[1451][4.10] OpenAL Positional Audio - Center/LFE Issues

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Dumpshock
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Joined: Mon, 8. Aug 05, 07:37
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[1451][4.10] OpenAL Positional Audio - Center/LFE Issues

Post by Dumpshock » Mon, 18. Oct 21, 06:53

Greetings,

So, for some time now I've been noticing that positional audio in X4 hasn't been quite "right" with my surround system, and I think I tracked it down. Searching, I haven't seen much discussion on this except related to the Stalker mod overwriting the OpenAL configs (I do not play Stalker), or distortion issues after OpenAL may have been updated (I think around 3.30?).

Anyways, the issue I have noticed is that the Center and LFE channel audio does not appear to be properly pushing through. I noticed then when on occasion, dialoge and SFX would just cut out when it should be attempting to play or transition over the Center.


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I've gone through all the local troubleshooting on my side and so far have not found this to be an issue directly with my setup I can identify. With the version of OpenAL X4 distributes, 1.18.2, Center and LFE is not being sent. Front and Rear channels appear to be functioning.

Research on this seems to show this being a known "issue" starting with build 1.17. The maintainer changed how positional audio is handled in that version. There is an issue on their Git found here: https://github.com/kcat/openal-soft/issues/129

I have found two workarounds so far that seem to work.
1) Rolling back to OpenAL 1.16 by replacing the openal32.dll fixes the issue with the center channel and positional audio works as expected again. No LFE channel seems to be coming through but my sound system mostly compensates for that.
2) Per the linked Git post, adding 'front-stablizer=true' to the 'alsoft.conf' in the X4 Foundations folder also provides a fix for versions above 1.17. Still no LFE channel.

I also tested by updating to the latest 1.21.1 (again, replacing the .dll) and noticed no appreciable change.

This is leading me to believe there may be some config issues with the current implementation of OpenAL within X4 that might need to be looked at.

Anyone else with an actual Surround setup noticing the same or can confirm my findings?

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