User Guides Improve your music playback

This guide is mainly aimed at all those people who have an audigy soundcard, and to a lesser extent , those using their onboard AC'97 sound , and those who care to have good sound quality ( and by that i mean more detail in the sound , not better bass :p) , and with speakers with a good high end.

Have you ever wondered why movies sound just right on your rig, but music not so? Well, the root cause of it is the mediocre quality resampling in the hardware. This is most obvious in the audigy series cards, and to a lesser extent , in AC'97's

to get an idea about it, check out the IM Distortion graphs at 44.1 Khz and 48 Khz The difference is pretty obvious !

imd44tx5.gif


at 44 khz

imd48km8.gif


at 48 khz



original measurements

Thankfully, help isn't far away!

The cure involves using a much higher quality software resampling and output direct to the sound card( and in doing this ,we bypass the windows default mixer which removes one less component) .



note : using software resample eats up CPU cycles like hell so attempt this only if audio fidelity matters more to you :eek:hyeah:

There are two ways ...

ASIO

ASIO stands for Audio Stream Input/Output , a low latency interface , which by itself has only the low latency bit as its merit, but combined with external resampling , proves to be just the ticket to audio heaven!

Kernel streaming

Unfortunately, all cards don't support ASIO, ( of course , there is always ASIO4all, a generic ASIO driver ) and thats were kernel streaming comes in. it works pretty much like ASIO functionally, and streams the audio direct , (bypassing the windows mixer) to the soundcard. the drawback being that KS tends to be buggy ( it didn't work at all on my Nforce onboard audio)

Now to utilize these, you need to use the appropriate playback plugin for playback

I'll talk about foobar ( actually i was a fan of QCD player , but its ASIO output plugin doesnt seem to work with my audigy ASIO , but it strangely has no issues with nVidia ASIO..)

Install foobar ( howto for winamp given at the end)

Setting up foobar

First of all you need the SSRC resampling plugin for foobar, as it is better than the stock PPHS resampler that comes with foo. Then you need the out_asio and if you're feeling adventurous , the out_ks plugins.

Extract the plugins to the foo plugins folder, and restart foobar

Enable the SSRC plugin, and set it to resample to 48 Khz.The higher the quality, the better ... but at the same time , keep an eye out for CPU. I use these settings as mine's an old barton :D(20% cpu at these settings) ( if you have a 96/24 capable card, then set to 96K !audigy users: disable all the EAX, CMSS , speaker calibrator.. pretty much all the ear candyif you want 96/24 playback.... The audigy DSP engine runs at 48Khz )

also remember to add the mono to stereo converter as ASIO doesnt detect mono



now for playback. If you're going the KS route, all you have to do is choose the KS instead of DS in the list.



ASIO... you need to choose from the list of possible ASIO devices , and in case of the foobar plugin, you can custom map the channels. If you plan to playback multichannel files (say dts) you need to have all the channels mapped. Then choose the newly added ASIO device in the playback list. Enable dithering if you know what dithering means and intend to use it (and your card supports it )



Winamp: the basic idea remains the same... the options here are much more varied , as a number of plugins and ways exist to accomplish the same thing..

1)resample to 48 khz

2)output to ASIO or Kernel streaming , or if neither works , directsound

Links

ASIO 4all :ASIO4ALL - Universal ASIO Driver

FOOBAR

ASIO for foobar: http://www.foobar2000.org/components/foo_out_asio.zip

Kernel streaming for foobar : http://www.foobar2000.org/components/foo_out_ks.zip

SSRC for foobar: http://otachan.com/foo_dsp_ssrc_057.7z

Sercret Rabbit code Resampler : Secret Rabbit Code Resampler for Foobar2000.

Winamp

Kernel streaming for winamp : Assorted Steve Monks Related Stuff

this plugin does not resample by itself, you need to use another resampler like the

Hqsoft resampling plugin: HighestQuality Software Processing - Homepage

and then route it to kernel streaming output

ASIO for winamp : a) dll version : WINAMP5? ASIO??????? (dll version) - ??????MIDI/Audio???



b) exe version : WINAMP5? ASIO??????? (exe version) - ??????MIDI/Audio???



c) x64 version : WINAMP5? ASIO??????? (x64 version) - ??????MIDI/Audio???

scroll down to the 4th point to download the file

don't ask me the difference ... i have no idea :D

all these ASIO plugins support built in Sample rate conversion so configure them right and you're set!

And lastly for the faint of heart, a directsound plugin (very much like the default DS plugin , with added SSRC ) : http://nunzioweb.com/sawgstuff/wa/out_ds_ssrc.zip



DISCLAIMER : a few of these plugins are betas or (in some case ) alphas , so use at your own risk !
 
Click to expand...
er, for some apparent reason, that plugin doesnt work with the audigy 2zs (doesnt work on mine either). it works fine with my nvidia onboard though. I'd recommend that you switch to foobar, or if you love winamp THAT much, to use the ssrc directsound out plugin :) set it to resample to 96 khz if it works at 96k and 24 bit if possible :)
 
very kewl guide... but need some help with winamp..
i installed the ssrc plugin... wherein kernel precision at 150 and resampling samplerate at 48000 and the other options are the same by default(Except i unchked the volume control)
now asio where do i install it?? and what abt the kernel?? doesnt show up in winamp if i install it in the winamp/plugin dir or winamp/plugin/asio dir.. and where to install kernel ?
 
greenhorn said:
whats your soundcard mate?
as far as winamp is concerned, out_ds_ssrc is the most trouble free way :)
Click to expand...

had the rest of the convo with him over IM

equipment: realtek AC 97 onboard

HQsoft reampling plugin worked
kernel streaming worked
but for some reason, togther, they made winamp crash:p.

He's using out_ds_ssrc now :)(48000Hz, 16 bit, dithering :none)

hope this comes in handy for winamp users on realtek AC 97 onboard
 
hey guys. the noise on the onboard @ the office had been driving me nuts. it plagues all soundcards, but onboards the most

to fix it , get the windows mixer (by double clicking the speaker icon in the systemtray or taking start menu->run->sndvol32.exe)

you'll get this window



take options -> properties in the mixer.



tick ALL the checkboxes.

now you'll get an extra :p wide mixer like the one shown above. Now mute EVERYTHING other than the main (leftmost ) slider if you are using Kernel streaming/ASIO .If you are using out_ds_ssrc or just the resampling bit , then dont mute wave either. You'll notice a HUGE reduction in background noise.

However , you will have to periodically unmute some mixers (wave for most things... you'll have to get used to checking/unchecking wave soon if you like this tweak:bleh: , line in or aux if you have a tv tuner card etc, mic if you voice chat etc. so if you know which mixer controls what input , then open the options -> preferences dialog and uncheck the rest of them (the unused mixers , like phone etc) this way, you can mute/unmute stuff on the fly.

If you are a noob to this , and after muting everything , suddenly you cant hear some players/stuff, try doing the above process in reverse (unmuting everything ) and then mute each mixer one by one until you find out which one is responsible :)

kicking out all this extra noise sure helps make the gains of SSRC /KS all the more noticeable :hap2:
 
there is no foo plugins folder there....

Or do you mean to say that I just need to extract into the "Components" folder ??
 
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