[MICHAELSD]

I wonder if it’s possible to get 3D head-tracked audio for music without the extra space added, with it feeling more like listening to the headphone with the effects off rather than the two speaker experience I’ve heard others describe when used with music. Imagine being able to move your head and sonically “looking” around the soundscape. Tilt to the left and the horn is front-and-center, to the right the guitar, etc. That would be downright fun and something I’ve been wanting to do with my EL-8 ironically enough.

 

[miceblue]

Someone should just make a video demonstrating the head-tracking since it seems difficult to describe by words. There's zero footage of it as far as I can tell, and describing it by words seems futile.

 

[Ted23]

For those looking to 'chain' a system that add its own 'ambiance' especially when using aux, here are the options, and what you choose will depend on your setup, and preference:

1. Turn off all 3D processing on Mobius (this will also disable head-tracking)
2. Leave 3D processing on for Mobius and if ther is a way to turn down the 'reverb' on your other box, do so.
3. The final App for Mobius will have a control for both head geometry and room reflection models. You could completely turn off room reflections on Mobius, this will still provide head-tracking and localization cues through HRTF modeling/IID and ITD. YOu can do this if you are concerned about 'double reverb or ambiance'

I have not heard Mixamp pro, so I cannot comment on that specific use-case.

Sounds great would love to hear if anyone has tried this with Windows Sonic or Atmos on PC as I’m assuming the experience will be similar on the Xbox.

 

[AxelCloris]

Someone should just make a video demonstrating the head-tracking since it seems difficult to describe by words. There's zero footage of it as far as I can tell, and describing it by words seems futile.

Afro KEMAR says hello.

 

[mashuto]

Just a couple alternatives/considerations for those looking for multichannel processing through their headphones:

At present, the game industry is still quite fragmented when it comes to spatial audio. There are a handful of games that are innovative in this regard. Overwatch is a great example, and has Dolby Atmos built-in. Grab any decent set of headphones and that game will give you full spatialization, including cues above and below your head. In that game, even if your character looks toward the floor the sound adjusts appropriately.

Personally, I’m not quite sold that I need to have head-tracking. I mean reallly, for the most part you are looking at the screen head-on and even if you tilt your head, it’s not like the screen is adjusting its presentation.

For VR, head-tracking is important but I’m wondering why this wouldn’t be a function of the VR headset itself and work in conjunction with the internal audio engine of the respective game? That seems more ubiquitous.

I guess for movie watching it would be okay but again you are mostly facing the screen and for the moments you turn away, no big deal.

For movies you can also get Dolby Atmos for Headphones (Windows) which you can then route to whatever source you want. Dolby Atmos for Windows is primarily made for decoding Atmos content (even Netflix has a few titles) but the best use at the moment is to process 5.1/7.1 content into a simulated surround stereo for your headphones. It works very well and is inexpensive ($15). Doesn’t work in Mac OS X though.

For mobile I highly recommend using nPlayer which is not only an incredible music player but also has DTS-X and can convincingly mixdown multichannel into stereo surround.

With respect to this new Audeze headphone, it is truly-leading edge with it’s features. The value certainly appears to be there and I look forward to hearing them. If I was in the market for a mobile planar, I’d personally probably look into these but ultimately choose whatever had the best quality (Sine or even PM3?) as wireless, headtracking and native surround aren’t that important to me.

I originally was also not sold on the necessity of head tracking especially when there are other virtualization and localization technologies available that are excellent for gaming (like sennheiser gsx, among others). However, this is the way I am thinking of it. While you get 3d audio locked to your viewport in a game, even if you turn your head slightly, its going to be locked to head as well. With the head tracking, I think its going to be much more like playing a video game on a 7.1 speaker system. The audio itself is still locked to the view in the game, but its not locked to your head.

Same goes with movies. Yes, there are things like dolby atmos that do the virtualization, but again the audio is still locked to your head. This is again supposed to be more like listening through actual speakers, sound that is not locked to your head. Which isnt that the goal?

I obviously have not heard the mobius yet, but I am excited about it, and based on other technologies I have heard before, I am absolutely convinced by virtual surround, and adding in head tracking seems like it will be exciting and add another level of immersion to really help pinpoint those spatial cues.

