Eugene Gavrilov

hi there

it's been some time since my last post at the forum.
due to serious time restrictions I cannot currently dedicate a lot of time to kX and/or the forum. I hope you understand this.

I still hope to release 3538 final soon.
for those curious in 'work in progress':

- I seem to have added support for a4 / audigy2 value [needs testing]
- sb22x issue requires more input. there will be an intermediate development release to finalize the required 'hacks' for this series of cards
- there was some work done on re-writing soundfont subsystem in order to support >32Mb samples, but this work is currently frozen (as well as any SF2.1-related development)
- asio 24/96 will probably be available in 'playback only' mode in 3538
- I'm still considering releasing certain parts of the driver as opensource, but this will definitely involve major change in project management. at the moment I cannot be 100% sure this model will work for kX due to the following:

* compared to Linux, there's no standard build environment
* driver is quite complex
* there are no people capable of checking and integrating proposed code changes
* full source code cannot be released due to NDAs
* parts of the driver released as opensource will require a lot of work to separate them completely from binary-only parts

some more ideas:
* there has been no attempts to support audigy2 zs notebook so far
* the same for E-DSP (new E-mu boards)
* there's no EAX support planned without people willing to implement it
* our online preset exchange system (to be introduced soon) is on the way, but this development takes some time, too

in 3538 I introduced some developer-related changes in order to simplify third-party development for kX, but haven't received any positive/negative feedback, that's why I cannot estimate any future changes in the kX SDK, although I keep some ideas in mind (towards further separation of theoretically opensource and closed-source components).

I will not mention here any release dates, but I guess there will be 1-2 more 'internal' releases soon before 3538 'final' is finally out. Sorry, guys, if this posting appears to you not as exciting and promising as you would hope it to be. but that's the truth

I'm very glad you keep visiting this forum and supporting each other. Please keep up the good work!

Also, I strongly encourage you to avoid sending me any Private Messages, especially with support questions.

Since I do not visit the forum regularly, I might miss some of the important reports / bugs / ideas / offers, so, if you really think it's important, feel free to drop me an e-mail. Any support-related questions ('How do I configure kX with Cubase' or 'When 3538 is out?' or 'Will there be EAX support?' will be ignored).

Thanks! And hope to post a new thread '3538 is finally out' soon!

All my best wishes to the kX Community,
E.
// Eugene //

Eugene Gavrilov

and, by the way, to whom it may concern
---
all people who have contributed to our driver with any source code (effects etc...)
if you have any updated versions of your code, feel free to send it to me by e-mail in order to beta-test it

E.

thomasabarnes

Thanks for the information.

__________________

May a song always touch you in a positive way.
SONAR X1D Expanded, Windows 7 Pro 64Bit, MOTU UltraLite MK3, 150 GB HDD, 250 GB HDD, 1 TB x2 HDD 7200 rpm

My Music Production: Top 40, Contemporary Christian, Pop/Rock, Decent Rap, Inspirationals, and Children Songs

ursamtl

Thanks for taking the time to let us know where things stand. This certainly sounds more encouraging than your last post.

yassinex

Thanks Eugene for your honesty.
Good luck for the futur, for your life, your pprojects.

Now I know what to decide, I'll start working on my music as soon as I get a new card (actually we can find some M'audio firewire audio cards 24/96 cards as the price of SBA2 platinum).

I'll keep my SBA card for nostalgy

Thanks for these years of hard work, you helped me a lot !

See ya

Yassine

Russ

Thanks for the updated info.

Rogacz

Thanks for info.

How about making a sticked and closed thread in which Eugene could write status information twice a month or so?

GJ on kX Eugene!

__________________

Vradash

Nicenicenice,but what do you mean with: "no EAX support planned without people willing to implement it"? Do you mean,the Kx Team has no experience with EAX or if you think that if the people do not say that they need it you also do not implement it? (Uhh...bad english?)

__________________
| ASUS P68Z68-V | Intel i5-2500K + Scythe Ninja 3| 2x 4GB Corsair XMS3 DDR3-1333 | GF 570 HD 2560MB | Asus Xonar Xense / Sound Blaster Recon3D Fatal1ty | WD Caviar Green 2TB; Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB | BD: Sony Optiarc BD-5300S + LG BH10LS30 |

Rogacz

As far as I know kX development team (Eugene? :-)) can't get full EAX source code or/and permission for implementing it.

