Sounds and sound settings

[ghostly_doggo]

Is there any chance we will get 7.1 surround sound in the sim? It would really help sound quality out immensely; I've messed around with my headphone settings and mixer settings and for the life of me I cannot get hardly any deep engine noises and reverberations from these aircraft. Especially the FW190's. I wish the cannon sounds were deeper as well. It kills immersion, the visuals are great, battle damage is very good, and the clouds are stunning but its lacking noise. For comparison or help my headphones are the EPOS 670's.

[Soilworker]

Not exactly what you're after but I can highly recommend bass-shakers if you want bass related immersion. 

[SYN_Mugue]

I could be very wrong. I don't run 7.1 and certainly not through headphones.(Are they actual Surround Sound or do they just "simulate" surround sound?)  But even if the game doesn't output the extra two channels for 7.1, it certainly runs in 5.1. And if I want to rattle the pictures off the walls and piss off my neighbors by cranking up my sub-woofer, it's as easy as twisting a knob...(actually and/or virtually)  So what I'm thinking is that, the game IS outputting enough info for 7.1, and it's actually your setup that's not working correctly either because the headphones don't actually support 7.1, Windows is not configured correctly, or you hardware's software is not configured or not there at all.

 

 One thing that might be at issue is that, Windows 10, has issues supporting "Dolby Surround Sound". Just google that and see how many people are flailing with MS over surround sound. It seems MS and many Motherboard manufacturers aren't willing to pay the licensing fees up front anymore like they did in the past with windows 7 and hardware driver suites. So you might not have native support for it. You may need a program that runs Surround sound, ie a utility of your motherboard, sound card, or maybe from your headphones?

 

After all that gets sorted, (and here's the problem that I had). Windows 10 will only output sound to all channels at a certain 'sample rate and bit depth' (ie. 24 bit, 96000) So if like me, you turned up the sample rate at any point trying to get the best sound possible to pump through my nice big stereo speakers. It won't function correctly.  That problem had me pulling my hair out for days!

 

Hope you find a solution. It's great when it works!! And I know the pain of trouble shooting audio problems all too well...

 

PS: Personally I'd ditch the headphones and get some manly speakers. You'll never get any real PUNCH out of those dinky, what are they?, 1" or 2" drivers.

 

Sir, You need to think bigger, much BIGGER. lol  

 

Cheers,

M.

[BMA_West]

1 hour ago, SYN_Mugue said:

.....

PS: Personally I'd ditch the headphones and get some manly speakers. You'll never get any real PUNCH out of those dinky, what are they?, 1" or 2" drivers.

 

Sir, You need to think bigger, much BIGGER. lol  

...

 

Might be there is a whole family involved whose other members chipped in for the headphones ...

Kind of makes it closer to the chest than a mere neighbour LOL

Edited May 20, 2022 by West

[AEthelraedUnraed]

2 hours ago, SYN_Mugue said:

[...] (ie. 24 bit, 96000) [...] So if like me, you turned up the sample rate at any point trying to get the best sound possible

Actually, a higher sample rate than Nyquist (i.e. 44100) doesn't improve audio quality. It can be mathematically proven that higher sample rates cannot possibly contain any audible information that a 44.1 or 48kHz file cannot contain, while it does have a number of drawbacks and can even introduce some issues/noise of its own.* Similarly, 24bit adds infinitesimally little information; 16bit is already more than enough to store around 120dB sound level difference. 120 dB is around the same difference as between a whisper and a jet aircraft taking off at 25m distance.**

 

Actually, I remember reading a rather well-written article about this a while back (from a competing university, so I shouldn't really say this )

https://etv.tudelft.nl/file/96?view?view=true page 18, https://etv.tudelft.nl/file/93?view?view=true page 22 and https://etv.tudelft.nl/file/202?view?view=true page 14. The article is in English.

 

* Note that higher sample rates do have some uses for audio editing.

** Note that larger amounts of bits/sample as well are useful for audio editing. Unless you're a professional audio engineer and you know exactly why you need it, 96kHz/24bit adds nothing at all.

 

 

EDIT: I couldn't help but add the following quote from the article, describing a controlled test where "high-definition" audio picked by "high-definition" advocates was played back on professional equipment in a noise-isolated studio, as well as a 44.1kHz/16bit version of the same sound. Both amateur and professional listeners were asked to identify whether the audio they heard was "high-definition" or "standard".

Quote

In 554 trials, listeners chose correctly 49.8% of the time. In other words, they were guessing. Not one listener throughout the entire test was able to identify which was 16/44.1 and which was high rate, and the 16-bit signal wasn’t even dithered!

Edited May 20, 2022 by AEthelraedUnraed

[ghostly_doggo]

5 hours ago, SYN_Mugue said:

what I'm thinking is that, the game IS outputting enough info for 7.1, and it's actually your setup that's not working correctly either because the headphones don't actually support 7.1, Windows is not configured correctly, or you hardware's software is not configured or not there at all.

The headphones definitely do support 7.1. But the other setting is 2.0. It is actual surround sound (I belive they have 4 or five speakers in each ear)  and they do very well in DCS because they have the correct software for 7.1 windows hasn't had a problem and works very well with them. As for the sub, I would definitely get one but I don't want to keep my wife up. But I appreciate the advice. I'll check if I'm missing anything but I'm almost 100% I have it configured correctly 

Edited May 20, 2022 by ghostly_doggo
Spelling error

[SYN_Mugue]

@ghostly_doggo, That's cool, I didn't think anyone made headphones that really did surround let alone 7.1. I thought it was simulated, but of course I never went down that rabbit hole since I have the freedom to use speakers...The fact that you get it to work with DCS is interesting. And a bit confusing. I guess maybe a direct question to the developers might be in order, just to see if it's possible to do.  Or perhaps it's some obscure checkbox buried in that horrible thing we call Windows Settings? Best of luck to you.

 

@ AEthelraedUnraed, Those studies don't surprise me at all. I've know plenty of audiophiles that claimed they could hear things that no dog could notice. In my defense I just like to fool with things till I break them, and then fool with them till there are fixed again. Let me stress this fact, I AM NOT A STEREO SALESMAN!  Nor an Audio Engineer. lol

 

[AstroCat]

A surround sound 5.1 speaker system gives you true surround and sounds great. Although I do wish we had some updates on the Sound Design.

Edited May 27, 2022 by AstroCat

[MajorMagee]

My Sony MDR-7510 headphones, paired with Boom3D, do a nice job on the soundscape without bothering my better half...

[S10JlAbraxis]

On 5/27/2022 at 4:21 PM, MajorMagee said:

My Sony MDR-7510 headphones, paired with Boom3D, do a nice job on the soundscape without bothering my better half...

I recently tried Boom3D with my Sony WH-1000XM4 headphones and was surprised how well it works.  Even though IL2 uses a stereo sound engine Boom3d significantly enhances it.  You have to play around with the settings to get it to your likings (too much 3D effect makes IL2 sound over the top) but at the right settings it is excellent.  Highly recommended.

[Gr3y]

@ghostly_doggo

 

Hi there, have you managed to solve the problem? I'm using same headphones and even though I enable 7.1 (with no additional reverberation though) in the epos gaming suite I'm not quite sure it plays as I'd expect, I mean the the "lows" are better audible but some sounds like the propeller get much softer/quieter. Unfortunately I do not have the luxury to compare it with DCS as simply I don't play it.

 

Edited November 30, 2022 by Gr3y

[coreyhkh]

every sound in this game needs a overhaul, I am hoping they hire an addition sound guy.