For much better or worse, this synthesizer was king in the 1980s music scene. Sure, there had been synthesizers before, however none acheived the unexpected popularity of Yamaha’s DX7. “Take on Me?” “Highway to the Dangerzone”?  That harmonica solo in “What’s like got to finish with It?”  All DX7. This synth was all over in pop music at the time, as well as now we can all get some insight from taking a look at this de-capped chip from [Ken Shirriff].

To be clear, by “look” that’s precisely what we imply in this case, as [Ken] is reverse-engineering the YM21280 — the waveform generator of the DX7 — from photos. He took around 100 pictures of the de-capped chip with a microscope, composited them, as well as then analyzed them painstakingly. The detail in his report is amazing as he is able to show private logic gates thanks to his powerful microscope. From there he can show precisely exactly how the chip works down to every private adder as well as range of memory.

[Ken]’s hope is that this work enhances the comprehending of the Yamaha DX7 chips sufficient to develop much more precise emulators. Yamaha stopped creating the synthesizer in 1989 however its ubiquity makes it a popular, if niche, platform for music even today. Of program you don’t requirement a synthesizer to make outstanding music. The next pop culture trend, grunge, essentially was a rebellion to the 80s explosion of synths as well as neon colors as well as we’ve seen some distinct methods of checking out this age of music as well.

Thanks to [Folkert] for the tip!