MSX1 vs C64

For things like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoGFV_xxR64

you want a SID, even though it has a gritty sound to it. As hamlet points out: it's apples 'n oranges really. Usas' Mohenho Daro tune sounds a lot cleaner, even though it is supposed to sound more boring due to only have square waves and barely any drums. C64 music tends to go way over the top, trying to fake more channels than three by using arpeggios (and many of 'm!), while MSX music usually is genuine three-channel music.

You could say there's a genre difference between MSX and C64. MSX tends to be more minimalistic, more classical in a way, just to name a game: Alpharoid, very basic music for two or three channels. C64 on the other hand tends to be more like pop music (bass, chord, drums, lead), as this one shows: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yv5_LsRaPrY

If only those C64 composers could choose for a moment not to have this pulse width modulation and arpeggios every bloody time! B-)

It is true these sound chips should be taken as for what they are (and comparisons are somewhat pointless). That doesn't mean we can not have opinions.

For me, most FM synthesis (OPL1-3 etc. ) have always sounded thin, metallic ... as if they are missing certain frequencies that should be there. I have a theory (for why I have this personal experience): an honestly synthetic sound sounds "good" (at least to some listeners like me), but something that tries to imitate real sounds but does not quite get there, sounds ... like it is lacking something.

In other words, FM is something in between, it is not "synthetic enough" because it tries to mimic real instruments (but I can right away think of a counter-argument: even when FM does not try to imitate real instruments, I'll still prefer SID or PSG+SCC any time!).

This effect (fondess towards synthetic / chip music) may be similar to why robot-looking robots are often "cute" but human-like robots (we can currently make) just look eerie, especially when they move ... because we can not (yet) reproduce robots that look enough human-like.

EDIT: many TYPOs and brain-fartes made their way into my post

It's not the frequencies. The effect of frequencies is like EQ'ing, it colours the sound, and may make it stand-out in the mix, but it doesn't make it sound better or fatter. See, I can make a real Stradivarius sound crap by playing it, while a really good violinist can make my own violin (100 euro) sound great. It's a common misconception that something is 'thin' because of its sound engine, while in reality it's the composer who's to blame for the lack of articulation and creativity.

This is a common theory, which I subscribe to: the uncanny valley in sound. On MSX, look no further than the OPL4 waveROM for an example of things wanting to sound big using a method that simply doesn't work.

FM is as good as the sound designer makes it sound. With the right settings, FM can sound rather fat actally, but it's no secret that most people can't make cheese from FM-synthesis even if their life would depend on it.

Also, the quality of the music itself matters. And perhaps you remember the music as being good, while thinking it's because of the sound engine rather than the music itself.

If you want to compare chips: use an oscilloscope to look at what those waveforms look like.

C64 games library is huge, as I see from GameBase64 collection, it's over 25,000 title. A lot of them are unplayable, in the collection there are some games from non English speaking countries. The official games released by companies (with covers, manuals..etc.) is 2500+ as I read from some people in lemon64 forum from people who collect and archive games (their base is if the game have cover and manual, it's official) ...
for MSX1 it's 500+ I think. MSX games are more playable. For Arabic countries (in my case where I live) there's over 100+ Arabic educational software (excellent design and good for all ages of kids)

C64 colors are more pale than MSX1 which are brighter.
scrolling and vic chip performance in C64 is better than MSX (especially hardware scrolling).

Music: C64's is noisy but more developed. MSX music and sound is more classic.

Keyboard: MSX is more comfortable keyboard, more standard and no complex combinations to produce stuff. (more playable in games you even don't need joystick)

MSX-BASIC is way better thank C64's one.

in my case, I like MSX more, may be because i grew with it. I am learning both, because i like both. But still, I think MSX is more organized.

Introduced: January 1982
Released: September 1982
How many: ~17 million
Price: US $595.
CPU: MOS 6510, 1MHz
Sound: SID 6581, 3 channels of sound
RAM: 64K
Display: 25 X 40 text
320 X 200, 16 colors max
Ports: TV, RGB & composite video
2 joysticks, cartridge port
serial peripheral port
Peripherals: cassette recorder
printer, modem
external 170K floppy drive
OS: ROM BASIC

Processor: Zilog Z80A running at 3.58 MHz
ROM: 32 KB
BIOS (16 KB)
MSX BASIC V1.0 (16 KB)
RAM: 8 KB minimum, most machines provided either 32 or 64 KB; machines with 128 KB exist
Video Display Processor: Texas Instruments TMS9918 family
Video RAM: 16 KB
Text modes: 40×24 and 32×24
Resolution: 256×192 (16 colours). In reality there are just 15 colour tints available, because, just like Sinclair Spectrum there are two codes for black. Unlike the Spectrum however, one of the blacks is actually “transparent”, so the MSX video picture could be overlaid on another video signal, for example one from a video disk.
Sprites: 32, 1 colour, max 4 per horizontal line
Sound chip: General Instrument AY-3-8910 (PSG)

Wild_Penguin: Maybe the fault of excessive low-pass filtering? Compare different filters here…