Headset not recognized, can only play in stereo

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I have the Steelseries 5h v2 headset which supports 7.1 surround. The game won't let me switch from stereo. Every time I try it says that it can't find the appropriate hardware.

[SeriousToni]

This happens also for my G35 headset with 7.1. But you should be able to play it in stereo though.

[7upMan]

Have you tried to switch to Open AL hardware support in the game? This fixed surround for me.

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Have you tried to switch to Open AL hardware support in the game? This fixed surround for me.

 

I have not tried this. But I don't see this option.

[SeriousToni]

What is OpenAL? See this link

 

If I'm installing OpenAL I can't run a mission anymore though - didn't find out why.

Edited October 10, 2013 by SeriousToni

[lost_soul]

You can also change the console value "s_numberofspeakers" without the quotes. I use a standard headset, but I get surround sound out of it. I.e. if I stand in a room (in game) and I twirl my mouse around with my eyes closed, I can tell you if a sound is in front of or behind me every single time.

[Serpentine]

7.1 headset... let me guess it is USB too? :/

[SeriousToni]

You got surround sound out of a stereo headset by changing a cvar?! Or do is misunderstand this..?

 

My headset is 7.1 connected via USB to the computer.

[7upMan]

SeriousToni, my guess is that it will then emulate 3D sound. While emulation is nowhere near as good as a real 5.1 setup (I had the Speed-Link Medusa 5.1 headset for many years), it still serves the purpose.

 

lost_soul, using your method I managed to increase s_numberofspeakers to 5 (instead of the default 2). It's also correctly written to the Darkmod.cfg file. However, on every game restart the value seems to be set back to 2. Is there a way to fix this? maybe via the autoexec.cfg file?

[lost_soul]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUDTlvagjJA

 

Try it and you will see what I mean. This is the effect that I get.

Its been a wile since I configured things, and I use straight ALSA, no Pulseaudio. There is a plugin for ALSA which simulates this from a multi-channel input, which I am using. Its called vdownmix.

Edited October 11, 2013 by lost_soul

[SeriousToni]

s_numberofspeakers setting up to 5 seems to make no difference to me. I think you can set it permanently to 5 by adding +set s_numberofspeakers to the darkmod link (german "Verknüpfung"). But as I said, how do you tell the difference - for me it seems still like stereo.

 

EDIT: I think the problem is, that Darkmod doesn't recognize the windows settings correctly. Even without the usb headphones. Because if I select in Windows settings that I have 7.1 speakers instead of stereo the game still won't let me change the sound settings there.

Edited October 11, 2013 by SeriousToni

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Yeah my headset is connected via usb. The fixes listed here don't seem to make a difference and playing a stealth game in stereo seems wrong. Could it be something with the Doom 3 engine itself?

[SeriousToni]

playing a stealth game in stereo seems wrong.

 

I'm a surround sound fan too but this statement of yours seems a bit too harsh, doesn't it?

[Serpentine]

Yeah my headset is connected via usb. The fixes listed here don't seem to make a difference and playing a stealth game in stereo seems wrong. Could it be something with the Doom 3 engine itself?

 

Your ears are 2.0, about all you get out of these things is exaggerated bass and lost detail.

 

Since its a USB setup, the sound API used by the engine has no idea about more than stereo. Most of these headsets are actually just transmitting stereo in any case and then using a second layer of HRFT, you actually just accumulate inaccuracy in... I'd say pretty much all cases. Old 5.1 sets used the full set of jacks, and even then most of them actually just ignored the extra channels by way of HRFT (however, since the source had already been converted).

 

But even with all of that, a set of *good* stereo will give you better directional hearing than 7.1 purely due to the game already applying HRTF for you you. No extra lossy steps needed.

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Your ears are 2.0, about all you get out of these things is exaggerated bass and lost detail.

 

Since its a USB setup, the sound API used by the engine has no idea about more than stereo. Most of these headsets are actually just transmitting stereo in any case and then using a second layer of HRFT, you actually just accumulate inaccuracy in... I'd say pretty much all cases. Old 5.1 sets used the full set of jacks, and even then most of them actually just ignored the extra channels by way of HRFT (however, since the source had already been converted).

 

But even with all of that, a set of *good* stereo will give you better directional hearing than 7.1 purely due to the game already applying HRTF for you you. No extra lossy steps needed.

 

That's presuming much but it doesn't fix the problem. I have so far gotten great sound quality out of this set bet this mod doesn't seem capable of utilizing them. While I appreciate the discourse on how headsets work, I think possible work arounds would be more fruitful.

[Serpentine]

That's presuming much but it doesn't fix the problem. I have so far gotten great sound quality out of this set bet this mod doesn't seem capable of utilizing them. While I appreciate the discourse on how headsets work, I think possible work arounds would be more fruitful.

Heh, sure

 

I think it's just a lot of time between when the sound API stuff was done, and modern Windows. I am not entirely sure how this works with some changes I want to look into, but I will keep an eye out.

 

As for workarounds, to me this sounds like it's at the API level, so I'm not sure that there would be any. I think that the use of extra speakers is just allowing the OS level mixer to expand the stereo again, which may or may not sound better depending on implementations on that side (A big guess, but I think you would find there is quite a lot of extra sound coming out of the directional channels).

[rich_is_bored]

I bought the exact same headset from Woot a few years ago but I guess it was a refurbished item because I don't have the little USB dongle.

 

If you insist on using the dongle, there's a program called Virtual Audio Cable that may work. I have no personal experience with it but from what I understand you are able to create virtual audio devices and then route and mix sounds however you please. And if TDM correctly identifies this virtual device you should be able to route 7.1 audio to the USB dongle.

 

Alternatively you can bypass the USB dongle entirely like I have and buy a copy of Rapture 3D. I tested this software in an older version of TDM so things may have changed but I did record a video at the time...

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJNr7IzcMR4

 

I don't use my headset that often but if there's interest I can track down the software and report back on if it works with TDM 2.0.

[7upMan]

As far as I know, Rapture 3D is not actively developed anymore. At least last time I checked the list of supported games showed mostly old(er) titles.

[rich_is_bored]

Yeah that suggestion is irrelevant now. Rapture 3D was openAL based and I've since learned that openAL support in TDM 2.0 seems to be broken.