3D or Hardware Sound in games dead??

[TAViX]

OpenAL is ment to replace DirectSound3D as the API to output (NOT to create) the 3D sound effects.
In other words, EAX provides the 3D sound effects like positioning, reverb, occlusion, obstruction, + all the other, and DS3D (dead now) or OpenAL, or Alchemy just outputs them.

 

[Maelstrom]

Ah makes sense, thanks

 

[yogurt_21]

Yeah, EAX has nothing to do with 3D sound..... :shadedshu

Btw, taking serious some of the "wiki" articles, it's just like trusting my 86 years old grandma...They are only half right and also full of ambiguity.

Here is a better description from Creative themselves:

http://www.creative.com/soundblaster/technology/welcome_flash.asp?j1=eax



Another article from respectful TechReport:

http://techreport.com/articles.x/11171


The tests they made are also interesting.

not really been part of the argument but i will say how funny it is when people claim inaccuracy in wikipedia, this paticular article cited 11 sources, and then post up an article from a tech site which is far less accurate and cites a single source. In this case their single source is a dead link.

I haven't done a ton of research into these technologies but I will say that between creative sound cards and the latest onboard sound I hear very little difference. Certainly not enough to warrant the expense. A true audiophile will go with a better solution.

 

[erocker]

Sound isn't really three dimentional so technically you are all wrong.

 

[Deleted member 67555]

Sound isn't really three dimentional so technically you are all wrong.

That's right it's a linear wave that gets reflected, absorbed and reverberated by the materials in it's path

 

[TAViX]

Sound isn't really three dimentional so technically you are all wrong.

Hehe. Your right. The same can be said about 3D graphics. It will only be 3D when you'll have some kind of 3D holographic monitor or something.....

 

[m4gicfour]

Hehe. Your right. The same can be said about 3D graphics. It will only be 3D when you'll have some kind of 3D holographic monitor or something.....

Not true. 3D graphics are true 3D, right up until they're output to your 2D monitor. Different optimizations such as Occlusion mapping (detecting which parts of the object the viewer can see, and not rendering anything he can't) can affect this however.

@erocker Of course sound is 3D. it is a wave which moves through particles (air, wood, drywall, etc). Those particles move in three dimensions (for those who can't conceptualize it, think ripples in a pond) although 3D in the sense of positional audio? No, that's simply playing audio from a speaker near to the relative position of the source in the game world. Now we're REALLY getting anal about it.

Why don't we all discuss the important aspects instead of semantics?

 

[Dent1]

TAViX,

All those quotes from Creative's website is Creative being misleading again, the same stuff which has landed them in hot water in the past. This is not the first time they've mislead their customers (for example as explained earlier about them lying about supporting Dolby Encoding on their old Sound Blasters)

EAX is not positional 3D audio, when creative talk about EAX its talking about EAX in combination with Direct Sound 3D. It's not talking about just EAX. The positional sound will be present with or without Creative or EAX, Creative are just trying to take credit for positional sound because EAX is implemented on top of Direct Sound 3D.

EAX is the effects, echos, spatial distance etc. To reiterate the positional sound is already present in the games with Direct Sound 3D, all EAX does is enhance the effects.

Edit:

In addition Creatives CMSS technology which is basically a upmixer from 2.0 to 5.1 has been rebranded under the EAX name. So technically when Creative say EAX they are also talking about EAX effects + CMSS. Again missleading. Somebody should ready take them to court.

 

[TAViX]

Yes, Creative is lying, you are right. This is the answer.

In your conception, even cheap integrated sound cards could output to DS3D minus EAX effects, isn't it???

Tell me then, in Windows 98 and XP, why only a couple of sound cards could output on (to) DirectSound3D, like Aureal or the ones from Creative. Other cards, even if they were high quality professional or integrated on mobos, couldn't offer sound over DS3D/EAX/A3D, not to mention hardware acceleration and/or 3D sound positioning in games, hmmm?

You keep insisting that EAX or A3D are just simple wrappers for DS3D when actually EAX, A3D, OpenAL, are different APIs, just like similar to video, Glide, D3D or OpenGL are.


Again, show me some detailed links on how this stuff works, tired of empty words.