Of course, even without the 3d stuff, this still sounds like an amazing bang for your buck. It will be my first planar, and my first bluetooth pair too. That alone makes it sound like good deal, but the that along with the 3d stuff really sold it for me. Very excited, hope it lives up to my expectations and the hype.

 

[KMann]

At present, the game industry is still quite fragmented when it comes to spatial audio. There are a handful of games that are innovative in this regard. Overwatch is a great example, and has Dolby Atmos built-in. Grab any decent set of headphones and that game will give you full spatialization, including cues above and below your head. In that game, even if your character looks toward the floor the sound adjusts appropriately.

Personally, I’m not quite sold that I need to have head-tracking. I mean reallly, for the most part you are looking at the screen head-on and even if you tilt your head, it’s not like the screen is adjusting its presentation.

For VR, head-tracking is important but I’m wondering why this wouldn’t be a function of the VR headset itself and work in conjunction with the internal audio engine of the respective game? That seems more ubiquitous.

We have been researching spatial audio for several years now, we have our own ambisonics microphone and we have both recorded and tried to faithfully reproduce it in our headphones. Reproducing multi-channel audio through a pair of headphones, be it for gaming, movies or music works on the same fundamental principles. You are trying to reproduce the experience that you get from mult-speaker setup from a pair of headphones.

Sound localization in a virtual audio scene needs five components:

1. Inter aural time delay -- Depending on the where the sound source is located, there is a small time difference between when our left and right ear hears the sound. Our auditory system is tuned to use this to localize sound. However there are places where left and right ears are equidistant from the sound source (for example directly in frot or directly behind). There can also be locations in the virtual audio scene where the inter aural delay can be exactly the same for two different locations (for example slightly to the right in front and slightly to the right but behind). These regions are called the 'cone of confusion'
2. Inter aural intensity difference -- Our head geometry approximates a sphere and is often 'in the way' causing the sound intensity level for one ear to be lower than the other ear depending on the direction of sound. This is more true for frequencies higher than 1kHz. This is another clue our brain uses to localize sound. However here too, when the sound is directly in front or behind or in the cone of confusion, we have difficulty localizing sound.
3. HRTFs - Our ear-shape, head and shoulders together cause reflections that are asymmetric and directional in nature and modify the sound we hear (both frequency and phase) depending on the location of sound. Our brain is used to this and helps us localize sound. However HRTFs are individual specific. Generic HRTFs can be effective to some degree to provide directional cues but they are not great to disambiguate when the sound source falls in the cone of confusion.
4. Reflections: 1, 2 and 3 above provide information on the direction of sound but not so much on depth. Our brain uses reflections to judge depth but our brain is also smart enough to 'subtract' or ignore these reflections so we do not hear 'echos' when we go about doing our day to day activities.
5. Head movements: We rarely hold our head steady in place in the real world. Head movement is a integral part of both our visual and auditory perception. Without head movements we find it hard to judge visual depth in a 3D space. Without head movements both human and animal subjects find to disambiguate location of sound if the sound source is directly in front, above , below or behind us or in the cone of confusion ( especially in the absence of any visual cues). In the presence of visual cues (such as some activity in the monitor), head movements accentuate the experience giving a larger sense of space. More importantly, being able to track head movements provides an auditory experience that is closer to reality so our brain is not constantly on over-drive to piece conflicting visual and auditory information. As a result the experience becomes immersive and natural, and one forgets you are wearing a headphone, which is exactly the experience we want to provide.

Many 3D audio applications may provide 1,2, 3, and 4 to a varying degree, but without head-tracking to provide a real-time feedback of the relative position of our head, they fall short of providing a truly immersive and believable experience.

One more factor to consider is all the requirements I have listed above rely on precise timing and faithful reproduction in both frequency and time domain. We believe for a immersive 3D experience, a very linear and transparent transducer with negligible distortion and high dynamic range is needed and our planar transducers fit that requirement very well.

 

[BunnyNamedCraig]

Same.
Im going to skip this product due to its lack of compatibility with the consoles.Hopefully @Audeze brings a console version to market soon.I will be all over it.

That’s what I am gathering as well... i wish Xbone could work easily with this. Can’t have it all I guess.

 

[Vader2k]

If and when multi-channel console support becomes available, would this version of the Mobius be able to work with whatever solution is developed (either via agreements with Sony and Microsoft to allow direct USB connection to the console or an additional external adapter), or would it require a revised version of the Mobius to be developed?

