Even though I've had MSFS2024 since release, I'm all of a sudden a bit confused about the sound settings.

I use either headphones (which works fine), or my surround sound system which is connected to the PC with a HDMI cable:

In the sim sound settings, there are several options:

It sort of makes sense to use surround (since I'm using Dolby Atmos) - but in that case the sim volume is very low (compared to other audio sources e.g. spotify or youtube). 

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to set things up properly?

Edited December 19, 20241 yr by Cpt_Piett

Are you able to beef up the slider in Windows/Sound Mixer for MSFS when running?

10 minutes ago, Cpt_Piett said:

makes sense to use surround

I know my audio but there's a lot of variables here. True surround will use a center speaker and a sub as well as rears. How are you listening? Thru a TV? Do you have a sound bar or just stereo or maybe 3d headphones? I would suspect if stereo the decoder might be sending discreet audio to an output that you don't physically have? 

 

42 minutes ago, Adamski_NZ said:

Are you able to beef up the slider in Windows/Sound Mixer for MSFS when running?

I've got the slider to max in both MSFS and Win11 volume mixer. 

37 minutes ago, sloppysmusic said:

I know my audio but there's a lot of variables here. True surround will use a center speaker and a sub as well as rears. How are you listening? Thru a TV? Do you have a sound bar or just stereo or maybe 3d headphones? I would suspect if stereo the decoder might be sending discreet audio to an output that you don't physically have? 

HDMI to a BluSound PowerNode 2i (Dali subwoofer and speakers + BluSound wireless surround speakers) => TV. No center speaker (not compatible with the PowerNode). 

Edited December 19, 20241 yr by Cpt_Piett

I think it might be working now. Don't know what the issue was... I've set the sim to "surround" and I've got sound from all the speakers (including the wireless surround speakers). The volume level seems reasonable (compared to other sources). 

Not sure why MSFS2024 has 5 entries in volume mixer - but let's not worry about that right now 😅🤷‍♂️

Just need to find the crossover frequency for the sub now. I'll just leave it at 40Hz for now and tune it further after listening for a while. Not an audio expert!

Edited December 19, 20241 yr by Cpt_Piett

13 minutes ago, Cpt_Piett said:

I think it might be working now. Don't know what the issue was... I've set the sim to "surround" and I've got sound from all the speakers (including the wireless surround speakers). The volume level seems reasonable (compared to other sources). 

At one stage, my sound kept intermittently cutting out altogether - goodness knows why. I ended up going round in circles, reinstalling drivers, messing with basic Windows settings, then checking in MSFS. Nothing appeared to work.

System sounds would work, videos/audio files played fine ... but as soon as I fired up MSFS, it messed up the sound across the whole PC. Never had this problem in 2020.

Then ... just as mysteriously ... it all came right again. I'm suspecting one or other of my addons might have been causing a (fast) memory leak ... but I've been running with the barest minimum - gradually porting my 2020 ones one by one.

6 hours ago, Cpt_Piett said:

I'll just leave it at 40Hz for now

Good to hear you got it fixed. Your sub manual should tell you best crossover freq. Should be precise as they know what the freq range of their product is! 

Just an update to this thread:

I'm usually using my headphones without any issues. But today I used my hifi system (details above). With the audio settings set to "surround", I got frequent "crackles" and sound dropouts. It's been fine after I changed to "TV". 

Unrelated note Mr. Piett, try looking into EarTrumpet. Much better sound mixer for Windows. 

13 minutes ago, Sethos said:

Unrelated note Mr. Piett, try looking into EarTrumpet. Much better sound mixer for Windows. 

Ok, so according to wikipedia: 

"An ear trumpet is a tubular or funnel-shaped device which collects sound waves and leads them into the ear. They are used as hearing aids, resulting in a strengthening of the sound energy impact to the eardrum...."

Ah ok, you're talking about the EarTrumpet app. Got it. Just installed it and it's a nice improvement to the Win11 volume mixer. Thanks for the suggestion!

...

Upon further testing of audio in MSFS2024, there seems to be a strong correlation between audio anomalies and spikes on the frame time graph. I can't remember if it was this pronounced in MSFS2020. Also, I think it's less pronounced using headphones in 2024. Strange. 

Edited December 27, 20241 yr by Cpt_Piett