EAX (Eugene please read)

JohnMcClane · Dec 15, 2004, 10:26 AM

Like I already mentioned in another thread, I contacted Creative's support forum concerning the EAX data sheets. They told me to get in contact with Creative's Developer Relations USA - well I did that and they replied pretty fast here is what they wrote:

JohnMcClane · Dec 15, 2004, 10:27 AM

Regarding EAX environment presets data
I guess what they need to is to get the EAX SDK so they can get the Preset
info.

In the EAX SDK, there exist a EAX.H file that contains the Preset
data.

What publically available...

The EAX 2.0 Specifications are available at:
http://developer.creative.com/landin...bcat=31&top=71

Attached is EAX10.ZIP , and this contains the EAX.H file with the
preset values.
attached is the EAX.H file from the EAX1.0 API

Looking at EAX20, I see that the defined presets were moved to a .LIB
file. and are not shown in the EAX.H, but
in EAX 3 and 4, they were moved back. weird

EAX 2.0 SDK:
The complete EAX 2.0 SDK, including documentation, header files, and
example source code.
http://developer.creative.com/articl...top=71&aid=138

EAX 2.0 API Guide:
Main EAX 2.0 documentation.
Includes explanations of EAX terminology, and detailed listing of all
EAX 2.0 parameters.

http://developer.creative.com/articl...top=71&aid=139

As far as I know, Each company can develop their own EAX, audio mixing
and HRTF (Head Related Transfer Function) algorithms.

Searching for environmental+audio
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q...dio+algorithms

3D Audio - The Sonic Spot
http://www.sonicspot.com/guide/3daudio.html

There are a lot of research for HRTF...

A quick search... HRTF
http://www.google.com/search?q=+head...+function+hrtf

2 Speakers, Head Phone, 4 speakers, 5.1, 6.1, 7.1 ...
Each speaker configuration requires different HRTF algorithm's and
filters.

Regards,
Phillip Williams
Creative Labs
Developer Support
DevRelSupport@CreativeLabs.com
http://developer.creative.com/
http://opensource.creative.com/
http://preview.creativelabs.com/
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Guest User <m.lodin@inode.at>
12/13/04 01:33 PM

To: devrelsupport@creativelabs.com
cc:
Subject: EAX for kX audio driver

Message Sent: 12/13/2004

Dear Sirs,

I'm a 20 year old student from the technical university of Vienna
(Austria), where I'm studying software engineering. A few months ago I
came across an alternative audio driver for all soundcards with Emu10k1
and Emu10k2 Chips - kX Audio Driver (www.kxproject.com). I was really
impressed, how a driver that is only 5MB at size could be that much better
than the original Creative drivers. The project is OpenSource and allowed
me to write my own plugIns for it's fully customizable DSP. I was able to
achieve ASIO latency down to 2ms and a superior audio quality when
listening to music or watching movies. The only thing I was missing was
the lack of EAX support in this drivers. The kX project Lead Programmer,
Eugene Gavrilov, told me, that he would have worked on EAX support, but
Creative did not publish the EAX enviroment presets data & specifications
to him. I don't think that there would be any reason for creative to hold
back that specs, so is there a chance to get them?

JohnMcClane · Dec 15, 2004, 10:33 AM

There were two attachements to this mail - you can download them here

http://members.inode.at/m.lodin/EAX.H

http://members.inode.at/m.lodin/EAX10.ZIP

Hope this brings us one step closer to EAX.

Samir · Dec 15, 2004, 02:09 PM

hej, John, are you regitrated user @ developer.creative.com? EAX3 & EAX4 SDKs might come in handy...

I think that Eugene is aware of EAX API'sif i remember right he found no real use out of it...

Keep up the good work!

JohnMcClane · Dec 15, 2004, 03:36 PM

No, In fact I'm pretty new to kx and digital sound processing. I have however a long-term programming experience and now I'm trying to write a few good plugIns for kx.

