The Nameless Guide To PC Gaming Audio (with binaural headphone surround sound) - Page 82

Quote:

Originally Posted by Evshrug 
I heard Nameless is selling a Recon3D USB pretty cheap: you could save up for that. I'm always saving up for something Right now, I'm saving for a new CPU and a new car

I still am. $70 shipped, if anyone's interested. You'd be hard-pressed to find it selling that low anywhere else, and it's in complete and working order.

I have to admit, I'm not doing a particularly good job of saving money right now, but I'll eventually sort myself out to the point where I have enough for a whole new desktop computer.

The thing I've noticed about the THX TruStudio Surround slider is that depending on its position, it biases the sound positioning more toward either the front or the rear. It's made quite obvious if you do some Windows speaker tests and note whether the front channels sound like they're in front or off to the sides.

Even in the sweet spot, though, I still don't think it sounds as good as CMSS-3D Headphone at its best, or even Dolby Headphone when working with 5.1/7.1-mixed sources.

EAX is just a set of reverb/chorus/occlusion effects. Older games used them, but similar effects can easily be done in software or through OpenAL's EFX, which is available to all devices.

What you really need to be concerned with is whether a game uses either the DirectSound3D or OpenAL APIs, as those are what allow for proper 3D headphone surround. Sometimes, you have to jump through a few hoops to enable them, like with Source engine games, Amnesia: The Dark Descent, or Borderlands 2.

Even if that isn't the case, Creative's surround tech still helps out, but it's dragged down to virtual 5.1/7.1, much like how Dolby Headphone works.

Oh, and I definitely would have suggested returning that Sound Blaster Z card...to get an X-Fi Titanium HD in its place.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nicholars 

Doesn't the Asus Xonar support OPENAL anyway?

 

So the only thing that the Creatives benifit over the Asus Xonar is EAX? Which is becomming obsolete now anyway?

 

Correct me if I am wrong but I just fail to see the point of spending more on a creative card?

If I'm not mistaken, they do have an OpenAL implementation better than the default "Generic Software" one, but there are still the following limitations:

-Dolby Headphone CANNOT use the positional audio data that OpenAL, or DirectSound3D wrapped via DS3DGX, can provide in its native form. It's downmixed to a virtual 7.1 theater system first, and then applies DH to that. Sure, it's a great-sounding virtual 7.1 theater, but why hear a ring of speakers around your position at the same height (meaning no actual height cues that a proper 3D mix can provide) when you can have a native 3D mix that sounds like you're actually there, more like real life than a home theater system trying to sound like real life?

-I don't know how well Asus' OpenAL implementation works out. The biggest test would be Battlefield 2 or 2142 in Creative X-Fi sound mode.

-This doesn't pertain to OpenAL directly, but the DS3DGX wrapper that Asus uses to convert DirectSound3D API calls to OpenAL is said to have issues here and there where Creative's ALchemy doesn't.

But if you were willing to get the Xonar DGX to save on cash, I would have suggested the basic X-Fi Titanium as a similarly-priced alternative at $40-50 shipped...or it would have been, had Newegg not ceased selling them. That bites...

Regardless, if you don't play any games that use the DirectSound3D or OpenAL APIs at all, you'd never see any benefit over the Xonar line or other C-Media chipset cards because the game engine's audio middleware is already doing the dirty work in software. A lot of people here tend to only play games that do it that way, by contrast to my outspokenness for older games. (To the point where I built an older computer with multiple sound cards for games that use Aureal A3D and/or take advantage of a few obscure Sound Blaster AWE32 features, at that.)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Evshrug 
AAAAGH I just typed out a well-thought out reply, then my web browser crashed!

Ok, basically I was saying you still are missing something. Dolby surround, and dolby headphone, are only 2D surround. I explained what that means here:
http://www.head-fi.org/t/646786/evshrugs-if-i-knew-then-what-i-know-now-discussion-journal

The short version is everything sounds like it's on the same floor as you, but you know that sometimes there are enemies downstairs or Rakk birds divebombing you from the sky, and Creative's cards used with headphones can simulate sounds coming from above and below. Even a 5.1 or 7.1 home theater can't do that!

Now, I'm not going to lie to you, not every game supports 3D audio... console games can only do the ring of sound designed for 5.1 speaker setups. EAX echo-effects are a different effect separate from surround sound, and I personally don't usually like the effect even in the games that had it built-in, and EAX hasn't been featured in a game for a long time. And if you want the cheapest soundcard, Asus probably has the best bargain. Asus' flagship has a slightly better amp than the Titanium HD, but Creative's new ZxR card beats that. But if you find a Creative card for the same or better price within your budget, they don't lose any functionality compared to Asus, and there are many games where the full surround, surround that's 3D and not restricted to channels of audio (well, maybe restricted to 128 channels, but you get the idea), of the Creative card will provide a more immersive and competitive experience.

I recently saw the Titanium HD selling for $110 at J&R, and I'm sad I missed out since I'm between jobs. Also refurb Titaniums regularly show up on Newegg for like $32, though the regular new one right now is available for $44.

GL HF.

I know the feeling about losing posts due to browser issues. It's happened to me more than once over the years, though not necessarily on Head-Fi.

Also, good description there in that fourth paragraph. That's largely what I'm trying to explain, though the EAX reverb/chorus is personal taste as usual.

Note that the amount of "channels" for older sound cards, in that context, would better be described as polyphony, or the amount of unique sounds that can be played simultaneously in hardware, on the sound card's DSP, without any sort of performance hit. Obviously, if there are more sounds playing at once than the sound card can handle, some of them have to be dropped entirely, and nobody wants that.

FMOD channels work the same way, just in software, on the CPU. Less audio channels means less CPU load, more audio channels means a lower likelihood of dropped sounds.