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stampee

5.1 surround sound not working

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Hi Awl: I have 5.1 surround working in other games. I try it in FSX and I hear only stereo sound.

I went into the FSX sound settings and selected default driver and speaker setting( which I use) to no avail.

I also have selected 5.1 and 7.1 sound in the windows drivers and in the realtek HDaudio manager,all to no avail. I turned on speaker fill as well without success.

 

 I am connecting my onboard audio to my pioneer receiver using the analog output ports on the main board. (asus m5a88-v)

 I also have tried optical link but could not get any surround sound, only 2.0 stereo output in all games. I would prefer optical, but from what I am reading this is buggy on win7 64 bit, so I gave up on optical for now.

 In fsx when sitting in an aircraft if I rotate my view to right or rear shouldnt I hear sounds come from the side/rear speakers? I also went to external spot view, rotated around and hear nothing but standard stereo sound.

I tried the MAUL which I normally fly, and also the cessna 172 and another plane I forget which.

From what I have been reading, it is possible that some plane's do not have surround capability.

Can somebody please tell me a plane they know they get surround sound in?

Also is surround sound implemented for the player when they rotate their view inside the cockpit? or am I only supposed to hear external sounds.

 

Any other setup advice would be appreciated.

 

-Stampee

 

 

 

 

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FSX is not a 5.1 or 7.1 surround sound program. There are programs that might say they give FSX surround sound but in reality, they do not. You just have the sliders in your FSX and you can turn engine sounds up louder or softer and change the environment inside the cockpit a little. I have noticed that varying sounds as I move my cursor around in the VC but that is not surround sound.

Best regards,


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Jim:Thank you, however I cannot understand this. I have read hundreds of posts now about people saying they have surround sound in FSX. I have been researching this quite awhile now.

-Stampee

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Mine works as well but a tip from the A2A forum recommended setting the channels to 8 channel in your sound setup program. Once i did that it worked as it should. Nice to have ATC comming thru my center speaker to make it easier to hear.


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Mine works as well but a tip from the A2A forum recommended setting the channels to 8 channel in your sound setup program. Once i did that it worked as it should. Nice to have ATC comming thru my center speaker to make it easier to hear.

Can you post a link to that forum topic?

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Merry Christmas!

 

I have a 5.1 surround setup that works fine when used for music, videos, or in the Creative diagnostic UI. The only problem is that I cannot get it to work in FSX. The center channel doesn't work.

 

I've looked at the sound settings and I don't see anything to tweak. I've searched the forums and not found anything. Is there a secret fsx.cfg tweak that I need to enable for 5.1 sound?

 

What am I missing here?

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I have surround sound using all the default planes and many add-on planes.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Flight_Simulator_X

 

New Features, bullet #9.

 

OK Jim, how? I only seem to get stereo.

 

My PC is linked to my home cinema receiver via a TOSLINK from my on-board RealTek audio.

In Win7 control panel I select RealTek digital output which supports DTS Audio and Dolby Digital and if I test those I get the sound going round my 5 speakers. If I click on the advanced tab in the Realtek properties the only sample rates and bit depth listed are all 2 channel which suggests stereo only.

 

Helpful advice appreciated.

 

Dave

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Could be a lot of reasons.

 

1. Are you going from a sound card to a stereo receiver then to your speakers or sound card direct to 5.1 speakers?

2.  What equipment is it your using exactly.

 

Might get more help in the hardware forum?

 

On my Soundblaster X-FI I have the three line outs (Speaker outs) Y'd off to RCA Cables and plugged into my JVC stereo Receiver inputs then out to my speakers it works fine. On the Creative card  I have one trick is to look for a setting in the "Creative Console App" that is called "enable base re-direction" this needs to be checked in order for your Sub to work. Since the Sub and the Center channel share the same output it might be worth investigating since it's simple to accidentally reverse a Y connector.

 

There is nothing in the fsx .cfg file to tweak.

 

Lastly don't set your expectations too high even with 5.1 sound FSX isn't going to blow you away with its sonic capability.  In fact in all honesty a good set of 2.1 speakers paired with a tactile transducer and a usb headset for ATC will sound/feel better than most 5.1 systems. Of course anything sound related is subjective to the user so YMMV.


RE Thomason Jr.

 

 

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FSX doesn't support native 5.1

 

You should've able to get stereo though and have some sound come through the rear speakers.


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When I first built my new rig I was having some issues to get it to work properly as well. I found this thread over on the A2A forum where a fellow explained the steps. http://a2asimulations.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=55&t=19673&start=0

 

It ended up in my case that I wasn't selecting enough "channels" in my Xonar control panel. I thought since I had 5 speakers I was supposed to select 5 channel output. After reading the post above and changing my output to 8 channels, it then started working properly. Now I hear ATC through the center speaker and all the other sounds coming through the correct speakers.

 

 

 

 


FSX doesn't support native 5.1

 

Perhaps its wrong since its Wikipedia and anyone can edit it, but it states that 5.1 is supported. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Flight_Simulator_X

 

It seems to be working on my rig after setting it up correctly, so I am guessing its supported since I hear different sounds coming out of each speaker and not the same sound in each one.


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I'm pretty sure it's not natively 5.1 though (five separate channels plus sub).  You'll get sounds through your rear speakers.... but if you're sure you're not hearing just a double of the sounds from the front (but less volume) that's awesome!  I've never been able to get it working.


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1. Are you going from a sound card to a stereo receiver then to your speakers or sound card direct to 5.1 speakers?

2.What equipment is it your using exactly.

 

SoundBlaster X-Fi Xtreme Gamer to a Logitech X-530 70 Watts 5.1 Speaker system connected directly to the SB card. No receivers or other AV equipment involved. The key thing to keep in mind, as stated, is that the 5.1 sound works perfectly outside of FSX. I can play music or movies or use other games on the system and I get 5.1 sound.

 

FSX worked for a while with a center channel and just stopped working without any explanation.

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Ok well that is a bit odd here maybe a few troubleshooting ideas may help and by no means am I trying to insult your intelligence.

 

1.  You said you had it working before and now it's not but plays 5.1 in other applications, that might lead me to double check your playback devices in the settings section of FSX and make sure both the sounds drop down value as well as the Voice drop down value are set to "Default Primary Device" or "Speakers Creative X-FI" .

 

2. I'd probably double check my speaker configs both in windows and from within your Creative App and be certain "Tone is played through all five speakers" Which shouldn't be the problem because you said they are working with other apps.

 

Did you do a recent driver change or update? Direct X? Recent add on conflict maybe?

 

The whole, "It was working before but now it's not is perplexing?"

 

Edit: Another thing you might want to try is tune an attis station on your com freq when powered up and see if it plays through your center speaker with some aircraft I don't pick up much sound through the rear or center speakers. A last ditch test is to enable "user interface music" (FSX music) which should be heard through all your speakers but one of the first check boxes I un-select after a install/ re-install. If the music plays in all channels it's probably just the aircraft your using use the "S" key to cycle your view around and see if you pick up sounds in the various channels. Example: (On my system) The Default B737 plays through all channels except the rear surrounds when in the VC. Selecting the "S" key to cycle to an external view and panning brings the rear channels to life.


RE Thomason Jr.

 

 

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Dave

 

Are you selecting the RealTec digital output in FSX on the Sound screen?

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