JdeFalconr
100+ Head-Fier
Thank you for writing this up, I was wondering what Sonar was like.I bought a Steelseries mouse, an Aerox 5 Diablo IV Edition, so I needed their GG software to config things. This got me playing with their Sonar software, and I can now understand why the dev for Redscape decided to stop selling his software. It's hard to justify $40 for something you can get free (GG or Windows Sonics), or you can get Dolby Access / DTS Sound Abound for $10 or less when it's on sale. (Cheapest I've seen is $9)
The GG Sonar software is quite useful, and the VSS if quite effective, since it's Waves NX 2.0. Only feature missing is adjusting the ear distance timing and other head measurements, which the old Waves has, along with Redscape. Otherwise, it's a convincing VSS, better than SBX, and you can tune the distance of the virtual speakers and their position. Nice for when you want to make the fronts L/R separation more pronounced. App also includes a PEQ and multiple virtual audio inputs, which can all have their own settings. The software engine supports 24/96 input, like Dolby Access and Redscape. DTS does not, (I have DVD-A rips of 6ch 96KHz music, so it's an important feature for me)
I believe some additional settings may become unlocked when a SS headphone is detected, but I have no way of confirming this.
I've noticed the GG software has matured since reviewing it over a year ago, tho I would like to see one feature added: I'd like for it to intelligently detect if 2.0 or 5.1/7.1 is being fed to it, and do a passthru w/o applying VSS if 2.0 is detected. This is a feature that Dolby Access does, and I love it for when I am playing a playlist with 2 channel and 6 channel music in it.
That feature you mentioned about detecting multichannel inputs is really interesting to me. I would think, though, that whether you wanted to do that would depend on what kind of content you were listening to. For music sure, that makes sense. For gaming I would want something like a mode select option to do the opposite: for stereo input apply VSS to output virtual 7.1 via stereo, and for multichannel input "downmix" it to virtual 7.1 via stereo.