m-audio revolution

[evil-zen 0]

well I've just got another soundcard and it's m-audio revolution 7.1 rev 3. preliminary tests seems to show that it is at least as good as a pcdp if not better. haven't tried it with my cd deck as i don't have an amp yet.

 

been playing around with foobar2000 for quite sometime now. so far this is what I noticed with diff outputs:

directsound: sounds muffled and has a lot of hissing. in other words, like s**t.

kernel streaming: much much better with better separation and no hissing at all. but it doesn't support 24bit

waveout: can't tell the diff between it and kernel streaming. supports 24 bit.

 

When using either resampling to 88.2khz or 24bit, I hardly noticed any difference.

Some questions. How come 24 bit can only be used with waveout? And why directsound sounds so lousy when it is the recommended output for win2k?

 

Using

Win2k SP3

directx 8.1

foobar2000 0.586

 

comments and answers welcome.

[voxel 0]

Seems Revo can't receive 24bit via kernel streaming, since there are other guys with the same problem.

I guess Revo doesn't support 24bit input indeed, and when you use 24bit with waveout, it's dithered to 16bit first and sent to the card Or it may be the problem of driver under 2k...

 

BTW, waveout is old way using in win9x, with reluctant support in win2k/xp, how could it be better than directsound

 

[evil-zen 0]

alright. i tested it using winamp and it has the same problem with directsound until i checked the option in directsound settings 'create primary buffer (for old soundcards, fixes sound quality problems)'. after checking it, directsound sounds the same as the rest. very weird though, not well implemented drivers?

 

another thing is that revo is listed as M-Audio Revolution(emulated) in both foobar and winamp. what's happening now?

 

how do you know its dithered to 16bit first when using waveout?

Edited April 18, 2003 by evil-zen

[voxel 0]

I just guess, since if a device does not support 24bit input, the signal must be dithered somewhere first, or there should be no sound out.

 

You may check this link for more details:

http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?act...=ST&f=24&t=6716

[evil-zen 0]

didn't see anything about dithering to 16bit in waveout in hydrogen audio.

 

you have a revolution too?

[voxel 0]

Not yet. I have ordered one, still on the way All that I know about dither, bit depth and sampling rate etc are only from hydrogen (not by practical usage)

 

BTW, have you done some search for revolution or dither on it?

[ablaze 0]

do a search in the foobar forums for an ASIO plugin for foobar. 24bit works for that!

[voxel 0]

but ASIO is totally different things from KS

some people think KS comes more natural on a normal pc, and ASIO for special apps

[evil-zen 0]

hmmmm?

both passes through windows kmixer. sounds the same to me. but has slight pops when doing something else in windows? will be using ks for now.

 

I find it weird that it doesn't do 24bit using foobar alone. other 24 bit cards supports it.

[evil-zen 0]

ablaze, what foobar settings do you use?

 

and the crossover in the control panel makes no difference for me. keep hearing the bass notes anyway.

[ablaze 0]

don't think it'll be completely immune to pops, either ways, but can minimise it by putting the ASIO/KS buffer size really high..

 

24bit used to work for foobar KS..but each time there's a new version..things change. anyway, I'm using ASIO, 24-bit playback,undithered, no other dsps or plugins, except crossFEED (I supposed this is what you're talking about. crossover is a different thing altogether) once in a while

 

regarding the crossfeed plugin, you might have to do a search and download it separately, don't think it was included in the standard install.

[evil-zen 0]

well I'm not talking about crossfeed. tried the foobar crossfeed and its pretty good too.

The crossover i'm talking about is the m-audio control panel under speaker set up. It has crossover from 40hz to 120hz. Although I put it in 120hz, 80hz still can be heard through my headphones.very weird. now its in off position.

 

And the directsound crappy sound is solved. seems like there was some error with directx and the drivers. I reinstalled both and now directsound is in the same level with ks and waveout.

 

for those who have no idea what we are talking about. it can be found in http://foobar2000.hydrogenaudio.org/ . A very good windows audio player built for sound quality, with minimal ui and low system requirements. highly recommended.

[ablaze 0]

I think when you set to "headphones" mode, the crossover doesn't work. try setting to 2 point speakers, and play with the crossover. think that should work. but why would you want to redirect the bass anyway?

[evil-zen 0]

another question.

it seems that the revo doesn't support directsound? it appears as revolution(emulated) under both winamp and foobar. I had it solved for a while and its back again as emulated??

[ablaze 0]

I never had that problem zen.

maybe its to do with your windows installation or something..

or try the new foobar0.6