7.1 sound not working

[-_ThatGuy_-]

I recently bought some urage soundz 800 headphones with 7.1 surround sound and I wanted it to enable it in the sound control panel but all I'm able to select is stereo, 7.1 option doesn't appear anywhere. Thoughts?

[Bombastinator]

25 minutes ago, -_ThatGuy_- said:

I recently bought some urage soundz 800 headphones with 7.1 surround sound and I wanted it to enable it in the sound control panel but all I'm able to select is stereo, 7.1 option doesn't appear anywhere. Thoughts?

What headphones?

[-_ThatGuy_-]

11 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

What headphones?

Urage soundz  800

[tikker]

You can't select 7.1 as an output, because it's not true 7.1. It's a stereo device. Did it come with software? They don't seem to have an English page and my German isn't good enough to understand everything, but they say virtual 7.1 surround, so it's likely some digital processing either through accompanying software or something else to make it into fake surround. Their specsheet is also weird:

Quote

• Full stereo headset in gaming design
• 7.1 Virtual Surround Sound: deep basses and clear trebles

Don't see what 7.1 has to do with deep bass or clear treble.

[Bombastinator]

1 hour ago, tikker said:

You can't select 7.1 as an output, because it's not true 7.1. It's a stereo device. Did it come with software? They don't seem to have an English page and my German isn't good enough to understand everything, but they say virtual 7.1 surround, so it's likely some digital processing either through accompanying software or something else to make it into fake surround. Their specsheet is also weird:

Don't see what 7.1 has to do with deep bass or clear treble.

Heh.  Point.  For true 7.1 you’d need 8 ears.  

[dilpickle]

There are "true" 7.1 headphones with multiple drivers and inputs. This doesn't look like one of them. 

[-_ThatGuy_-]

2 hours ago, tikker said:

You can't select 7.1 as an output, because it's not true 7.1. It's a stereo device. Did it come with software? They don't seem to have an English page and my German isn't good enough to understand everything, but they say virtual 7.1 surround, so it's likely some digital processing either through accompanying software or something else to make it into fake surround. Their specsheet is also weird:

Don't see what 7.1 has to do with deep bass or clear treble.

It's nothing digital. I think it's supposed to be selected in settings but I cannot. When I watched a 7.1 test video on youtube I noticed it doesn't work

 

[tikker]

13 minutes ago, -_ThatGuy_- said:

It's nothing digital. I think it's supposed to be selected in settings but I cannot. When I watched a 7.1 test video on youtube I noticed it doesn't work

 

In what way doesn't it work? YouTube is stereo if I remember right, so you're not getting surround sound there anyway in that case. Something like this should give an impression, but it's not surround surround.

You'll never get to hear actual surround sound with headphones, because 7.1 surround sound requires 7 speakers and a subwoofer. I'm not sure where their acclaimed 7.1 happens, but I find in general it mostly is just a marketing gimmick. Even more so if there is no software accompanying it, because there has to be some digital processing somewhere to create this "virtual 7.1" sound.

 

You can get a perfecly fine "surround" experience, however, if the audio is engineered correctly. Check out the virtual barber shop for example which demonstrates binaural audio:

 

If games or media implement it well themselves, there's no need for this virtual 7.1 processing to get a good experience with accurate positional sound.

[Bombastinator]

2 hours ago, dilpickle said:

There are "true" 7.1 headphones with multiple drivers and inputs. This doesn't look like one of them. 

Would need 4(5?) drivers in each can though.  Also I understand they don’t actually work very well.  Gamers wear headphones for “directional stereo” which can be done with 7.1 but also can be done with 2 and some funky filtering.  There’s actually something like 20 different electronic models of human skulls that need to be used for part of it.  A majority of humans have just one kind though.  The other 19 are all for edge cases.  If you are one though simulated surround simply won’t work unless you have the right model.  It’s done by retarding sounds by microseconds and creating tiny simulated echoes as well as simply playing more loudly in one can than the other.  It’s super complex.

Edited May 6, 2021 by Bombastinator