Is 7.1 bullshit

[an actual squirrel]

So many games can output 7.1 pcm. This has 7 angles, as opposed to the 2 angles that stereo has. When you use 7.1 virtual surround for headphones, the 7.1 track is converted to binaural audio so that you can still hear the 7 angles. With the extra angles, you can differentiate front and rear a lot more reliably, because there are actual front and rear channels/angles in the mix.

 

That brings me to a myth: the idea that open back headphones will fix everything. With open back headphones, you don't have reflections from the rear of the driver messing with your perception, which is good. But it's not going to fix problems with the mix and add in spatial information that isn't there to begin with.

 

Another myth is that games will just automatically set this up for you. This is not true. The main issue is that this type of binaural audio is only compatible with headphones. So it is extremely unlikely that any type of virtual surround for headphones is enabled in game by default. Overwatch and CSGO do have it as an audio options - the dolby atmos for headphone option and the headphone hrtf option respectively. They are labeled clearly to indicate binaural audio and also to prevent people without headphones from using them. But an issue with relying on the games to do this is that each game can have a different dsp, so learning each individual hrtf can be a grueling experience if you are playing multiple games.

[Max_Settings]

7 hours ago, Hiya! said:

Cloud 2 is okay although open back headphones will do much better job cause they have larger soundstages.

For your answer.

 

42 minutes ago, an actual squirrel said:

So many games can output 7.1 pcm. This has 7 angles, as opposed to the 2 angles that stereo has. When you use 7.1 virtual surround for headphones, the 7.1 track is converted to binaural audio so that you can still hear the 7 angles. With the extra angles, you can differentiate front and rear a lot more reliably, because there are actual front and rear channels/angles in the mix.

 

That brings me to a myth: the idea that open back headphones will fix everything. With open back headphones, you don't have reflections from the rear of the driver messing with your perception, which is good. But it's not going to fix problems with the mix and add in spatial information that isn't there to begin with.

 

Another myth is that games will just automatically set this up for you, so you don't need the virtual surround sound dsp. This is not true. The main issue is that this type of binaural audio is only compatible with headphones. So it is extremely unlikely that any type of virtual surround for headphones is enabled in game by default. Overwatch and CSGO do have it as an audio options - the dolby atmos for headphone option and the headphone hrtf option respectively. They are labeled clearly to indicate that it is binaural audio and also to prevent people without headphones from using them. But an issue with relying on the games to do this is that each game can have a different dsp, so learning each individual hrtf can be a grueling experience if you are playing multiple games.

Just an FYI, open back headphones don't always mean wide sound stage. They do tend to have wider but not always. And sometimes the closed variant of a headphone has more sound stage. For example the $1800 Mr. Speakers Ether Flow and Ether Flow Closed, the closed has more sound stage than the open. But I don't know why you all are freaking out about sound stage. You need some no doubt, but what is more important is imaging. Imaging is what determines how accurately you can determine where footsteps come from. It doesn't matter how wide they are if you can't pinpoint accuracy. That is why I recommend the SHP9500s, they have both better sound stage than the Cloud 2 and better imaging. To further my point, the best headphones I've ever used for gaming by far, the Fostex T50RP MK3, don't have very wide sound stage, but their imaging is just insane, probably the best for any headphone under $1000. I was playing BF1 last night and I had 4 games in a row with 30-2-4 KD, not using any 7.1, but their imaging is so god tier I can tell exactly where people are position myself accordingly. The only times I ever died was from range, a sniper or LMG user. But using the double barrel shotgun in that game I never once lost a fight in close range because of the sounds I always had the jump.

 

Now @an actual squirrel I don't know what you are talking about. Virtual 7.1 destroys front to back imaging.

[Hiya!]

20 minutes ago, Max_Settings said:

 

Just an FYI, open back headphones don't always mean wide sound stage. They do tend to have wider but not always. And sometimes the closed variant of a headphone has more sound stage. For example the $1800 Mr. Speakers Ether Flow and Ether Flow Closed, the closed has more sound stage than the open. But I don't know why you all are freaking out about sound stage. You need some no doubt, but what is more important is imaging. Imaging is what determines how accurately you can determine where footsteps come from. It doesn't matter how wide they are if you can't pinpoint accuracy. That is why I recommend the SHP9500s, they have both better sound stage than the Cloud 2 and better imaging. To further my point, the best headphones I've ever used for gaming by far, the Fostex T50RP MK3, don't have very wide sound stage, but their imaging is just insane, probably the best for any headphone under $1000. I was playing BF1 last night and I had 4 games in a row with 30-2-4 KD, not using any 7.1, but their imaging is so god tier I can tell exactly where people are position myself accordingly. The only times I ever died was from range, a sniper or LMG user. But using the double barrel shotgun in that game I never once lost a fight in close range because of the sounds I always had the jump.

