Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Hardware and Software => Topic started by: Chalenge on August 14, 2008, 11:14:42 PM
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Audio Stream Input Output? What about this driver protocol makes one card better then the other? Is there a better implementation then bgears b-Enspirer? I dont think Xonar delivers quite like this card but if someone has a different experience please relate it to me!
The review that initially got me hyped about the Enspirer is here:
http://benchmarkreviews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=36&Itemid=59
I didnt get excited about it until I started reading reviews on Newegg. When I first hooked it up I didnt have much that was that different from X-Fi except the tinny echo that comes with EAX in games like Doom 3 were gone and a much more realistic 3D audio presented itself. I am also able to hook up speakers and headphones at the same time for those late night flights with the squad (110 decibels of audio carries quite a distance). Then I discovered I had hooked up the speakers incorrectly and... wow... I mean just WOW!
Its true what they say. Headphones sound like 5.1 surround sound and 5.1 speakers sound like 7.1. I really want an audiophile to test it so I know its not just my novice self being fooled by the junk Creative has been putting over on us all but it wont matter in the end. I have found the answer for me and there wont be any going back to creative stuff now. Ive heard 24bit and 32 bit now and going back to 16 bit just is not happening.
There is supposed to be a way to change the pitch of your voice over the mic too. I think I have heard this from other players in the game that sound 'mechanical' but so far I havent played with it. So far... :D
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Audio Stream Input Output?
If you do a lot of sound editing, yeah, it's a must have. Pretty much industry standard.
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Okay so is there anything beyond ASIO 1.0 or 2.0? My card supports 1.0 and 2.0 at least. I might do some editing with GoldWave and cut sounds from film with Premiere. Is this good enough and is there something more?
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ASIO 2.0 is current.
Not sure about goldwave ASIO support. I was thinking more of Cubase, Pro Tools, Nuendo, etc
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Like 2bighorn said, ASIO is mainly used by the better sound editing packages. I think some of the better DVD movie players for Windows may also use it.
Creative's ASIO drivers are actually pretty good. Creative's hardware was not worth using for sound editing until the Audigy 2 line of cards were released.
What ASIO brought to the party was very low latencies amd the ability to by-pass the Microsoft sound mess, er mixer. Important when you are trying to sync up multiple tracks in an editing environment and when you need the exact sound you originally recorded.
In the sound card industry there have been the gaming sound cards and the editing sound cards. High end cards from Lynx or RME, for example, are not really good gaming cards, and are targeted at sound engineers for editing. How many gamers would even consider blowing between five and nine hundred dollars for a sound card? So those high end companies are not concerned with DirectX gaming support. Instead they focus on the ASIO drivers as well as the best sound production and hardware feature set best suited for editing. Most of them also have support for Linux, but not for Vista.
Microsoft sabotaged the sound API (in the name of DRM) in Vista which is making it the anti-choice for sound editing operating systems. In order to prevent Vista from munging the digital sound when using the ASIO drivers, you have to jump through some hoops. If you are not careful Vista will grab the sound and modify it. ASIO drivers no longer prevent the operating system from interfering with the sound stream, which is the one of the reasons ASIO came into existance.
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What ASIO brought to the party was very low latencies and the ability to by-pass the Microsoft sound mess, er mixer. Important when you are trying to sync up multiple tracks in an editing environment and when you need the exact sound you originally recorded.
What he said.
It works well for musicians that use there computers to record multi-tracks.
For instance, Track 1 is drums.
I plug my guitar in and try and play along with the drum track, but there's a delay between me striking a note, and it playing through the phones without asio.
With asio, as i strike a note, it is playing back in real time through the phones.
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I was just noticing that the 'easy solution' to sound copying from film are gone now. I guess thats the problem with DRM and 'pilfering' sounds.
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DRM makes it bad, but what is worse is Vista always modifies the sound being played. Like I said, you have to go through some hoops to get the sound out that you put in and that can only be done via ASIO.
In the process of butchering the sound, Vista may make a sound longer or shorter.
It is an atrocity.