Phruwt Issue 03 006

eZine lover (@eZine)

Published in 

Phruwt

 · 22 Aug 2019

  

Tone Generators 
A Review Of Tone Generator 3.0, AutoTONE 3, and Phoney4Mac 

Review by Santiago (the PHRuWT tree user #7) 

 
Note: I rated each of these tone generators on a scale from 1-5, 1 being the  
worst, and 5 being the best. 

--- 
Tone Generator 3.0 
By Phreak'em Communications 
213k Application 

	Tone Generator has a fitting name - simply put, it generates tones. Phone tones 
that is. It makes a total of 61 miscellaneous phone tones, ranging from standard 
DTMF tones (1,2,3, etc.) to operator tones (RO IR, CS, D3, etc.) to the sounds 
of different types of coins being inserted into payphones. In addition, there is 
a small window describing each of the different operator tones, a text reader, a 
war dialer, terminal, and custom tone generator.  With the click of the mouse,  
you can also delete or rename a file from inside Tone Generator. You can also  
change programs from inside Tone Generator, but I'm not quite sure what that  
does. 
	 
	The text reader can open a decent number of text file types, but the war dialer 
did not respond to any of the menu choices, including quit. I eventually had to  
force quit the program because the war dialer wouldn't quit. Then I tried the  
terminal. Tone Gen 3's terminal is no replacement for Zterm or Hermes terminal. 
For one, it has two lines up at the top with the time and date written horizo- 

ntally next to each other on them. The line on the top is updated smoothly,  
while the time and date line on the bottom flashes every fourth of a second or  
so and is quite annoying. I tried dialing up my favorite BBS with it, and it  
hung up right after connecting at 14400bps. When I tried the custom tone option 
, I was prompted for four tone frequencies and a duration of tone. Not knowing  
much about tone frequencies, I entered the same thing for each frequency prompt  
and five in the duration prompt. I clicked on "Play sound" and the custom tone  
window closed. The Delete/Rename a file menu choices work fine, especially in At 

Ease when you have a file on a disk you want to delete, but At Ease won't let  
you. Did I mention TG 3.0 has a nice icon too? 

	My complaints about Tone Generator include: the interface is a cantankerous -  
you can't quit until you've closed all the windows, and there's no way to reach 
the author - no text file was included with the program, and the text from the  
"About.." box has been deleted. 

	Overall, Tone Generator 3.0 is a small, reliable tone generator every hack/ 
phreak enthusiast should have. 

Rating: 4 

--- 
AutoTONE 3 
By The (403) Phoney 
7k MS Basic Runtime Document (Needs MS BASIC Runtime, 77k) 

 
	AutoTONE was made in QuickBASIC, so it's not as fancy as Tone Generator 3.0 or  
Phoney4Mac. When you open it up, an introduction sound starts to play. And play  
it does, I counted 34 seconds. But it's no major problem. 

	First of all, I have to give this guy props for this program - it appears to be 
an early version of Phoney4Mac, and the fact that it's written in QuickBASIC.. 

	The interface is quite simple. There are tones for 6 different boxes: DTMF, MF, 
Silver, Blue, Red, and Green. You can choose between three different waveforms:  
sine, sawtooth, or square, something that Tone Generator 3 and Phoney4Mac don't  
include. AutoTONE also prints out the tones you've played in a window above the  
tone buttons, in case you're making a red box and want to know if you recorded  
enough quarter sounds, etc. Use your imagination. 

	That's about it. Nothing fancy, no huge bugs as far as I can tell, just a  
simple, small tone generator - it's the smallest of all three. 

	My overall impression is that this is a fair program because it's small size  
makes up for the few things I didn't like about it - the intro sound, the  
somewhat crude interface, etc. 

Rating: 2.5 

--- 
Phoney4Mac 1.0 
By The Armchair Hacker 
748k Application 

 
	Phoney4Mac is the most pleasent of these three tone generators. It has a very  
realistic, color interface. In the large window, it displays the tone buttoms,  
in a smaller box it has  six clickable buttoms which cycle the tones window.  
Phoney plays a total of 40 tones, not including the custom  
"Armchair Hacker Tone." A couple things annoy me. Phoney's large size is a  
minus - it's the largest of the three generators listed here. Also, the tone  
for zero is WRONG! Or my telephone is broken. 

	If you can get the Phoney FAQ, it includes all the "tech specs" you'll need to 
use Phoney. Also, it includes a way to reach the author, a definite plus. This 
program has no other parts to it like Tone Generator 3.0. 

	Basically, I think that Phoney4Mac is a great program to show to your friends. 
The colour graphics are nice but not necessary. 

Rating: 4