 

Now @an actual squirrel I don't know what you are talking about. Virtual 7.1 destroys front to back imaging.

Right but most of the times Open back tends to have bettery imaging than closed back.

[Max_Settings]

2 minutes ago, Hiya! said:

Right but most of the times Open back tends to have bettery imaging than closed back.

Better imaging? No, I personally wouldn't say there is anything that says opens have better imaging in general. It really just depends on the headphone.

[an actual squirrel]

1 hour ago, Max_Settings said:

Now @an actual squirrel I don't know what you are talking about. Virtual 7.1 destroys front to back imaging.

There's an example comparing stereo to virtual surround here in this video, at 2min 43s. You can experience the lack of angles on stereo creating ambiguous imaging , and experience that ambiguity go away with virtual surround. It's specifically due to the better front-back performance you can get with virtual surround.

 

[pas008]

so @Max_Settings

you are saying virtual surround is bad because it kills the imaging? lol

 

by saying virtual surround you are bundling up all them in one generic classification

and its why companies keep coming out with versions or improving their algorithms

sbx, Sennheiser Binaural Rendering Engine, silent cinema, etc

 

and I know it per game on overall, because many games dont need anything

love sbx studios pretty much for everything though its pretty consistent, but havent tried senns yet

I'm about immersion its also why I use nvidia surround

if it sounds better to me I go for it

 

 

[Max_Settings]

1 hour ago, an actual squirrel said:

There's an example comparing stereo to virtual surround here in this video, at 2min 43s. You can experience the lack of angles on stereo creating ambiguous imaging , and experience that ambiguity go away with virtual surround. It's specifically due to the better front-back performance you can get with virtual surround.

 

 

1 hour ago, pas008 said:

so @Max_Settings

you are saying virtual surround is bad because it kills the imaging? lol

 

by saying virtual surround you are bundling up all them in one generic classification

and its why companies keep coming out with versions or improving their algorithms

sbx, Sennheiser Binaural Rendering Engine, silent cinema, etc

 

and I know it per game on overall, because many games dont need anything

love sbx studios pretty much for everything though its pretty consistent, but havent tried senns yet

I'm about immersion its also why I use nvidia surround

if it sounds better to me I go for it

 

First of all you all know what I meant. I meant virtual 7.1 as in headsets. I don't doubt binaural or technologies like Sennheiser's surround. The point is those formats work with stereo. Real surround stuff actually works. But taking a game and then hitting the 7.1 button on your headphones or using Razer surround is trash, that makes imaging far worse in my opinion, because it's not possible, that's just not how sound works. I've even tried Atmos, works amazingly with the proper speakers, but I didn't think it did much with headphones.

[pyrojoe34]

2 hours ago, an actual squirrel said:

-snip-

Great video. Explains why using 7.1 with my headset in PUBG makes such a massive difference in game. I went back to stereo for a game and couldn't tell where anything was other than left or right, with 7.1 enabled I can pinpoint sounds much better (including elevation), really changed the game for me.

[Max_Settings]

12 minutes ago, pyrojoe34 said:

Great video. Explains why using 7.1 with my headset in PUBG makes such a massive difference in game. I went back to stereo for a game and couldn't tell where anything was other than left or right, with 7.1 enabled I can pinpoint sounds much better (including elevation), really changed the game for me.

That's because PUBG has trash audio. They are redoing it in a future update, it doesn't have any up or down positioning. A normal game will have this.

[pyrojoe34]

3 minutes ago, Max_Settings said:

That's because PUBG has trash audio. They are redoing it in a future update, it doesn't have any up or down positioning. A normal game will have this.

What I'm saying is that when I use the simulated 7.1, the audio is phenomenal. I can pinpoint shots to a specific building at 1km away and can tell the difference between footsteps above me vs below me in a building. It's the stereo audio in PUBG that's terrible, the surround is very accurate (for my head/ear shape).

[Max_Settings]

You know what I'm not even going to bother with this. Sunday night I will have a whole thread about what's wrong with virtual surround and gaming headsets at a whole. You all are so brainwashed by marketing it's honestly sad. "Surround" isn't possible in headphones, the fact that there is two drivers makes it not possible, doesn't matter what you think or what the marketing says, it's physically impossible. 

