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Is this worthwhile?

MavericK

MavericK

Zero Cool
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Sep 2, 2004
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Hello,

My current headphone setup is a pair of Senn HD590s on an X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty card. I know that Creative has CMSS-3D for headphones, but to be honest the "surround" sound is lacking IMO in a lot of games. I was doing some searching and found this:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=470938631&pf_rd_i=507846

So the question is: is this worthwhile, or should I just buy a 5.1/7.1 gaming headset? I like the sound quality on my Senns but the virtual surround is just pretty crap.
 
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If you want Dolby Headphone instead of CMSS3D, the cheapest way to get it is through Xonar DG. CMSS3D vs DH seems to be a matter of taste. The ability of a particular headphone to project a wide soundstage and image those sounds properly will also impact your perception of the surround sound. I would not recommend a 5.1/7.1 gaming headset. They are bad.
 
I would also have to recommend staying away from most gaming headsets. To someone who has never worn a good pair of cans before, they might seem alright. In your situation, coming from Senn HD590s, I bet you would notice the lack of clarity and precision right away.
 
Valaire said:
If you want Dolby Headphone instead of CMSS3D, the cheapest way to get it is through Xonar DG. CMSS3D vs DH seems to be a matter of taste. The ability of a particular headphone to project a wide soundstage and image those sounds properly will also impact your perception of the surround sound. I would not recommend a 5.1/7.1 gaming headset. They are bad.
Click to expand...

Hmm, that's an interesting deal with the Xonar DG...only like $16 after rebate right now with a dedicated headphone amp and DH. I wonder if there would be any trouble using that with my X-Fi, though, or should I just ditch the X-Fi entirely?
 
Should be able to use the two together, but I agree that it may be a bit wasteful. The most compelling reason to get an X-Fi is probably for CMSS3D. If you don't like CMSS3D I'd probably sell the X-Fi and just invest higher up the Xonar line to the DX or the Essence. However, first we should establish that you have tweaked all the available settings correctly in game and X-Fi control panel to achieve the best gaming virtual surround.
 
Well, I've tried messing with the CMSS-3D settings and none of them seem to make much difference. The game I play most is ArmA 2, which has good 5.1 sound, but going to headphones there is no discernable difference between front and rear.
 
Have another pair of headphones that you can test with? As mentioned, the headphone itself also directly impacts the surround sound feel, probably moreso than the virtual surround algorithm. Some headphones do better than others when it comes to placing objects at your 6 o'clock for instance.

I have no personal experience with your headphones or that game, so maybe somebody can chime in who does.
 
Not really any decent pairs unfortunately, no. I feel like I've gotten good virtual surround before with these so I'm not sure what it is...possibly the X-Fi since I've had this cans way longer than that.

Anyway, I went ahead and ordered a Xonar DG for testing...if it works, great, if not, it was only $16 so it's no big deal. If I decide to go with a better Xonar in the future I'll consider it, but don't have the funds right now to spend another $70+ on a sound card.
 
Not to hijack the thread but can anyone[out of personal experience] fill in how good the stx headphone combo is with directional gaming like in BC2.
 
Are your setting correct? You should be able to hear front/rear with CMSS-3D. Set 5.1 speakers in Windows, and in the game, and then set Headphones as the output in the Creative control panel and make sure CMSS-3D is on. If you try the CMSS-3D demo, it should be obvious when the sound travels around.
 
Yeah, I've tried all that and it is set up properly. What demo do you mean specifically? I've tried a few 3D sound demos but none of them really sound right (i.e. the front and the rear sound pretty much the same)

I listened to a Dolby Headphone demo online and the front and rear seemed a lot more distinguishable, but we'll see once I get the Xonar card to test since that was some sort of flash/software demo.
 
MavericK96 said:
Yeah, I've tried all that and it is set up properly. What demo do you mean specifically? I've tried a few 3D sound demos but none of them really sound right (i.e. the front and the rear sound pretty much the same)

I listened to a Dolby Headphone demo online and the front and rear seemed a lot more distinguishable, but we'll see once I get the Xonar card to test since that was some sort of flash/software demo.
Click to expand...

Actually, the demo I was thinking of is the helicopter one that is available on the CMSS-3D settings page - but I have the X-Fi Forte, so that demo might not be there on the actual Creative control panel.
 
Yeah, I don't have that demo. I did, however, try out some Counter-Strike: Source and CMSS-3D seems to work a lot better in that (i.e. I could actually tell where footsteps were most of the time). So partially it could be ArmA2 (which I have heard doesn't have the greatest audio ever), but I feel like there is more to it than that, since it has more or less perfect 5.1 audio over speakers, but extremely poor virtual surround sound, which seems like it would be more a fault of CMSS-3D than anything since it is taking 5.1 audio and doing all of the "magic" with the pure stream, right? If that's the case then there's nothing wrong with the 5.1.

I guess the only thing to do now is try Dolby Headphone with the Xonar card and see if it's any better. At least I'll have something to compare to at that point.

EDIT: Another interesting thing is that when you set 5.1 sound in Windows 7 you have the speaker test, and I can hear all of them using CMSS-3D, but the rear ones sound pretty much identical to the front ones (easy to tell since you can just click Front and Rear consecutively to hear the sounds). Seems like there should be some sort of virtualization here, but there's not.
 
Maybe it is partly the headphones - I just tried the Windows speaker test with my X-Fi Forte and ATH-AD700s, and the rear speaker sounds were clearly behind me.
 
Could be, but like I said I got pretty good results in CS:S. Dunno, there are a lot of factors at play and I'm not sure what exactly is causing the problem.

EDIT: I guess if DH doesn't do it, upgrading the headphones might be the next step. I have read a lot of good things about the soundstage on the AD700s.
 
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Yes, the AD700's have one of, if not the widest soundstages of any headphone. You've got a lot of variables at play so I suggest performing as many controlled experiments as possible.

The culprits/variables are either your headphones, the game's audio engine, or the virtual surround algorithm.
 
Just got the card today...Will update with results when installed and tested. :cool:
 
Got the DS installed...kind of a pain to get set up the way I want, but overall I'm impressed with the headphone results. Dolby Headphone seems WAY better than CMSS-3D to me...the soundscape seems a lot more broad, and it's a lot easier to distinguish between front and back. I'll keep playing around with the settings, but I like it. :cool:

I do have to say, however, that driving my 5.1 speakers I think the X-Fi sounds a lot better for music...haven't tried gaming, but I guess I can just use both since they're both in there. :D

EDIT: Probably what I will end up doing is selling off my X-Fi at some point and saving up to get a better Xonar card in the future. Right now this works, though.
 
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Another thing is that when using my 5.1 speaker setup, the bass on the DG seems a lot quieter/less "punchy" than the X-Fi, in music and games both. Sounds great through the headphones, but with the speakers it seems not right. I've tried adjusting some of the bass settings but I can't get it quite right. Anyone else have the DG that can comment?
 
Another obnoxious thing about the DG (or rather, the drivers) is that when I plug in headphones to the front panel, it does switch to Headphone mode and mutes the rear speakers, but it defaults to Dolby Headphone being disabled every time. I have to re-enable it every time I plug in the headphones, which is sort of annoying. Is it maybe a bad driver install, or is that just how they are?
 
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