Poll to determine nr. of simultaneous 3D/2D sounds

[Dwarden 1124]

in past I was trying to find out max. number of simultaneous sounds supported by ArmA, both 2D and 3D yet was no usable informations about ...

after some discussion i got official information (from BIS) that Armed Assault utilize hard-coded 16 3D & 16 2D hw. acc. sounds  (16/16) ...

so in short i raised wish to see higher number of simultaneous sounds as that "may" lead to better experience from sound side of ArmA

don't worry - modern sound cards handle w/o problem way higher numbers than 16/16 ...

and that's why i start this poll and thread to discuss about this "limitation"

please keep this discussion to point and civil, thanks

[Czechm8 0]

I DON'T UNDERSTAND option2 & 3 AND WHAT it'll change in my arma experience...

[Dwarden 1124]

like more simulataneous sounds played at once instead cutoff / muted by priorites ...

[max power 21]

Given a choice, people are going to vote for more sounds or options. This poll is completely ridiculous. We need a clear indication of the kinds of performance issues we're talking about with 10 billion / 10 billion simultaneous sounds.

[Dwarden 1124]

what issues , if you got card capable handle it then there are no issues ...

and poll got it's reason ... or what You suggest instead ...

of course if you gunna try use eons old soundcard then ... nvm

[Paco454 0]

Given a choice, people are going to vote for more sounds or options. This poll is completely ridiculous. We need a clear indication of the kinds of performance issues we're talking about with 10 billion / 10 billion simultaneous sounds.

Ah don't listen to him Dwarden. Hall monitoring is in his blood. He just had nothing better to do than wine on your thread because he doesn't like the idea.

Were dealing with an older, or some have said and updated OFP engine, with that comes limitations. I'm not sure they can allow the engine to use more sounds but I support your idea for higher number of simultaneous sounds to make a better experience.

I understand from other sources that a new engine supporting (Dx10 hopefully) is being developed which will be used in the next version of this title, however this maybe years away.

PACO454

[Pierrot 0]

XBOX360 has already supported 512 s/w sounds. But ArmA has only 16 s/w and 16 h/w sounds? It makes no progress scince OFP. I'd like to vote 512 sounds but no such an option in the poll?

[Dwarden 1124]

XBOX360 has already supported 512 s/w sounds. But ArmA has only 16 s/w and 16 h/w sounds? It makes no progress scince OFP. I'd like to vote 512 sounds but no such an option in the poll?

i wrote 16 3D and 16 2D (hardware accelerated if enabled in options) sounds ...

don't mix XBOX360 there where processing unit helps to "hardware accelerate" 256 to 320 sounds ...

different architecture approach

[Pierrot 0]

i wrote 16 3D and 16 2D (hardware accelerated if enabled in options) sounds ...

Oops, sorry

Quote[/b] ]don't mix XBOX360 there where processing unit helps to "hardware accelerate" 256 to 320 sounds ...

different architecture approach

Yeah, that's it! The powerful processor of XBOX360 enables sound hardware acceleration. ArmA does not take advantage of mulit processors at this stage. Although we prepare for dual core or quad core processor, ArmA uses only one of them and the rest of all is almost idling. Why not use these idling processors for sound operation? It might increase the number of simultaneous sounds dramatically.

[Maddmatt 1]

The X-Fi soundcard can handle 128 hardware sounds. (Maybe reduced to 64 in cases, I'm no expert but I think applying effects to the sounds would reduce this to 64.)

Some games have similar settings in the options, to set the maximum limit for sounds. A decent soundcard will do the processing, so large numbers of sounds (like 128) wont be a problem. As for people with onboard sound, it still shouldn't be too much of a problem with a limit of 32.

Although you shouldn't be using onboard sound if you use your PCs for games/music/movies anyway.

[Dwarden 1124]

Yeah, that's it! The powerful processor of XBOX360 enables sound hardware acceleration. ArmA does not take advantage of mulit processors at this stage. Although we prepare for dual core or quad core processor, ArmA uses only one of them and the rest of all is almost idling. Why not use these idling processors for sound operation? It might increase the number of simultaneous sounds dramatically.

another myth , Your additional cores are not idle, they do rest OS tasks, video driver assigned tasks (multithreaded support is already in latest NVIDIA and ATI drivers), etc.

demand to rewrote ArmA into multithreaded engine are unrealistic ... it's not that simple ...

(only what "MAY" be easier and possible are multi-threaded file operations like was done with PlanetSide)

i suggest You read nice article about upcoming support for multi-threading in Source Engine (yes even huge company like Valve STILL uses only single threaded engine),

it's well done text so even laic get some insight on how problematic this transition is ...

http://www.bit-tech.net/gaming....e_Engin

p.s. maximal number of 3D/2D hw accelerated sounds scale by used APU (if any1 remember old SoundStorm 2 it was able handle hw accelerated 256 sounds)

todays hi-/end endproducts handle 128/128 (ie X-Fi, C-Media 8788) where max number is always bit lower due to effects overhead ...

medium-end cards (ie C-MEDIA 8770,8878, Audigy 2 ZS) handle 64/64 (minus overhead)

low-end 32/32 (minus overhead)

and cheap onboard audio can fall to 16/16 (yet hw acceleration is in fact there done by CPU)

fully customizable values could help people who got very old soundcards or issues with onboard ones etc...

[feersum.endjinn 6]

16 sounds like good default option, as my onboard Realtek ALC850 claimed to support 46 simultaneous hardware sounds but in practice going anything above 24 produced crackling.