[Max_Settings]

And just an FYI, if this tech was so great don't you think companies who do nothing but make headphones, Sennheiser, Audio Technica, Hifiman, Audeze, etc... would put this in their headphones? Just to be clear I'm not doubting the recording of stuff in surround, like Sennheiser's surround recording format. That is perfectly legitimate because it is recorded that way. But does Senneheiser make surround headphones or give their headphones a 7.1 button to play it back? No. It's played back in stereo. Virtual surround is where the issue is, taking audio and running some sort of software or DSP to convert it into "surround" that doesn't work and kills the sound quality.

[pas008]

5 minutes ago, Max_Settings said:

You know what I'm not even going to bother with this. Sunday night I will have a whole thread about what's wrong with virtual surround and gaming headsets at a whole. You all are so brainwashed by marketing it's honestly sad. "Surround" isn't possible in headphones, the fact that there is two drivers makes it not possible, doesn't matter what you think or what the marketing says, it's physically impossible. 

virtual surround is just algorithms some work some dont some do nothing

from a gaming standpoint as you said pubg audio is trash well many games auido is trash

so using a tool/software/algorithm works to fix

 

 

[pas008]

2 minutes ago, Max_Settings said:

And just an FYI, if this tech was so great don't you think companies who do nothing but make headphones, Sennheiser, Audio Technica, Hifiman, Audeze, etc... would put this in their headphones? Just to be clear I'm not doubting the recording of stuff in surround, like Sennheiser's surround recording format. That is perfectly legitimate because it is recorded that way. But does Senneheiser make surround headphones or give their headphones a 7.1 button to play it back? No. It's played back in stereo. Virtual surround is where the issue is, taking audio and running some sort of software or DSP to convert it into "surround" that doesn't work and kills the sound quality.

see above

also they have a button so you can listen to music and not have it in surround which virtual surround is horrible for most of the time

[Max_Settings]

1 minute ago, pas008 said:

see above

 

4 minutes ago, Max_Settings said:

And just an FYI, if this tech was so great don't you think companies who do nothing but make headphones, Sennheiser, Audio Technica, Hifiman, Audeze, etc... would put this in their headphones? Just to be clear I'm not doubting the recording of stuff in surround, like Sennheiser's surround recording format. That is perfectly legitimate because it is recorded that way. But does Senneheiser make surround headphones or give their headphones a 7.1 button to play it back? No. It's played back in stereo.

^^^^^

[pyrojoe34]

12 minutes ago, Max_Settings said:

You know what I'm not even going to bother with this. Sunday night I will have a whole thread about what's wrong with virtual surround and gaming headsets at a whole. You all are so brainwashed by marketing it's honestly sad. "Surround" isn't possible in headphones, the fact that there is two drivers makes it not possible, doesn't matter what you think or what the marketing says, it's physically impossible. 

It is very physically possible. It's complicated and nobody has perfected it yet but it's far from impossible. The way we localize sound is a due to temporal and amplitude differences and frequency shifts in the sound our ears pick up (ear drums are also stereo btw), our brain is literally doing virtual surround processing. It becomes complicated because all our ears are difference sizes/distances apart and our pinna are all slightly different shapes. This means our brains learned to localize sound using those specific parameters and cannot be assumed for everyone. Having said that, since our ears use things that can all be adjusted by any stereo speakers (amplitude, frequency, time) it is possible to modulate these values for each sound source based on it's relative coordinates. It wouldn't be all that complicated to make a near perfect surround experience for one specific subject where the virtualization is specifically matched to the person's anatomy. Maybe one day "soon" they will even be able to use a simple 3D scan of your head to adjust any model to work for any person without specifically training the model for that person.

 

My point is saying it is impossible is ignorant, and even using currently available virtual surround models, people with anatomies close enough to the prototypical anatomy used to train it will get a very close to realistic surround experience. Right now the tech isn't perfect (depends almost entirely on the software/model side, not hardware), and it only works for people who are similar enough to the standard model used, which is why it's hit or miss and why some people have great luck with it and others can't stand it.