If you wanna take a look to some other proggs I've written:

Alarm: http://members.inode.at/m.lodin/other/Alarm10b.exe it's a fully skinable clock with alarm function. just try it, it's pretty cool

HTML³D: http://members.inode.at/m.lodin/other/HTML³D.exe I wrote this HTML Editor in a time when I was the webadmin of a tactical ops clan - It made programming a lot easier for me, but I didn't work on it anymore, since I left the clan

imgFX: http://members.inode.at/m.lodin/other/imgfx - 0.7.exe was just experimenting with Images (needs .jpg) - should be some test for an image editor I never wrote

Snake.net: http://members.inode.at/m.lodin/other/snake - needs .net!!!!.rar That's a snake game I wrote for WIN2K/XP .net, it has a built in level editor - however I had more fun with programming, than playing it

I also made a simple disk hockey game (OpenGL), which I lost due to a disk fragmentation. The last six months I was developing a component package for delphi 7 - you can try it there (might have a few bugs) http://members.inode.at/m.lodin/othe...icControls.pas

I stopped it, cause I own now Delphi8.Net and Visual Studio 2003.Net and the package doesn't work there anymore. And well, looks like my new hobbie will become kx

PS: Sorry for going sooo OFFTopic

**Eugene Gavrilov** · Dec 15, 2004, 05:09 PM

the problem is not with 'presets', actually
of course, everyone can get EAX2 SDK (or even sign an NDA and get EAX3/EAX4 SDKs), but you won't get the source code for reverb engine.

that is, it is possible to get the 'parameters' used in, say, 'Cavern' preset, but you will need to write a complete reverb engine (with reverb effect) in order to convert them into particular Reverb settings.

since the present reverb implementations bundled with kX are not truely EAX-capable, and since I don't have enough time / intention / knowledge to design a brand-new reverb algorithm, the EAX cannot be supported.

E.

JohnMcClane · Dec 15, 2004, 06:04 PM

Sorry, i think I misunderstood that first

. Thx for clearing things up.

pzad · Dec 15, 2004, 07:22 PM

For EAX 3, EAX 4, .. you need to sign NDA.

JoshuaChang · Dec 15, 2004, 07:29 PM

hi Eugene, i think the eax's advantage is the change of env in different game scenes, the implement of the eax in kx could be like this:
use the exist reverb engine and write some code to read the eax instruction in game(is it possible???),then change the env sound by switch the different preset in reverb engine, between the switch, just some fade needed

that's all, no extra new engine needed

Tiger M · Dec 15, 2004, 08:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Eugene Gavrilov

the problem is not with 'presets', actually
of course, everyone can get EAX2 SDK (or even sign an NDA and get EAX3/EAX4 SDKs), but you won't get the source code for reverb engine.

that is, it is possible to get the 'parameters' used in, say, 'Cavern' preset, but you will need to write a complete reverb engine (with reverb effect) in order to convert them into particular Reverb settings.

since the present reverb implementations bundled with kX are not truely EAX-capable, and since I don't have enough time / intention / knowledge to design a brand-new reverb algorithm, the EAX cannot be supported.

E.

Eugene, do you mean that the dsp implementation is not correct or the actual parameters to control the reverb are not known?

Since the dsp part is extracted from the original creative dlls, I guess you mean the latter.

I recently made a small investigation of my own to discover the parameters of EAX3 reverb (since its topology is most familiar to me) and I found the basic parameters. But I guess to truly achieve EAX there must be a whole bunch of other parameters, which control several or more physical registers.

Would it be illegal to make a dialog with a few controls for these reverbs?
Or to alter the dsp part for other uses (beside EAX)?

I don't believe that these reverbs are much better than the ReverbStation actually (keeping in mind their different FDN structure) , the only improvement they seem to have (although I'm not shure) is modulation of some of the delay lenghts, which in theory would increase density and they are optimized (what I will make with ReverbSt. for its next release).

**Eugene Gavrilov** · Dec 15, 2004, 11:03 PM

>> do you mean that the dsp implementation is not correct or the actual
>> parameters to control the reverb are not known?

I mean that 'binary-only' reverbs (CLReverbXXX) cannot be used since we don't know how to change all the parameters, while the newer reverbs, such as ReverbStation, would require translation layer for changing EAX parameters into ReverbStation parameters (and none of the reverb authors has ever tried to write one).