This was one reason why I bought X-Fi, for me sounds contribute so much than more graphics. It is kind of annoying to hear tank sounds disappear every time you shoot your weapon or you run so fast that character starts to breath heavily - 16 sounds is way too low for any larger battle.

Therefore I vote for some kind of option to enable more 3D sounds for those that have hardware to support it.

[andersson 285]

Why would anyone not choose #3?

Its a honest question, are there any reasons to choose 0,1 or 2?

[Maddmatt 1]

Why would anyone not choose #3?

Its a honest question, are there any reasons to choose 0,1 or 2?

Onboard soundcard users .

But seriously, there is no reason to choose 0 or 1, even if you use onboard you would be able to turn it down if there were options.

#2 makes things simpler, you don't need to be able to specify an exact number. People with decent soundcards would be fine with 128.

[Dwarden 1124]

Why would anyone not choose #3?

Its a honest question, are there any reasons to choose 0,1 or 2?

Onboard soundcard users   .

But seriously, there is no reason to choose 0 or 1, even if you use onboard you would be able to turn it down if there were options.

#2 makes things simpler, you don't need to be able to specify an exact number. People with decent soundcards would be fine with 128.

i put in no soundcard option to just see who plays w/o sound (sadly such number usually degrade by jokers)

[Pierrot 0]

i suggest You read nice article about upcoming support for multi-threading in Source Engine (yes even huge company like Valve STILL uses only single threaded engine),

it's well done text so even laic get some insight on how problematic this transition is ...

Thanks Dwarden. Yes, I know it's difficult to rewrite ArmA into multithreaded engine. But is it difficult to separate only sound operations into another core? If it were possible, any PC which has multi-core would be able to play hundreds of sounds simultaneously even though it has low-end sound card.

[Dwarden 1124]

i suggest You read nice article about upcoming support for multi-threading in Source Engine (yes even huge company like Valve STILL uses only single threaded engine),

it's well done text so even laic get some insight on how problematic this transition is ...

Thanks Dwarden. Yes, I know it's difficult to rewrote ArmA into multithreaded engine. But is it difficult to seperate only sound operations into another core? If it were possible, any PC which has  multi-core would be able to play hundreds of sounds simultaneously even though it has low-end sound card.

of course it is, you need to synchronize such "offload" with rest of engine ...

[baddo 0]

If it were possible, any PC which has  multi-core would be able to play hundreds of sounds simultaneously even though it has low-end sound card.

Sorry but here is something I don't really understand - if a soundcard can play only x number of sounds simultaneously, like x = 16, then how does a multi-core processor change that? The sounds must still go through the soundcard which has the limitation right?

[max power 21]

Why would anyone not choose #3?

Its a honest question, are there any reasons to choose 0,1 or 2?

This was my earlier point... apparently when you use long sentences it's scary or something.

[Dwarden 1124]

Why would anyone not choose #3?

Its a honest question, are there any reasons to choose 0,1 or 2?

This was my earlier point... apparently when you use long sentences it's scary or something.    

on low end soundcard limit you will need "re-mix" these hunders sounds into value soundcard can handle

[desertfox 2]

I think one point should be taken into concern here - No matter how many sounds you are able to generate through hardware or software means - the human brain is not able to keep them apart anymore after a certain number has been reached. It will start to melt into "noise" at some point.

[Dwarden 1124]

I think one point should be taken into concern here - No matter how many sounds you are able to generate through hardware or software means - the human brain is not able to keep them apart anymore after a certain number has been reached. It will start to melt into "noise" at some point.

yep if they "merge" (or melt) each into other ...

with priorities in place you can easily reach moment where some sounds are simply cuttoff / missing due to max limit ...

sweet range gunna differ by each user ...

[Millenium7 0]

I think one point should be taken into concern here - No matter how many sounds you are able to generate through hardware or software means - the human brain is not able to keep them apart anymore after a certain number has been reached. It will start to melt into "noise" at some point.

and its a huge number, depending on the sound frequencies. Obviously the closer they are the harder they are to seperate but even noise is better than hearing nothing but the reload sound

[Pierrot 0]

Sorry but here is something I don't really understand - if a soundcard can play only x number of sounds simultaneously, like x = 16, then how does a multi-core processor change that? The sounds must still go through the soundcard which has the limitation right?

The point it that where do you merge sounds into stream.

Conventional PC games including OFP and ArmA did it on sound card. These games put all sounds (gun-fire, explosion, communication voice and etc) into buffer on sound card and let it merge these sounds into one stream. Almost all the calculations concerning sounds are done in sound card, the load of CPU can be reduced low.

On the other hand, new style of sound operations arouse in XBOX360 and PS3. These consoles have powerful multi-core processors in it and it is natural to do sound operations in one of these powerful processors. They merge hundreds of sounds into one audio stream(let's say stereo audio stream) in their processor then put it sound I/O stream to let you hear sound stream. The advantage of this style is that there is no limitation of sounds because the processor convert them into two-channel stereo stream (or 5.1ch surrounding sounds) in itself only to leave this sound stream to sound I/O for D/A conversion (All the sound cards from Creative high-end card to on-board low-end card have D/A converters). The actual limitation of the number of sounds depends on the processor. BTW, XBOX360 can handle 512 sounds simultaneously.

Baddo, when the sound go through the sound card in the latter case, it has already converted to two-channel stereo audio stream, so it has nothing to do with the limitation of the sound card.