Basically, I'd hate to get a Mobius now and find out it will never be able to support multi-channel audio on consoles.

 

[X-Frame]

Running out of the Mixamp with all processing disabled, into the Mobius via 3.5mm with the Mobius processing turned on? Yes, you'll only be getting stereo that way. It would be simulating a 2.0 speaker setup via the 3D spatialization and head tracking.

If you have the Mixamp enabled, it will be outputting a pre-processed signal to the Mobius. With the Mobius's 3D turned off, you'll get standard Dolby Headphone processing. With the 3D turned on, you'll get the two together. The Mobius's processing will stack on top of the Dolby Headphone signal. As MLE mentioned, this will increase the perceived reverb because you're processing the signal twice. My setup for Monster Hunter World has been Mixamp (on) > 3.5mm > Mobius (on). From my experience with MHW, it helps add to the sense of immersion. Do note that I only play competitive first-person games on PC, so I'm sure MLE has more experience with first-person games on console than I do.


I ran the Mobius through a powered USB 3.0 hub (Anker) on my Mac without issue. On both of my PCs I fed the Mobius straight from the motherboard. I didn't try it with a bus powered hub.

Thank you very much for your help and the explanation!

For those looking to 'chain' a system that add its own 'ambiance' especially when using aux, here are the options, and what you choose will depend on your setup, and preference:

1. Turn off all 3D processing on Mobius (this will also disable head-tracking)
2. Leave 3D processing on for Mobius and if ther is a way to turn down the 'reverb' on your other box, do so.
3. The final App for Mobius will have a control for both head geometry and room reflection models. You could completely turn off room reflections on Mobius, this will still provide head-tracking and localization cues through HRTF modeling/IID and ITD. YOu can do this if you are concerned about 'double reverb or ambiance'

I have not heard Mixamp pro, so I cannot comment on that specific use-case.

Very much appreciate you chiming in with this information, and the final App being able to control such things is wonderful.

How would adjust my Mixamp to turn down the reverb? The Mixamp Pro comes with a master Volume knob, as well as a knob they can adjust volume more towards Game, more towards Voice Chat, and if left in the middle it is 50/50 each.

I’d obviously play around with it, but if we can adjust the volume on the Mobius directly then I’d probably have to find a good base setting on the Mixamp. Would higher master volume be theoretically better to reduce reverb? Lower? Just curious, but if you haven’t used one then no worries.

 

[Mightygrey]

If and when multi-channel console support becomes available, would this version of the Mobius be able to work with whatever solution is developed (either via agreements with Sony and Microsoft to allow direct USB connection to the console or an additional external adapter), or would it require a revised version of the Mobius to be developed?

Basically, I'd hate to get a Mobius now and find out it will never be able to support multi-channel audio on consoles.

Super keen to hear the response on this, just having pulled the trigger as an Xbox player.

 

[Ted23]

That’s what I am gathering as well... i wish Xbone could work easily with this. Can’t have it all I guess.

As far as I understand it should be able to work with you using dolby atmos/Sonic turned on and using the head tracking and HRTF of this headphone in combination. Although I haven’t heard of anyone replying to how this sounds yet as those sound codecs are available on PC as well.

 

[pshych0]

@Mad Lust Envy Can you please provide a sound quality comparison with EL-8 or other headphones? Much appreciated.

 

[stacey]

Sold. Go team Copper!
At this rate, the $249 tier will be gone by this weekend.
So are these sweat proof? Would like a BT headphone to go to the gym with.

 

[BunnyNamedCraig]

As far as I understand it should be able to work with you using dolby atmos/Sonic turned on and using the head tracking and HRTF of this headphone in combination. Although I haven’t heard of anyone replying to how this sounds yet as those sound codecs are available on PC as well.

I’d love to hear how that combo is! Was always curious about using Atmos. Doesn’t the content, aka the video game, have to support that though?

 

[Ted23]

I’d love to hear how that combo is! Was always curious about using Atmos. Doesn’t the content, aka the video game, have to support that though?

A game has to support some sort of surround sound for either Sonic or atmos to work. They give you a depth and a height component. If that can be combined properly with the head tracking of these headphones that is what I am hoping for. Most new games have surround sound features so I’m not really worried about that it’s the combination between the two that I hope is smooth. Unfortunately no one with the headphones has commented on this point.