Anyway, it's not priority, because kX is designed mainly for musicans.

__________________

ursamtl

Has anyone considered what EAX might do for mixing 5.1 music?

dj_stick

not much at all

EAX has nothing to do with 5.1 sound, apart that it can be upmixed to 5.1
afaik the EAX engine is stereo in…

__________________

ursamtl

Yes, but as I understand it, EAX offers some very realistic 3D sound positioning and spatial simulation.

Samir

No, EAX is enviroment effects / spatial simulation ony! 3D sound positioning is done in DirectSound3D... Ignore these Creative candy-words about EAX, it's all evil marketing...

__________________
MU3NKA 3A HAPO6!

ursamtl

Ok so "enviroment effects / spatial simulation" can sound great through a 5.1 system. Don't get me wrong, I'm not asking for EAX support in kx. I just don't think it should be written off as for gamers only and not useful for musicians. IMHO, expanding beyond 2-channel stereo is one of the most significant developments for musicians since the invention of stereo.

Mithias

Isnt't there an option in one ot the many option boxes to filter the EAX requests anyway?

Mithias,

dj_stick

the filter eax requests option is for games which won't work in 5.1 without EAX enabled

__________________

Tiger M

I don't see any use of 5.1 for musicians (quadrophonic sound exists from the late 60s).

As for EAX, it is basically an interface between games and a hardware reverb (afaik). You have the EAX3 and 4 reverbs in kX - 'add effect' -> 'LiveWare'

__________________
Miss you, Steve...

ursamtl

Then why are so many people buying all those 5.1 DVD-Audio releases?

rushko

not related with the EAX, u have 5.1 mix support in all major sequencers and other music production software.

__________________

adi111p

EAX is of no use for audio positioning in games, but A3D is, and as far as I know the technology was bought by Creative from Aureal when they bankrupt them, so I came up with an idea, and this can only be tried by Eugene

If Creative is willing to give Eugene full specs of EAX I wonder if they are willing to give him the full specs on A3D (let's say for an implementation support of original A3D positioning in KX driver, I mean the original Aureal A3D wavetracing, and not A2D conversion of A3D into DirectSound 3D requests.

If Creative is willing to release A3D specs to Eugene (which I doubt but a try doesn't hurt anyone) I am willing to help developping A3D support in kx driver

Game3DFreak

What for? It's not being used nor developed anymore. Creative bought it and let it die.

ursamtl

But no multichannel reverb unless one pays big bucks for one of the commercial plugins.

Rogacz

Just look at Source engine. There is no EAX, and effects are simply great.

__________________

adi111p

I know that Source sound engine sounds great and doesn't use EAX, but what in the world A3Dapi.dll is doing in HL2? Has anyone any idea?

Game3DFreak: "What for? It's not being used nor developed anymore. Creative bought it and let it die."

Well, buy an Aureal2 soundcard and play CounterStrike and you'll see the difference. I asked that because A3D is the only wavetracing engine I know, and if it was developped for Nasa i'm sure it was for a reason, and now all that work died, so I wondered even if Creative has it, if it is willing to provide it for someone to develop it further (for Creative of course, and for free).

Rogacz

Hm wavetracing engine... and the DSP takes all calculations or is it left for the CPU?

__________________

adi111p

Aureal soundcards had done it all in the DSP, but I don't know how Creative had implemented it in their driver (A3D1.0).

Rogacz

I never heard it in games.

__________________

igor_levicki

EAX is intended for games and not for music.

While games and movies may sound good in 5.1, music still sounds best in stereo simply because we have only two ears.

EAX reverb is good when compared to many other reverb engines but it is rather poor and harsh compared to PristineSpace for example.

EAX 2 is not interesting at all because most games sound the same or better without it. For EAX 3 and 4 surely some license must be paid and I don't believe Eugene can afford it.

__________________
Regards,
Igor Levicki
--
Creative Audigy 2 ZS Retail (SB0350) kX 3538h

ursamtl

Sorry but I completely disagree. Music sounds far better in 5.1. Having instruments sound three-dimensional and having the sense of being in a space where the performance is occurring takes the listening experiences light years beyond what stereo could possibly do. The difference is at least as dramatic as that between stereo and mono.

dj_stick

music only sounds good in 5.1 if it was recorded that way

upmixed music is nothing

__________________