Sony VR Headset/Project Morpheus/PlayStation VR

[Shifty Geezer]

The "3D Audio" isn't in the headphones or their dongle. You can connect the dongle to a PC, Mac or even Android and it's just a pretty plain USB stereo device.

If PS4 supports surround-to-stereo mixing in hardware, isn't 7.1 available on every set of headphones? If the 7.1 Headphones don't have any mixing hardware, how come they work with PS3? Seems pretty certain that the headphone solution has audio mixing hardware capable of taking a surround sound audio source and mixing it to binaural. Again, if this feature was in Sony's console, it could be supported for all headphones.

Because no one cares about audio, at the moment.

Gamers do. If COD or whatever had amazing, unbelievable audio immersion driven by the console, why isn't anyone talking about it? Why didn't Sony mention the existence of this capability in their dev docs? Why is the audio hardware simply described as audio decoding and mixing in VGLeaks? Why talk about two display planes but not the latest, greatest AMD audio tech?

Most importantly for this discusison, your assertion that PS4 includes HRTF mixing hardware is not validated. It's a belief you hold. The validty should be discussed (and has been!) in that other thread, the Audio Solutions thread. For the purposes of this discussion, we don't know for certain if PS4 requires audio mixing hardware in the breakout box or not, and that'll remain an unknown until we get some completely solid info on the audio hardware in PS4 (at least for those who think the VGLeaks details left out special secret audio processing power and Sony decided not to talk about it and Sony aren't really using it yet because they're waiting for PSVVR and then they'll enable the special hidden audio processor to provide 7.1 processing in PSVR's headset )

 

[Davros]

Excuse me?

Thats not binaural, the clue is

all that is needed to enjoy the true 3D audio experience is a stereo output using any pair of headphones or speakers

binaural is a headphone only tech because you need zero crosstalk for it to work.
its probably wavetracing

 

[manux]

Isn't binaural more of a recording technique for headphones that records exactly what one would hear. Works great for movies, music, porn when listened via headphones.

Games would require something different as game would need to produce the sound that would be the source for binaural recording.

For example imagine a soundsource and then it get's obstructed. Game engine would need to calculate how the sound changes. On the other hand binaural recording would just record what the person hears.

3d audio in vr games would be rather important and not so trivial to get right(i.e. presence, your brain says sounds are exactly right)

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Binaural is being used here just to refer to a 3D spatial audio solution that works with headphones. Whether that's generated by recording with a virtual head or in-ear microphones, or created via computer, makes no odds.

 

[manux]

Binaural is being used here just to refer to a 3D spatial audio solution that works with headphones. Whether that's generated by recording with a virtual head or in-ear microphones, or created via computer, makes no odds.

How the binaural sound is created matters. One would need to have some form of environment approximation and locations of sound sources, location of listener, head position etc. before even beginning to put the sound together. If the external box or even headphones are doing this it would require much more computation and information than just mixing samples together and running them through "algorithm". There would need to be some sort of approximation of gameworld inside that box to take care of obstruction, echoes etc. At least if you want things to invoke presence where your brain believes the sound is right.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Erm, yes. Binaural simply means stereo. People working with audio have associated the term binaural with using head-related-transfer-functions (or brain-related) to reduce surround sound into stereo.

 

[hughJ]

How the binaural sound is created matters.

The binaural/HRTF aspect of it is just a directional cue though, not positional or environmental. The PSVR box could receive a multi-channel signal that's already had the environment and spatial cues (including height) processed on the PS4, mixed to 7.1 (or whatever the PS4 supports for traditional speakers) and then from that mix you could do a transform (to match the head orientation) and then apply whatever combination of low-pass filters to produce the HRTF-like sound. There's really no silver bullet fix to spatialized audio because having it sound 'right' (even in theory) requires not only knowing the shape of your particular head, but all the geometry and material of the environment, and an obscene amount of horsepower. All that matters at this point is whether these VR platforms are at least offering something better than raw stereo output for headphones, which they will. Oculus's audio solution is nothing earth shattering either for the same reasons.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

There's really no silver bullet fix to spatialized audio because having it sound 'right' (even in theory) requires not only knowing the shape of your particular head, but all the geometry and material of the environment, and an obscene amount of horsepower.

