branch logan (a fork of DISTRHO/DPF with our changes; pugl from Helge666/pugl) |
plugin framework |
- The plugin (
plugin/ostrich), the tools (plugin/tools,tools/): GPL-3.0-or-later, as emu110. - The emulation core (
plugin/core), the MAME devices and drivers: BSD-3-Clause, so that findings can flow back into MAME. - Third-party code and its licences: THIRD-PARTY.md. See LICENSE.
"Roland", "U-220" and "U-110" are trademarks of Roland Corporation. This project is not affiliated with Roland.