Think of it this way...would you rather have high quality uncompressed audio sent to the x7, and then allow it to deal with virtual surround, or would you rather choose to have muddy sound?
The point of sbx is to convert stereo to virtual surround for a non-surround setup, such as headphones.
So, you will be sending out unprocessed and uncompressed stereo info to the x7, which will then apply virtuall surround to the source.
This will give you the best audio quality. Just make sure the ingame settings are set to 5.1 sound system, since that is what your replicating with vietual surround (it would send the directional info needed)
Ah, what?
Options:
1.) You can have the PS4 output stereo LPCM.
This rounds down positional data to just left-right. If you have a game like The Last of Us or Battlefield 4 with built-in headphone surround, then positional data survives the PS4 output because it's already been "baked into" the stereo (TLOU has height processing, but I wasn't as impressed with the sense of soundstage as with SBX). This how I prefer listening to music sources.
2.) You can have the PS4 output stereo, and add SBX processing.
SBX can add "air" and push central sounds out further in front of you, but this isn't as positionally accurate as Dolby bitstreaming because you throw away all the rear positional data. I haven't tried this with SBX, but Dolby ProLogicIIx tried to "guess" when something was supposed to come from behind, and overall the effect was inconsistent and sometimes weird. If you have a game like The Last of Us or Battlefield 4 with built-in headphone surround, then positional data survives the PS4 output because it's already been "baked into" the stereo, but in that case you wouldn't want to use SBX at all (as this would cause more processing than just bitstreaming Dolby). If you're gaming this way, you might as well get the less expensive E5 instead if the X7's other distinguishing features aren't necessary for you.
3.) You can have the PS4 output Dolby, and the SBX processing translates that to virtual headphone surround.
This option actually has less fidelity degradation than adding surround processing to stereo, and having the DSP trying to "guess" what direction things come from. Dolby + Creative's surround processing has been my preferred gaming audio experience for 3+ years (since the 360).
Bigbeard, I know you're new here, but I challenge you to listen to option 1 and write out how option 3 has aspects of it's sounds worse than option 1. Obviously SBX will have more "distance" in the sound, but point out how compression affects option 3's bass, mids, treble, instrument separation, believable tone realism, "harshness," and other aspects of compression. I think you'll find that the compression is pretty light, or maybe even indistinguishable since games don't feature high-definition audio, and overall you'll get tired of the analysis and come to the conclusion that the only appreciable difference with game audio is how much better the positional imaging is in option 3. If you have a BluRay HD audio disc, WELL PROBABLY you will hear the sound degrade a bit, I don't know I don't have any of those. Or maybe, you'll subjectively disagree, I have met about two or three people a year who doggedly prefer stereo while gaming, and that's personal taste and therefor I can't say your taste is wrong (but maybe bad
).
