Headphone virtual 5.1 or 7.1 software?

[pkane]

I've come across a few hardware solutions for 5.1 or 7.1 reproduction using headphones, and some software ones. I'm particularly interested in any software out there that is capable of playing 5.1 (or other multi-channel) content over my own headphones without spending thousands of dollars. My headphones only cost around $200, so I would put that as the upper limit on the software, as well. I know there are some very good but very expensive hardware/software solutions out there, but that's not what I'm looking for.

Most of the software I find seems to be designed for gaming. Is this any good for music? How realistic is the reproduction of space? Is the sound still all 'in your head', despite coming from different directions? And is there really a sense of space or just the sense of the direction of individual sounds? Trying to see what cheap state of the art is out there and is it enough to enjoy music without being distracted by unnatural theatrics

 

[Doodski]

I used the optional ASUS 3D software that comes with the 370E motherboard and it works well for creating a sense of exaggerated space. I am picky and decided to uninstall the Sonic Radar and just go with the Sonic Studio III with 10 band EQ and without using the Sonic Studio effects because I think I can locate enemies for fragging better without the 3D effect and I like the music in simple stereo sound.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-ca/p/sonic-studio-3/9n81c41dq5sj?activetab=pivot:overviewtab
https://www.asus.com/Microsite/mb/ROG-supremefx-gaming-audio/#sonic_studio
https://rog.asus.com/technology/rog-sound-innovations/sonic-radar/

 

[maxxevv]

Not sure if its the same, but the Creative Super X-Fi software supposedly does something along those lines.

 

[Doodski]

Most of the software I find seems to be designed for gaming. Is this any good for music? How realistic is the reproduction of space? Is the sound still all 'in your head', despite coming from different directions? And is there really a sense of space or just the sense of the direction of individual sounds? Trying to see what cheap state of the art is out there and is it enough to enjoy music without being distracted by unnatural theatrics

It was OK for some music but if I remember correctly there was a lower gain using the 3D software and I needed more volume.

The reproduction of space was bigger than stereo sound.

The sound was all around and inside my head.

There was directionality that is supposed to make locating sound origins better.

 

[Jumbotron]

Waves NX App for Windows and MAC is cheap and really, really good for the price. And it is kind of customizable.

https://www.waves.com/nx/apps

You may also try Headphone Surround Virtualization (HeSuVi) over Equalizer APO, which are free software.

 

[daftcombo]

Voicemeter Banana is free and works well.

https://www.vb-audio.com/Voicemeete...MIiM2VmMK15wIVT0HTCh38gA61EAAYASAAEgKNbvD_BwE

 

[pkane]

Not sure if its the same, but the Creative Super X-Fi software supposedly does something along those lines.

Yes, I saw mentions of this, and for under $30, this seems like a bargain. I'll probably get it just to try it out.

 

[pkane]

Waves NX App for Windows and MAC is cheap and really, really good for the price. And it is kind of customizable.

https://www.waves.com/nx/apps

You may also try Headphone Surround Virtualization (HeSuVi) over Equalizer APO, which are free software.

That looks great, thank you!

 

[pkane]

Downloaded a trial of NX app. Interesting! I like that it even includes a head tracker, very cool! The sound is good for movies, but not so sure about music. Seems to add too much reverb, a bit more 'in the barrel' feeling than without it. Otherwise, amazing what you can get for $10 Still can't get the sound completely out of my head, but this part is better with Nx than without it. I'll need to spend more time with it, for sure.

I'll try the other suggestions, too, thanks for everyone's input!

 

[Jumbotron]

Yes, for music I prefer normal stereo playback, at least if your headphones are good.

 

[DanDilla]

Atmos for Headphones is far better than the Sonic Studio stuff, in my experience.
Works great with movies and gaming If you got a dolby or dts signal With at least 5channels.

For music I would recommend to fall back to stereo.

It’s mixed and mastered for that and works best, virtual surround always got a layer which does not belong there, feels mostly a little distorted, the sonic studio stuff always added like a reverb layer which was really discracting.

if I’m gaming and listen to music while that via headphones I am mostly at my xbox where I can not separate so I use stereo for both, music and game, I get too distracted by the music running through Dolby Atmos for headphones. There’s just something irritating,

 

[k3nb5t]

Atmos for Headphones is far better than the Sonic Studio stuff, in my experience.
Works great with movies and gaming If you got a dolby or dts signal With at least 5channels.

This matches my experience as well. You can get Dolby Access from the Windows store and it will walk you through the process. I'm pretty sure the headphone codec is $10-ish to license. I use it with Overwatch, and it's quite good. Presumably it supports movies as well, though I've not tried. I'm guessing it won't help much with music, unless you have music already encoded in Atmos format.

