DTS NEO:6 upmixing / Audigy 2

[asscore]

Hi Everyone!

I have an audigy 2 zs soundcard. When I upgraded the card drivers I noticed that it installed a package called DTS Neo:6 according to creative labs....

"DTS Neo:6 injects the power of surround sound into any stereo source material such as MP3 and CDs."

It's doc's (available here in pdf.... http://www.dtsonline.com/media/uploads/pdfs/neo6.pdf )
state that it works somewhat like pro-logic as it works on a channel steering and separation model.

To get to the gist of my question, do any of you know how to enable this feature with the audigy 2 series of cards? This isnt CMSS correct?! I've looked through all of the catagories of tabs in the creative control panel and cant find ANY reference to DTS upmixing.
I would like to find a way to use this DTS neo:6 and integrate it into a 5.1 upmixing method.

any ideas would be much appreciated!

[ursamtl]

I think you can find some technical info on Neo6 on the www.dtsonline.com web site. Let us know if you come up with anything and I'd be happy to add it to the guide list.

[Soulhunter]

You can activate it under "C:\Programs\Creative\DTSNeo6 Settings\Neo6.exe" !!!

But afaik it works only with the Creative MediaSource Player... ;)


Bye

[asscore]

Well I have figured it out somewhat.

In the folder C:\Program Files\Creative\DTSNeo6 Settings

there is an app called Neo6.exe

when you double-click it it opens up an options dialog
click enable dts Neo:6 this will automatically disable CMSS.

then you have 2 options- Music mode or Cinema Mode
Music Mode keeps the original stereo image intact on the front speakers, and creates rear and center channel images.

Theater Mode features more agressive channel separation logic, and does not perfectly preserve the original stereo image on the front speakers. This mode tries to separate voices and place them into the center channel. It does a pretty good job! While they dont recommend this mode for music I think it sounds good.... this is probably very dependant on what type of music you are upmixing.
I tested with the beatles "while my guitar"... the original recording places all of the vocals on the right channel, and instrumentation between both channels, making for a good test of center voice placement. Normally crating an upmix from this type of mastering situation would create an overly strong vocal image coming from the right surround speaker.... making the track sound imbalanced. Neo 6 did a good job of placing the vocals in the center, altho there was some vocals bleeding into the other channels. All and all I would say neo 6 sounds just as good or better than PL2.

So as an upmixing method, open creative mediasource player (neo 6 only works via this program) and set your record to "what U hear" filetype to Multichannel WAV. Restart the app and these record settings will take effect (dont ask me why you have to restart it) load the playlist that you want to convert into the player. Hit CTRL+R to start recording and then hit the Play button. You will have to wait for it to play in realtime speed. When it is finished hit CTRL+R again to stop recording. By default it puts the recorded files in my music/my recordings/filename.wav
open with your favorite sound editing app (I'm partial to audition) and cut up your tracks from this one big multichannel wav. from within audition you can use the multichannel mixer (CTRL+E) to export as 6 individual wav's, if you are going to use surcode to make them DTS. Or you can use besweet or whatever other app you prefer. You can also leave the files interleavened if you are taking them into Softencode.
thats about it.....
any comments or additional suggestions?

[daphy]

Hi asscore,

this sounds interesting. Are there any USB2 based solutions around which can be recommended.
(Maybe I have to update my equipment from 2.0 to audigy 2 zs :rolleyes: first I have to ask my wife ;) )

One question:
your multichannel WAV, what mapping is inside. L,R,C,LFE,SL,SR? I think it´s a important question when using softencode :o

[asscore]

Wav channel order from mediasource is:

1 FL
2 FR
3 C
4 LFE
5 LS
6 RS

This is the standard channel order used by most apps these days I believe. This is also Auditions default channel order.

Are there any USB2 based solutions around which can be recommended.
you can check out the DDTS-100
http://www.nordichardware.com/reviews/Multimedia/2004/DDTS100/index.php?ez=2&PHPSESSID=3dd5fe87eefb5d512f27d7cf919332bc
I dont know if this is right for you , but it is an external Neo:6 encoder.... You have to have some kind of internal soundcard for it to work tho I believe. Or get the 2 zs... I love mine! Once you can preview your mixes in 5.1 channels you'll never want to go back to sound editing in stereo!

[DSP8000]

You can't open the multichannel wav file in BeSweet!
It is 6ch 96kHz wav.
If you have Nuendo, there is no need for finding the correct channel mapping as Nuendo will do the job for you.
So from Nuendo export as 6 separate wave files or if you have Nuendo Surround Edition with Dolby, DTS encoder just open the multichannel wav that Creative Media Player created and encode as DD or DTS.

I also like the output from DTS Neo6.
Maybe DSP Guru can do something with BeSweet about this.

DSP8000

[asscore]

sorry about the besweet problem, I dont really use it myself, and do all of my normalizing and other filtering tasks right in audition or nuendo. I just assumed that besweet would be able to open it. I know you guys are fond of that app.

If you REALLY wanted to use besweet (if you like it's normalization) just take the wav into ur favorite editing app and resample the file in @44.1khz. then besweet should be able to open it.

[asscore]

also if anyone is interested in hosting something for me, I've made a
demonstration cd with a 5minute clip from a non-copyrighted piece of music (free to trade)- Beethoven-Piano Concerto #3.
in the following formats:
1. Original 44.1khz WAV
2. 5.1 Channel Dolby Digital 44.1khz 448kbps (AMBISONIC)
3. 5.1 Channel Dolby Digital 44.1khz 448kbps (PRO-LOGIC II Music)
4. 5.1 Channel Dolby Digital 44.1khz 448kbps (DTS NEO:6)
5. 5.1 Channel DTS 44.1khz 1.234MB/s (AMBISONIC)
6. 5.1 Channel DTS 44.1khz 1.234MB/s (PRO-LOGIC II Music)
7. 5.1 Channel DTS 44.1khz 1.234MB/s (DTS NEO:6)
8. 5 Channel Dolby Digital (no LFE) 44.1khz 448kbps (DTS NEO:6)
9. 5 Channel DTS (no LFE) 44.1khz 1.234MB/s (DTS NEO:6)

rar'd up it is about 400MB

[Sycho]

that would be interesting what encoders did you use?

[daphy]

rar'd up it is about 400MB

this package is tooo big for me, sorry.

Can you shorten your samples - let´s say about 1 min playing time I could find a solution...

[asscore]

that would be interesting what encoders did you use?
Ambisonic - The bidule based method outlined by EOH... slightly altered.
Prologic 2 - Minnetonka's PL2 Encoder
DTS NEO:6 - Soundcard stream capture.


this package is tooo big for me, sorry.

Can you shorten your samples - let´s say about 1 min playing time I could find a solution...

I'll re-make this in shorter clip segments. 10 minutes of music that is compressable should be less than 100MB. Hostings a bitch, huh! I'm thinking about buying some hosting just so I can serv up files to people when I want to! (and have my own upmixing forum where we could trade files around pretty freely)

If any of you have any recommendations for good hosting, let me know.
I'm looking for something like 100GB transfer month, good downspeed (at least 300KB, and should be on an un-congested pipe with low latency to the midwestern USA . If you know someone who can do this for $35-$50/month that would be great. I dont realy care whether it's linux or windows. I'm more familiar with windows servers, but I do know enuf linux to run an scp/ftp server and some php forums.

[Sycho]

make a bittorent of the files leave PM only a few people, including me and have it up over a day or two.

[daphy]

there are a set of real good drivers around for Audigy1-4

http://www.driverheaven.net/showpost.php?p=618748&postcount=101

give them a try! :cool: