PC Gamers At A Audio Disadvantage Against Console: Surround Sound vs Positional Audio

Here is the hard truth you cant seem to get. Headphones SUCK compared to a real speaker system. Virtual audio sounds laughable in comparison to a properly calibrated system. Youtube cant show you this, as its only stereo.

 

DD+ is DD man. Its been around for a long time. It just has added bandwidth for other "infinite" positional channels (Its actually up to 8.1.4 I believe or something like that). DD+ can only be run through HDMI, whereas DD can work through toslink\coax. There is virtually no sound difference in the end.

 

Yet it CLEARLY AF does. over a decade of proof accessible via Google will show you this. You would not be able to tell, I cant tell, the next person wont be able to tell. I am floored this isn't common knowledge... How many people out there actually do have inferior gaming setups (*regarding sound)? My god.

Nobody has a real time Atmos encoder right (maybe this is what PS5 sound is, that I dont know)? Think about that when we talk hardware POSITIONAL audio. We are not talking about sound quality, if we were... well I upgraded the OPAMPS on my card, and uncompressed stereo PCM to my studio monitors is incredible. I could virtualize this, but I would be doing a disservice to my ears. Like most of you apparently.

 

Ah yes, we've come full circle to "your wrong" again. Ah, it's such a refreshing new response..oh wait. LOL
You haven't refuted anything. Nothing in your reply has addressed my findings for positional audio in the games I mentioned. You haven't even articulated what it is you are refuting other then "you wrong".

Yes, I did say that and I won't retract it. You've posted questionable software/app solutions that I will respond to at the bottom of this post. However, you've not once suggested a PCIe audio card. Even in your reply in this post you haven't provided one. LOL

And here is your 2nd snafu. Your omission to playing those games, calling it irrelevant, is actually relevant to the discussion of this thread. Its what the entire thread is based on! For you to say that gaming audio is irrelevant solidifies that you are basing your opinion on application use other then gaming. With again, completely refutes your objection of why I found those headphones so important for positional audio in finding enemies I don't see. You aren't able to comprehend what it is I am saying. I bet you believe that Sonic is so good in music/movies that you falsely think the same for all applications, including gaming. Which is simply wrong.

Still haven't actually proven anything other then say, "your wrong". I think we all get it now, you don't agree. But not agreeing with someone doesn't make them wrong. Specially when you've already confessed that you have no experience on the subject. Sheesh.

And this is where your lack of insight shows. This isn't positional/directional audio that reveals an echo like locations of enemy tracking. You are creating a false equivalence suggesting that the audio engine in consoles are the same as Realtek on PC. HAAAAAA!

The Series X|S has a dedicated audio chip. I'm not sure of the name but their engine is specifically design/tailored to work well using their Spatial. It's all from MS for goodness sake. On the PS5 it's called Tempest Engine.

On September 3, 2020 MS released KB4571744. What's so important about this update? It revised dolby access app to support 24bit audio. In the past it was only 16bit. I should know I had it before that date. Now the second question is: What so important about that date? Well on November 10, 2020 the xbox series consoles were released. Which, btw, also uses, drum roll....Dolby Access/DTS Sound. This proves, to me, that those spatial "enhancements" are more geared for xbox then on win10. Without the new consoles I seriously doubt we've gotten an update to those spatial sounds. The proof is the fact that they had years to release that update for PC and never did. The common denominator is the release of the xbox.

Just like any spatial audio it provides surround sound. Not positional audio. And it doesn't compare to HRTF from Waves NX built into the headphones. Also, the amount of cpu cycles, interrupts and i/o processes those kind of apps cause can actually hinder gaming performance as a whole. My solution, although a bit more expensive is hardware based. Therefore, doesn't require the CPU to do the work. And IMO that's the way it should be for audio. There, I refuted it

So, once again we are still back to the OP. The biggest problem is that in all your responses to me you've not proven what you say. Nor have your proven, to me, that what I provided is wrong. Because you cannot. That's because you haven't stated that you have DD/DA hardware. You've ignored my information on positional audio as a whole in those games. And, you've stated that using positional audio to find enemies based on audio only is "irrelevant" to you. These kind of responses serve nothing more then to post in a troll like manner.

A few pages back I've provided game play video showing situational awareness. Sure, YT won't replicate the level of audio quality I have do to compression. But it does show me being able to know enemy position without seeing them.

Now having said that. I've found that the Mobius and the Orbit S to be the top 2 headphones that provide the best positional audio for hidden enemies. That gives you a kind of echolocation of enemies you don't see. It doesn't require any additional software to run in the background. And it's better then any speaker setup I've tried because the audio is more focused in your ear when headphones are used. Speakers need to fill the room in order to get 1/2 the level of immersion I get out of these headphones in gaming.

 

oh my god you have no clue

*you are linking to software sound virtualization software?

 

I know it's off-topic, but has the download for the WaveNx Windows app disappeared from the website?