>> Would it be illegal to make a dialog with a few controls for these reverbs?

if you don't use Creative Labs code for that, then, probably, that should be o.k. btw, have a look at the EAX4 reverb with presets

we have a special tool for 'retrieving' DSP effects from the DSP (which works under any driver, CL or kX). it also tries to update the parameters in the .da code.

also, our present plug-in architecture assumes the effects are executed in user-level mode, while EAX will need to access them in kernel-level mode. thus, if any such reverb is released, it should be available in source code in order to be ported to kernel-level (for instance, source code for Max's kXU library is not available).

if you wish to participate in EAX development, let me know. you will probably need to sign an NDA with Creative Labs in order to access EAX3/4 SDK.

E.

Tiger M · Dec 16, 2004, 02:28 PM

Quote:

we have a special tool for 'retrieving' DSP effects from the DSP (which works under any driver, CL or kX). it also tries to update the parameters in the .da code.

you mean from the creative effects DLLs (which I know has been implemented as a kX console function) or something else?

Quote:

if you wish to participate in EAX development, let me know. you will probably need to sign an NDA with Creative Labs in order to access EAX3/4 SDK.

I'm not interested in EAX, rather in using these nice optimized reverbs for musical purposes

**Eugene Gavrilov** · Dec 16, 2004, 11:33 PM

>> which I know has been implemented as a kX console function

there's a different tool that extracts the effects directly from the DSP
[with all DSP register values]
the dump can be then used for 'restoring' the effect into .DA form using DSP dump file and Creative labs .DLL

>> I'm not interested in EAX, rather in using these nice optimized reverbs for musical purposes

practically all reverb authors have the same opinion. that's why there's no eax still

E.

Verbo · May 16, 2005, 12:16 PM

Somebody know, where i can download the Eax4 SDK, but not include the Creative's web-site!?

pzad · May 16, 2005, 03:39 PM

AFAIK you need sign NDA to get EAX3 SDK ok EAX4 SDK. Only way is through creative web-site.

**Eugene Gavrilov** · May 18, 2005, 11:37 AM

the SDK itself doesn't contain enough information in order to re-implement EAX1,2,3,4

Dec 15, 2004, 10:26 AM	#1
JohnMcClane DriverHeaven Lover Join Date: May 2003 Location: Vienna, Austria Posts: 146 Rep Power: 0	EAX (Eugene please read) Like I already mentioned in another thread, I contacted Creative's support forum concerning the EAX data sheets. They told me to get in contact with Creative's Developer Relations USA - well I did that and they replied pretty fast here is what they wrote:

Dec 15, 2004, 10:33 AM	Thread Starter #3
JohnMcClane DriverHeaven Lover Join Date: May 2003 Location: Vienna, Austria Posts: 146 Rep Power: 0	There were two attachements to this mail - you can download them here http://members.inode.at/m.lodin/EAX.H http://members.inode.at/m.lodin/EAX10.ZIP Hope this brings us one step closer to EAX. Last edited by JohnMcClane; Dec 15, 2004 at 11:46 AM.

Dec 15, 2004, 02:09 PM	#4
Samir kX Lover Join Date: Jan 2003 Posts: 520 Rep Power: 0	hej, John, are you regitrated user @ developer.creative.com? EAX3 & EAX4 SDKs might come in handy... I think that Eugene is aware of EAX API'sif i remember right he found no real use out of it... Keep up the good work! __________________ MU3NKA 3A HAPO6!

Dec 15, 2004, 03:36 PM	Thread Starter #5
JohnMcClane DriverHeaven Lover Join Date: May 2003 Location: Vienna, Austria Posts: 146 Rep Power: 0	No, In fact I'm pretty new to kx and digital sound processing. I have however a long-term programming experience and now I'm trying to write a few good plugIns for kx. If you wanna take a look to some other proggs I've written: Alarm: http://members.inode.at/m.lodin/other/Alarm10b.exe it's a fully skinable clock with alarm function. just try it, it's pretty cool HTML³D: http://members.inode.at/m.lodin/other/HTML³D.exe I wrote this HTML Editor in a time when I was the webadmin of a tactical ops clan - It made programming a lot easier for me, but I didn't work on it anymore, since I left the clan imgFX: http://members.inode.at/m.lodin/other/imgfx - 0.7.exe was just experimenting with Images (needs .jpg) - should be some test for an image editor I never wrote Snake.net: http://members.inode.at/m.lodin/other/snake - needs .net!!!!.rar That's a snake game I wrote for WIN2K/XP .net, it has a built in level editor - however I had more fun with programming, than playing it I also made a simple disk hockey game (OpenGL), which I lost due to a disk fragmentation. The last six months I was developing a component package for delphi 7 - you can try it there (might have a few bugs) http://members.inode.at/m.lodin/othe...icControls.pas I stopped it, cause I own now Delphi8.Net and Visual Studio 2003.Net and the package doesn't work there anymore. And well, looks like my new hobbie will become kx PS: Sorry for going sooo OFFTopic Last edited by JohnMcClane; Dec 15, 2004 at 03:43 PM.