 

[Dent1]

TAViX, as Yogurt_21 said the Wiki article had over 11 sources. You decided not to challenge the 11 sources yet you find the time to post to start talking about 3D holographics.

In regards to your "Tech Report" link.

http://techreport.com/articles.x/11171


Quote:

EAX, otherwise known as Environmental Audio eXtensions, is a positional 3D audio standard with roots in Creative's SoundBlaster Live. The standard tags in-game sounds with information about their position in the world, allowing for more realistic interactions with the player. Through EAX, positional audio is mapped to the appropriate speakers in a multi-channel setup, giving the player a sense of direction associated with each sound. EAX can also modify in-game sounds to take into account obstructions like walls and pillars, and the occlusion effect of different materials, such as wood and glass, between the player and a given sound.

That quote doesn't even support what you are saying. It says it's a "Positional Audio Standard" - It doesn't say that EAX creates positional audio as standard. It's obvious EAX is a "positional Audio standard" because its a trademarked technology that has become established and is layers on top of Direct Sound 3D which is a standard in its own right, duh.

"The standard tags in-game sounds with information about their position in the world" - This implies that the in-game sound information is already present, hence direct sound 3D.

"Through EAX, positional audio is mapped to the appropriate speakers in a multi-channel setup, giving the player a sense of direction" - Again it implies that the positional audio cues are already present. Doesn't mention or imply on the fly creation of audio cues.

 

[Dent1]

Yes, Creative is lying, you are right. This is the answer.

Tell me then, in Windows 98 and XP, why only a couple of sound cards could output on (to) DirectSound3D, like Aureal or the ones from Creative. Other cards, even if they were high quality professional or integrated on mobos, couldn't offer sound over DS3D, not to mention hardware acceleration and/or 3D sound positioning in games, hmmm?

So are you implying that non-creative cards couldn’t output basic sound in windows 98 or windows XP. So according to you all those laptops and PCs that were shipped with integrated non-creative cards were unable to output sound.

Again, show me some detailed links on how this stuff works, tired of empty words.

That Wiki link had 11 sources from independent sources. Get reading

Yes, Creative is lying, you are right. This is the answer.

You are not a good reader. I said that Creative was lying about their Dolby Digital Encoding capabilities in the Past. As far as your EAX argument I said that are misleading their customers (not lying).

Edit:

Yes, Creative is lying, you are right. This is the answer.

In your conception, even cheap integrated sound cards could output to DS3D minus EAX effects, isn't it???

Nope. I never said that. Most cheap Soundcards could implement up to EAX 2.0 just fine. All I'm saying is that EAX is an effect not a 3D positional sound.

I don't mean to be rude, but is English your second language?

 

[TAViX]

EAX is not positional 3D audio, when creative talk about EAX its talking about EAX in combination with Direct Sound 3D. It's not talking about just EAX. The positional sound will be present with or without Creative or EAX, Creative are just trying to take credit for positional sound because EAX is implemented on top of Direct Sound 3D.

EAX is the effects, echos, spatial distance etc. To reiterate the positional sound is already present in the games with Direct Sound 3D, all EAX does is enhance the effects.

Edit:

In addition Creatives CMSS technology which is basically a upmixer from 2.0 to 5.1 has been rebranded under the EAX name. So technically when Creative say EAX they are also talking about EAX effects + CMSS. Again missleading. Somebody should ready take them to court.

You're right. That's why I can have 3D sound in Vista or W7 even without DS3D... :shadedshu

That quote doesn't even support what you are saying. It says it's a "Positional Audio Standard" - It doesn't say that EAX creates positional audio as standard. It's obvious EAX is a "positional Audio standard" because its a trademarked technology that has become established and is layers on top of Direct Sound 3D which is a standard in its own right, duh.

"The standard tags in-game sounds with information about their position in the world" - This implies that the in-game sound information is already present, hence direct sound 3D.

"Through EAX, positional audio is mapped to the appropriate speakers in a multi-channel setup, giving the player a sense of direction" - Again it implies that the positional audio cues are already present. Doesn't mention or imply on the fly creation of audio cues.

The game producer writes all the game sound info, positional algorithms, the needed effects and stuff, not DS3D, LOL!

So are you implying that non-creative cards couldn’t output basic sound in windows 98 or windows XP. So according to you all those laptops and PCs that were shipped with integrated non-creative cards were unable to output sound.