Edit: found the directlink
http://cf-installers.waves.com/NX/PC/WavesNx_Installer_1.0.18.0.exe

 

For best surround audio experience, nothing beats the real thing: AV receiver + 5.1/7.1 speakers. Virtual surround via headphones sucks ballz in comparison.

 

What about sounds that are intended to be very close to your ear, like whispering into your ear, in a horror game for example. Or the famous asmr barber shop, where he suddenly whispers in your ear. Or playing an space game where you are wearing an astronaut helmet where you can hear you breath or perhaps almost feeling the small space debris hitting your helmet. Or rain drops hitting your head or umbrella 20 cm above your head. I think this closeup effects are not possible with speakers. Just imagine someone is whispering into your ear from a speaker which is like 6 meters away. Should not work as intended. Yeah there is atmos where you can hear a helicopter fly above your head, from left to the right and to the bottom with an awesome explosion. But it is all in distance, where speakers are the better choice and will kick ass. But it always depends on the intergration of the game or movie as well. I did have a 7.1 speaker setup myself. But it looks like we are now at a developing point, where we have both technologies at the same time to choose from. I guess we have to wait and see.

 

^Hellblade was fine with DDL on my system. The "position" of the whispers covered space headphones cant.

All you have to do if you want a clear answer if play RE: Village. Doors closing behind you, and all the other creepy stuff that happens off camera is producing some of the best sound Ive heard in a game.

Virtual audio simply cant put the door and other stuff behind you physically. Physically being the key word.

 

I read the first paragraph posted by OP and I'm confused. Console has surround sound, and so does PC (unless the game doesn't support it). You can hook up 5.1 speakers to both systems if you want. But if you want to compare a console with 5.1 vs a PC with headphones, it's not a valid comparison. Are you saying that stereo on console sounds different from stereo on PC?

 

I believe the OP is saying that current consoles have really good virtualized HRTF when using headphones, even though the audio source are in Surround Mode = 5.1, 7.1, etc..

On PC by default, it drops down to Stereo 2.0 on headphones unless there is HRTF enabled via apps or built in DSP functions, which it mostly is true. The default audio drivers with most motherboard do not do surround to headphones unless it was bundled with another application, not counting Creative Labs onboard audio chips which mostly DO have some kind of Surround or HRTF technology, via software running on the CPU or a hardware DSP to offload the CPU.

He is not wrong at all in this aspect thus his search for a full surround audio solution using headphones.

 

He was given one of the only options for "full surround" ... Digital headphones with multiple speakers in them (paired with an appt sound card), that will decode a bitstream DDL or DTSC, or ones that have multichannel analog inputs. What is really happening is he is just searching for what "sounds best" to his ears because thats as far as you get with these software "solutions."

 

Just an update since I've been using these headphones. I've increase my k/d substantially since I've been able to pinpoint enemy footsteps (almost like echo location) in Cold War.

When the opponents use ninja I refernce certain gunfire from enemies. In Cold War I've gone from 1.43 k/d which was about Top 10% to noticing a difference at:

This is my 1st recorded k/d while playing. But I then noticed a 0.07 increase in my k/d which I didn't pay attention to.



To what you see above and still raising. Which is roughly top 3% at 2.00 k/d. Overall, I wanted to get my monies worth and finally have fun playing the game. Since the upgrade I'm finally having fun in the game I believed was the worst first person shooter out there. This game has a lot of flaws including sbmm and eomm. But overall I no longer have to worry about the problems I was having before.

This is why I invested in the headphones. I don't use them for anything other then just gaming. As this is how I have the HRTF setup and works best for.

Spoiler: k/d results

Some examples of the improvements I've seen that allow me, at times, to dominate the match. Before, I would be lucky to make the top 3.

 

I have similar results in BF1, BFV etc. (BF) 2.04KD and most of the time top 3 on servers (32ppl or 64ppl).
In MW i have no such skills yet, game is very different (Gun Play) than BF.
And Yes sound positioning in MW is not so good (right of the bat), BF is on another level (5.1 or HP or 3D HP) i hear everything fine.

 

4.6 K/D is getting up there

 

If the game audio is well made it will be positional even while the system runs stereo, besides that I often find in-game sound visualization to work much better than any 3rth party alternative.

Tried headsets that got drivers for 5.1/7.1 in the past, none of them was as good as a proper set of studio/hi-fi headphones even when it comes to surround.
Did try all the software encoders as well, sound becomes to unreal for my liking and doesn't really give any positional advantage, probably because modern games already do the job so using something on top just messes it up?

 

Its truly amazing how good these headphones are for me.

Yes, the dolby atmos used in this mw2019 and cold war is phenomenal compared to other games. I also tried the vision to but the position audio it really isn't that much important.

The thing is with my sennheiser's it's just not good for gaming. It's only recognizes stereo and the sound is... Lacking is the best term I can describe .

 

I have a pair of hyper X Revolver S headphones and they work very well in game, I hear where they are coming from, it's my 69 year old hand/eye co-ordination that lets me down