[Max_Settings]

Just now, pyrojoe34 said:

It is very physically possible. It's complicated and nobody has perfected it yet but it's far from impossible. The way we localize sound is a due to temporal and amplitude differences and frequency shifts in the sound our ears pick up (ear drums are also stereo btw), our brain is literally doing virtual surround processing. It becomes complicated because all our ears are difference sizes/distances apart and our pinna are all slightly different shapes. This means our brains learned to localize sound using those specific parameters and cannot be assumed for everyone. Having said that, since our ears use things that can all be adjusted by any stereo speakers (amplitude, frequency, time) it is possible to modulate these values for each sound source based on it's relative coordinates. It wouldn't be all that complicated to make a near perfect surround experience for one specific subject where the virtualization is specifically matched to the person's anatomy. Maybe one day "soon" they will even be able to use a simple 3D scan of your head to adjust any model to work for any person without specificly training the model for that person.

 

My point is saying it is impossible is ignorant, and even using currently available virtual surround models, people with anatomies close enough to the prototypical anatomy used to train it will get a very close to realistic surround experience.

No no no, you missed the point. If the sound is recorded in surround, then yes it is possible to have a surround experience with stereo headphones. But no software or any button on a headset will give you 7.1 audio, you physically need 7 drivers for that, headphones have 2. So that's physically impossible. 

[pas008]

1 minute ago, Max_Settings said:

 

^^^^^

buy you stated whats wrong with virtual surround 

fyi

sennheiser does have their own

just like creative

just like yamaha

just like dts

just like dolby

etc

[Max_Settings]

Just now, pas008 said:

buy you stated whats wrong with virtual surround 

fyi

sennheiser does have their own

just like creative

just like yamaha

just like dts

just like dolby

etc

That's not virtual surround that's real surround because it's recorded in surround, but it's played back in stereo. Virtual surround is taking an audio source that's not surround, like a gaming, and applying software to it to make it "surround" that doesn't work like that.

[Max_Settings]

The point is stereo can play back surround perfectly fine with left, right, front, and back positioning as long as you have good headphones. But taking a no surround source and converting with software it is when there are problems.

[pas008]

2 minutes ago, Max_Settings said:

That's not virtual surround that's real surround because it's recorded in surround, but it's played back in stereo. Virtual surround is taking an audio source that's not surround, like a gaming, and applying software to it to make it "surround" that doesn't work like that.

no I use sbx and and silent cinema from yamaha

if I am listening to music it will place the sounds as its algorithm calls for thats why I must turn it off if listening to music

 

but with pinkfloyd sometimes I will leave it on

[Max_Settings]

3 minutes ago, pas008 said:

buy you stated whats wrong with virtual surround 

fyi

sennheiser does have their own

just like creative

just like yamaha

just like dts

just like dolby

etc

And like I said, Sennheiser has surround, but they make no "7.1 surround headphones" so all you need is stereo. Even the $50,000 HE-1 is not a surround headphone, it's stereo.

[pas008]

Just now, Max_Settings said:

And like I said, Sennheiser has surround, but they make no "7.1 surround headphones" so all you need is stereo. Even the $50,000 HE-1 is not a surround headphone, it's stereo.

https://en-us.sennheiser.com/audio-amplifier-gsx-1000

 

read sennhieser even states 7.1 virtual lol

its a pretty big well know company

[pyrojoe34]

9 minutes ago, Max_Settings said:

No no no, you missed the point. If the sound is recorded in surround, then yes it is possible to have a surround experience with stereo headphones. But no software or any button on a headset will give you 7.1 audio, you physically need 7 drivers for that, headphones have 2. So that's physically impossible. 

Even with stereo recording you can get near perfect surround out of headphones (remember, your ears are stereo, only two channels that your brain simulates surround with). If you were to create a perfect anatomical model of your head (same size, material, shape, pinna, etc) and place a mic inside each ear, you could then play that back (in stereo) with speakers inside your ears to create a perfect simulation of surround sound. The trick is that it will only work well for your since it was modeled against your anatomy. You absolutely can have surround using only stereo recording and stereo speakers, it's just very specific to the model used. Current tech has to use an assumption of an "average" anatomy which is one reason it just doesn't work well for everyone. Another reason is that physically-based audio rendering is not common and still far from perfect. Both of these things can be improved and are far from impossible to do.

[Max_Settings]

1 minute ago, pas008 said:

https://en-us.sennheiser.com/audio-amplifier-gsx-1000

 

read sennhieser even states 7.1 virtual lol

its a pretty big well know company

That's because Sennheiser is smart and knows gamers who know nothing about audio like you won't buy a gaming audio device without 7.1. If they really believed in the tech and it worked it would be on their real high end audio stuff.