Dolby Access @ Windows Store https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/dolby-access/9n0866fs04w8

 

[dwkdnvr]

I remain intrigued by the Impulcifier project: https://github.com/jaakkopasanen/Impulcifer . Basically a DIY version of the Smyth Realizer idea. You use Impulcifier to measure your own HRIR and generate headphone corrections, and then use the generated correction filters in HeSuVi or JRiver to play back over headphones. I haven't had a chance to try it out yet, but am hoping to do so soon-ish.

 

[pkane]

I remain intrigued by the Impulcifier project: https://github.com/jaakkopasanen/Impulcifer . Basically a DIY version of the Smyth Realizer idea. You use Impulcifier to measure your own HRIR and generate headphone corrections, and then use the generated correction filters in HeSuVi or JRiver to play back over headphones. I haven't had a chance to try it out yet, but am hoping to do so soon-ish.

Looks interesting, but on a quick look, this appears to apply a recorded impulse response from two stereo speakers to the headphones. I don't see any multi-channel or surround-sound processing there. Did I miss it?

 

[dwkdnvr]

Yes, it can do full 7.1 either in 1 shot (sequencing through the speakers), or in segments using 2 stereo speakers and various head/body rotation angles to complete the full speaker set. I think it can probably do it with a single speaker and 7 rotations too, but that might require a bit of tweaking. As I said I haven't tried this personally yet, but there is a long-ish thread on Head-Fi where several folks report great results.

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/recording-impulse-responses-for-speaker-virtualization.890719/

 

[pkane]

Yes, it can do full 7.1 either in 1 shot (sequencing through the speakers), or in segments using 2 stereo speakers and various head/body rotation angles to complete the full speaker set. I think it can probably do it with a single speaker and 7 rotations too, but that might require a bit of tweaking. As I said I haven't tried this personally yet, but there is a long-ish thread on Head-Fi where several folks report great results.

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/recording-impulse-responses-for-speaker-virtualization.890719/

I tried going down that route with headphones before. Recording impulse response using in-ear mics and then applying it to headphone signal. I didn't find this to be very good (could be that my process was flawed). The result was a bit more muddied sound with too much reverb, although this was with only two speakers.

In the end, I wound up measuring my ear response with in-ear mics and EQ-ing it to a gentle (5dB dip, 20-20k) line. This produced the most natural sound to me using three different headphones, but didn't do anything to move the sound out of my head. I experimented with various forms of crossfeed, and while it helped a little, it also seemed to fuzzy the sound on high quality recording.

 

[dwkdnvr]

If you read through the head-fi thread you'll find that getting good measurements is a bit hit-and-miss with the type of binaural mics that are readily available - they seem to be very sensitive to insertion depth and canal blocking. Based on the reports from the Smyth Realizer though, the basic concept seems pretty solid. Impulcifier has some tools and produces some plots helping to gauge the quality of your measurement which might help. If you already have the mics, it seems like it's probably worth spending a couple hours giving it a try.

I'm particularly interested in this project due to the potential to use it to try a couple different auralization ideas that I've had in addition to 'straightforward' reproduction. (ambiophonics over headphones being one, realistic crossover auralization being another). Based on my track record though, it's likely I won't manage to carve out enough time to actually explore them fully.

 

[bravomail]

I've come across a few hardware solutions for 5.1 or 7.1 reproduction using headphones, and some software ones. I'm particularly interested in any software out there that is capable of playing 5.1 (or other multi-channel) content over my own headphones without spending thousands of dollars. My headphones only cost around $200, so I would put that as the upper limit on the software, as well. I know there are some very good but very expensive hardware/software solutions out there, but that's not what I'm looking for.

Most of the software I find seems to be designed for gaming. Is this any good for music? How realistic is the reproduction of space? Is the sound still all 'in your head', despite coming from different directions? And is there really a sense of space or just the sense of the direction of individual sounds? Trying to see what cheap state of the art is out there and is it enough to enjoy music without being distracted by unnatural theatrics

What media your 5.1 sound comes from? If it is DVD or Bluray - then PC software player (CyberDVD, PowerDVD, WinDVD) will be able to do the trick of downsampling multichannel audio for you. There are also ton of "ripping" software which will convert DVD audio for you, with optional downsampling. For "on-the-fly" multichannel audio - follow the suggestions ppl gave u.

 

[pkane]

What media your 5.1 sound comes from? If it is DVD or Bluray - then PC software player (CyberDVD, PowerDVD, WinDVD) will be able to do the trick of downsampling multichannel audio for you. There are also ton of "ripping" software which will convert DVD audio for you, with optional downsampling. For "on-the-fly" multichannel audio - follow the suggestions ppl gave u.

I have no problem playing 5.1/7.1 content over headphones, the problem I have is that it doesn't sound like real surround sound

 

[Doodski]

I have no problem playing 5.1/7.1 content over headphones, the problem I have is that it doesn't sound like real surround sound

Curious. Did you install the Sonic Studio III/Sonic Radar and did it work on your motherboard. I'm interested to see if it works on anything other than a ASUS or Gigabyte etc.