OpenAL and EAX in Thief Deadly Shadows?

bikerdude on 9/1/2014 at 11:43

Quote Posted by Daraan

Now I have to choose between Alchemy and OpenAL

OpenAL is by far the better option. I lookforward to the Day its part of the Darkmod so we can remove the dependence on EAX.

Daraan on 9/1/2014 at 12:01

Quote Posted by bikerdude

OpenAL is by far the better option.

I have no background information. What are the advantages/differences?

bikerdude on 9/1/2014 at 14:17

Quote Posted by Daraan

I have no background information. What are the advantages/differences?

* It isn't sound card vender reliant (like EAX is on creative card on any version higher than 2.0)
* OpenAL (2.1) supports as many voices (48) as EAX.
* It doesn't access the OS kernel directly (like EAX/Creative driver does) - buggy drivers cause BSOD's (and when have we known creative to release a solid set of drivers?)
* Onbooard sound chip's are a lot better than they used to be and will support OpenAL - so why waste £60-90 on a creative card when you don't need to.
* Multi platform & Multi OS - (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenAL)
*

Midgard on 9/1/2014 at 22:38

Quote Posted by bikerdude

* Onbooard sound chip's are a lot better than they used to be and will support OpenAL - so why waste £60-90 on a creative card when you don't need to.

Even the best onboard sound solutions still get RF interferences from being so local to other components on the motherboard, resulting in poorer SNRs. I got the Creative Sound Blaster Z because I was sick of the background noise, however fairly faint, I was hearing with headphones during quiet passages during music & silences in movies. With so much extra shielding on the SBX and a decent external DAC I can easily determine it's quite a bit cleaner than the RealTek on my Asus onboard sound. Virtual Surround on the SBX is also suppose to be better than onboard too but I haven't tried many games to determine that yet. I think I'll check out the latest Assassin's Creed soon, a series I fell in love with because it reminds me a bit of Thief.

M.

bikerdude on 9/1/2014 at 23:29

Quote Posted by Midgard

Even the best onboard sound solutions still get RF interferences from being so local to other components on the motherboard, resulting in poorer SNRs.

Yeah, one of the main drawbacks. But as I said they are getting better.

Linda on 9/7/2014 at 21:06

Tried to install that version of Alchemy (Alchemy Universal_1_00_8) and oalinst, but when I start Alchemy and set TDS as enabled games and I click on Audio Hardware Mixing the sound vanishes... someone could help??:confused:

bikerdude on 10/7/2014 at 23:07

Quote Posted by Linda

Firstly what are your system specs, (OS, Sound card make/model and driver version). I will then go and find the latest driver for your card along with the matching alchemy (if you have Win7 or higher) and the latest version of OpenAL (I am running ver 2.1.0.0)

Linda on 10/7/2014 at 23:16

Quote Posted by bikerdude

My bf says "Windows 7 SP1" the sound card is embedded into the motherboard Gigabyte GA-Z87X-OC FORCE. The system is up to date, and so the drivers for the motherboard. OpenAL is 2.0.7.0 ... maybe it's because of this? I can't find the 2.1.0 anywhere..

bikerdude on 11/7/2014 at 00:34

Quote Posted by Linda

* "Windows 7 SP1"
* the sound card is embedded into the motherboard Gigabyte GA-Z87X-OC FORCE.
* I can't find the 2.1.0 anywhere..

* Is that 32bit or 64bit - (http://windows.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows/32-bit-and-64-bit-windows#1TC=windows-7)
* Ok The Sound card on that motherboard is a "Realtek HD" and the latest driver can be found on Gigabyte's website (http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=4484#dl) here
* The OS and the card support OpenAL and the latest version cane be found (http://support.focus-home.fr/oalinst.exe) here

The above config will allow you to select OpenAL(instead of EAX) in Thief 1/2 with the new dark .exe installed, but the problem your going to run into is that T3 dosen't support OpenAL, only EAX. The Realtek HD dosen't have support for EAX officially, so what can try is "(http://kickass.to/creative-alchemy-universal-1-00-08-by-daniel-kawakami-t788898.html) Creative Alchemy Universal" - which can be found (http://community.pcgamingwiki.com/files/file/28-creative-alchemy-universal/) here. This isnt guaranteed to work though, but its supposed to get EAX working on all non-creative sound cards.

You'll need to make sure you have dsound.dll and dsound.ini in the Thief3 system folder, in my case it's - E:\Thief\T3\System.

If after all the above dosent work then the simplest solution is to buy either new or second hand creative card -

(https://www.google.co.uk/shopping/product/6752828469364017362?client=firefox-a&hs=dw5&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&channel=sb&q=sound+blaster+Z&bav=on.2,or.r_qf.&bvm=bv.70810081,d.ZWU,pv.xjs.s.en.fb-Qw9IFZiU.O&biw=1680&bih=906&tch=1&ech=1&psi=1jG_U5qcNsO6O-z8AQ.1405039057609.7&sa=X&ei=5jG_U7DyDILEPP_cgMAE&ved=0CE0Q8wIwAA) - Soundblaster Z for around £50
or
(http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/like/390690913347?limghlpsr=true&hlpv=2&ops=true&viphx=1&hlpht=true&lpid=108&device=c&adtype=pla&crdt=0&ff3=1&ff11=ICEP3.0.0&ff12=67&ff13=80&ff14=108) - Soundblaster X-fi Titainium for £29

Linda on 11/7/2014 at 03:17

It's 64bit. No luck, even with updating the audio drivers. I guess the version of Alchemy I had before is the same of this one... The dsound.dll and dsound.ini files can be found here (http://www.indirectsound.com/) http://www.indirectsound.com/ when I check Audio Hardware Mixing just silence :(

I've read somewhere in the web that those new audio cards (Titanium in particular) does not anymore permit to the Alchemy software to work... I don't think it's a proper solution... And I've read plenty of people who made this working even with realtek audiocards...