You'll need an obscene amount of horsepower if you actually do try to simulate a head (general) + inner ear + outer ear using e.g. a finite elements software like ABAQUS. But that would probably be the least effective implementation, since you would also need several CT scans for each person doing the calibration. You'd need not only an obscene amount of horsepower but also an obscene amount of time and money.

You could create personal HRTFs using in-ear microfones during a single calibration session and then just use those functions as real-time filters for 3D spatial sound.
I did just that some 10 years ago using a football filled with foam, I used neural networks and the calibration didn't take that long (though I did only for a 2D horizontal plane, not 3D). The results were pretty good with a 7º maximum error.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

BTW, here's Raja Koduri on PSVR:

What they’ve been able to achieve on consoles in the current generation, versus the current high-end PC — the current high-end PC specs are at least four to eight times faster than current consoles. The Fury X is an eight teraflop machine. The PS4 is a two teraflop machine. It’s four times more compute in that single Fury. You can build a dual Fury PC. But PC doesn’t give you that much better an experience with cutting edge content, because they can extract more performance from a console. They’re also investing a lot of IP into that architecture. They’re doing some really clever things that are not possible on the PC yet.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

The Fury X is an eight teraflop machine. The PS4 is a two teraflop machine. It’s four times more compute in that single Fury. You can build a dual Fury PC. But PC doesn’t give you that much better an experience with cutting edge content,

That's because cutting edge content isn't targeting a dual Fury PC as the market would be miniscule. Developers still have to target a reasonable base spec to have any chance at an audience, so the 'cutting edge' of what's being made is going to be way less than the cutting edge of what's possible. But at least it shows PSVR isn't likely to be a massively inferior experience, just as PS4 isn't massively inferior to PC for the same reasons. PC == same fundamental experience just with the quality dialled up.

 

[orangpelupa]

Yeah, sure developers have to cut back some stuff for psvr. But the main meat itself should be good enough.

London heist showed this with its nice detailed close objects and horrible environment. Summer lesson with the indoor VS outdoor graphical quality difference also interesting to see the sacrifices need to be done to balance things up while still keeping the same overall quality.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

I wonder what things is he talking about that are "not possible in the PC yet".
Once you set in a minimum spec of a R9 290 and a GTX 970, what is it that the PS4 can do but the PC can't, with a similar breakout box?
Is it purely IP related or is there some other tech involved?

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I presume he means software solutions, maybe HSA based (??).

 

[MrFox]

Ah ha! I was wrong. It was clearly stated in a recent interview.

http://www.gameinformer.com/b/featu...ei-yoshida-richard-marks-virtual-reality.aspx

SY: As a company, we’re working on the price-point and what’s in the box and the launch lineup and, of course, launch day, and we have yet to be ready to announce them. We are still saying the first half of 2016 and the price of PS VR might be similar to the cost of a new console, so that’s as much as we are saying as of today.Device:

 

[Globalisateur]

similar to the price of a new console

Like a Wii or a Neo Geo?

 

[Deleted member 13524]

It's now very unlikely that it'll be more than the PS4's launch price, which was $400.

 

[goonergaz]

It's now very unlikely that it'll be more than the PS4's launch price, which was $400.

based on?

 

[Deleted member 13524]

based on?

Shuhei Yoshida's statements about the price.

 

[goonergaz]

Shuhei Yoshida's statements about the price.

From the above link? That's a big assumption or am I reading it wrong!?

 

[chris1515]

I presume he means software solutions, maybe HSA based (??).

Read again sebbbi SIGGRAPH presentation on one slide he said everything not currently possible on PC with DX12 like ordered atomics used in Dreams for exemple...