Dec 15, 2004, 07:29 PM	#9
JoshuaChang HardwareHeaven Lover Join Date: Mar 2003 Posts: 127 Rep Power: 0	hi Eugene, i think the eax's advantage is the change of env in different game scenes, the implement of the eax in kx could be like this: use the exist reverb engine and write some code to read the eax instruction in game(is it possible???),then change the env sound by switch the different preset in reverb engine, between the switch, just some fade needed that's all, no extra new engine needed __________________ lumetools.blogspot.com

Dec 15, 2004, 10:27 AM	Thread Starter #2
JohnMcClane DriverHeaven Lover Join Date: May 2003 Location: Vienna, Austria Posts: 146 Rep Power: 0	Regarding EAX environment presets data I guess what they need to is to get the EAX SDK so they can get the Preset info. In the EAX SDK, there exist a EAX.H file that contains the Preset data. What publically available... The EAX 2.0 Specifications are available at: http://developer.creative.com/landin...bcat=31&top=71 Attached is EAX10.ZIP , and this contains the EAX.H file with the preset values. attached is the EAX.H file from the EAX1.0 API Looking at EAX20, I see that the defined presets were moved to a .LIB file. and are not shown in the EAX.H, but in EAX 3 and 4, they were moved back. weird EAX 2.0 SDK: The complete EAX 2.0 SDK, including documentation, header files, and example source code. http://developer.creative.com/articl...top=71&aid=138 EAX 2.0 API Guide: Main EAX 2.0 documentation. Includes explanations of EAX terminology, and detailed listing of all EAX 2.0 parameters. http://developer.creative.com/articl...top=71&aid=139 As far as I know, Each company can develop their own EAX, audio mixing and HRTF (Head Related Transfer Function) algorithms. Searching for environmental+audio http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q...dio+algorithms 3D Audio - The Sonic Spot http://www.sonicspot.com/guide/3daudio.html There are a lot of research for HRTF... A quick search... HRTF http://www.google.com/search?q=+head...+function+hrtf 2 Speakers, Head Phone, 4 speakers, 5.1, 6.1, 7.1 ... Each speaker configuration requires different HRTF algorithm's and filters. Regards, Phillip Williams Creative Labs Developer Support DevRelSupport@CreativeLabs.com http://developer.creative.com/ http://opensource.creative.com/ http://preview.creativelabs.com/ -------- Notice -------- The information in this message is confidential and may be legally privileged. It is intended solely for the addressee. Access to this message by anyone else is unauthorized. If you are not the intended recipient, any disclosure, copying or distribution of the message, or any action taken by you in reliance on it, is prohibited and may be unlawful. If you have received this message in error, please delete it and contact the sender immediately. Thank you. Guest User <m.lodin@inode.at> 12/13/04 01:33 PM To: devrelsupport@creativelabs.com cc: Subject: EAX for kX audio driver Message Sent: 12/13/2004 Dear Sirs, I'm a 20 year old student from the technical university of Vienna (Austria), where I'm studying software engineering. A few months ago I came across an alternative audio driver for all soundcards with Emu10k1 and Emu10k2 Chips - kX Audio Driver (www.kxproject.com). I was really impressed, how a driver that is only 5MB at size could be that much better than the original Creative drivers. The project is OpenSource and allowed me to write my own plugIns for it's fully customizable DSP. I was able to achieve ASIO latency down to 2ms and a superior audio quality when listening to music or watching movies. The only thing I was missing was the lack of EAX support in this drivers. The kX project Lead Programmer, Eugene Gavrilov, told me, that he would have worked on EAX support, but Creative did not publish the EAX enviroment presets data & specifications to him. I don't think that there would be any reason for creative to hold back that specs, so is there a chance to get them?