Disaster.

You don't even know what was the difference between DS and DS3D!! LOL

This discussion is over. I'm done posting here about those matters.
Enjoy.

 

[Dent1]

The game producer writes all the game sound info, positional algorithms, the needed effects and stuff, not DS3D, LOL!




Disaster.

You don't even know what was the difference between DS and DS3D!! LOL

This discussion is over. I'm done posting here about those matters.
Enjoy.

The discussion was over when you couldn’t differentiate between THX, EAX and Dolby Digital many pages back

 

[TAViX]

right...

 

[Dent1]

The game producer writes all the game sound info, positional algorithms, the needed effects and stuff, not DS3D, LOL!

So you basically have admitted yourself that the positional algorithms are there because of the game developers and NOT EAX.

you basically contradicted your own argument.

(PS. I was talking about Direct Sound API which the developers use to construct the sound )

 

[TheMailMan78]

Sound isn't really three dimentional so technically you are all wrong.

It depends on how high you are. I have personally seen sound.

 

[hellrazor]

I believe this is the longest continual trolling I have ever witnessed in these forums.

 

[TAViX]

So you basically have admitted yourself that the positional algorithms are there because of the game developers and NOT EAX.

you basically contradicted your own argument.

(PS. I was talking about Direct Sound API which the developers use to construct the sound )

Bro, I think we are speaking 2 different languages here, and none is English. Go bother some else please.

 

[TheMailMan78]

Imma be, Imma be upgraded hetero!

 

[yogurt_21]

I believe this is the longest continual trolling I have ever witnesses in these forums.

I call bs on this. I've seen the mailman do far longer trolling.

 

[TheMailMan78]

I call bs on this. I've seen the mailman do far longer trolling.

Oh yeah. Ive gone way longer then this.

If there was a military branch that specialized in trolling. I would be like a Tier 1 troll.

 

[hellrazor]

I don't follow the Postal guy too much, so I haven't witnessed his spectacular trolling in action.

Unless he was doing something in the Crysis 2 leak thread, but I might not have been aware of it (it got too long too fast, so it was tl;dr).

 

[Wile E]

Bro, I think we are speaking 2 different languages here, and none is English. Go bother some else please.

Again, you are implying that you have won this argument, but you are very much wrong. EAX is not positional audio, it's different types of sound effects added to the sound depending on where a character is positioned in the environment in the game. It interprets positional audio to make it more realistic, it does not create positional data.

AKA: If you are next to a wall, EAX will add reverb and other effects in order to attempt to make the sound more true to life in it's behavior. The fact that you hear the enemy creeping up bhind you while you are standing there has nothing to do with EAX. The positional aspect of the sound is coded into the game using any number of engines, not EAX.

 

[Praetorian]

I have read this topic with interest, but I have to say there is a lot of confusion an misinformation here. Well, I'm not an expert myself, but as far as I know, or I knew, Aureal had it's own API for 3D sound that replaced DirectSound3D as the default API in supported games.
here:
http://members.optusnet.com.au/kirben/a3demulation.html
http://members.optusnet.com.au/kirben/a3dvsds3d.html

Now regarding EAX, well Creative bought A3D, and developed their own API to compete with DS3D and A3D. Again to compete and not to be a wrapper for DirectSound3D. So EAX used to be a competing API and also a set of effects named after the same API. Therefor the confusion. Now, because of Vista, Creative dumped EAX as a direct API, and focused on OpenAL an open API for 3D sound. Old EAX games now are run through emulation and you need to switch to a game mode on the sound card in order to have that. The thing is nowadays Creative have only some nice but mostly useless effects for sounds in Windows, that are confusingly named EAX effects but have nothing in common with the EAX API that used to be for Win 98 or XP.

p.s. I remember reading about this matter in a magazine more than 10 years ago, so I might omit a few things....

 

[Mussels]

EAX was a patch on top of directsound3D, while aureal had its own engine.

as happens sometimes, the superior version (aureal) died.


the rest of it sounds like you're vague on it anyway - EAX stands for environmental audio Xtensions. it was only ever designed to add reverb like effects on top of an existing audio engine. with vista that engine was removed, so the lost their meal ticket and moved to openAL as the base, with EAX on top of that.