Dec 15, 2004, 05:09 PM	#6
Eugene Gavrilov kX Project Lead Programmer and Coordinator Join Date: Dec 2002 Posts: 3,119 Rep Power: 75	the problem is not with 'presets', actually of course, everyone can get EAX2 SDK (or even sign an NDA and get EAX3/EAX4 SDKs), but you won't get the source code for reverb engine. that is, it is possible to get the 'parameters' used in, say, 'Cavern' preset, but you will need to write a complete reverb engine (with reverb effect) in order to convert them into particular Reverb settings. since the present reverb implementations bundled with kX are not truely EAX-capable, and since I don't have enough time / intention / knowledge to design a brand-new reverb algorithm, the EAX cannot be supported. E.

Dec 15, 2004, 06:04 PM	Thread Starter #7
JohnMcClane DriverHeaven Lover Join Date: May 2003 Location: Vienna, Austria Posts: 146 Rep Power: 0	Sorry, i think I misunderstood that first . Thx for clearing things up.

Dec 15, 2004, 07:22 PM	#8
pzad DriverHeaven Junior Member Join Date: Sep 2004 Posts: 40 Rep Power: 0	For EAX 3, EAX 4, .. you need to sign NDA.

Dec 15, 2004, 11:03 PM	#11
Eugene Gavrilov kX Project Lead Programmer and Coordinator Join Date: Dec 2002 Posts: 3,119 Rep Power: 75	>> do you mean that the dsp implementation is not correct or the actual >> parameters to control the reverb are not known? I mean that 'binary-only' reverbs (CLReverbXXX) cannot be used since we don't know how to change all the parameters, while the newer reverbs, such as ReverbStation, would require translation layer for changing EAX parameters into ReverbStation parameters (and none of the reverb authors has ever tried to write one). >> Would it be illegal to make a dialog with a few controls for these reverbs? if you don't use Creative Labs code for that, then, probably, that should be o.k. btw, have a look at the EAX4 reverb with presets we have a special tool for 'retrieving' DSP effects from the DSP (which works under any driver, CL or kX). it also tries to update the parameters in the .da code. also, our present plug-in architecture assumes the effects are executed in user-level mode, while EAX will need to access them in kernel-level mode. thus, if any such reverb is released, it should be available in source code in order to be ported to kernel-level (for instance, source code for Max's kXU library is not available). if you wish to participate in EAX development, let me know. you will probably need to sign an NDA with Creative Labs in order to access EAX3/4 SDK. E.

Dec 16, 2004, 11:33 PM	#13
Eugene Gavrilov kX Project Lead Programmer and Coordinator Join Date: Dec 2002 Posts: 3,119 Rep Power: 75	>> which I know has been implemented as a kX console function there's a different tool that extracts the effects directly from the DSP [with all DSP register values] the dump can be then used for 'restoring' the effect into .DA form using DSP dump file and Creative labs .DLL >> I'm not interested in EAX, rather in using these nice optimized reverbs for musical purposes practically all reverb authors have the same opinion. that's why there's no eax still E.

May 16, 2005, 12:16 PM	#14
Verbo DriverHeaven Newbie Join Date: May 2005 Posts: 1 Rep Power: 0	Somebody know, where i can download the Eax4 SDK, but not include the Creative's web-site!?

May 16, 2005, 03:39 PM	#15
pzad DriverHeaven Junior Member Join Date: Sep 2004 Posts: 40 Rep Power: 0	AFAIK you need sign NDA to get EAX3 SDK ok EAX4 SDK. Only way is through creative web-site.

May 18, 2005, 11:37 AM	#16
Eugene Gavrilov kX Project Lead Programmer and Coordinator Join Date: Dec 2002 Posts: 3,119 Rep Power: 75	the SDK itself doesn't contain enough information in order to re-implement EAX1,2,3,4