News:  July 24-30, 2000

Sunday, July 30, 2000

Icewind Dale Patch - Mark @ 21:44 EST

Interplay has released a version 1.06 patch for the DS3D with EAX supporting Ice Wind Dale. You can grab the 3.3 MB file from 3Dfiles.

MidiLand and 3DsoundSurge Contest Winners Announced! - Mark @ 11:25 EST

A reminder that MidiLand has announced the winners of the contest that they sponsored here at 3DsoundSurge over the past few weeks. We would like to thank all of you who took the time to share your dream multimedia system impressions with MidiLand. They note that all the responses have been forwarded to their Research and Development team. Some of you may soon be seeing your "dream system" on the market under the MidiLand name! Now on to the winners! You can check the results at our Winners Page. If you have not heard from MidiLand already be sure to contact them right away to claim your prize. Details are on the winners page where you can also find a link to MidiLand's news page for additional MidiLand contests.

Creative Labs Encore 6x Review - Mark @ 11:17 EST

Techphiles has posted a review of Creative's Encore 6X DVD kit. For a second opinion on the kit with more detail you can also check out our review of the same kit. Look for our review of the 8X kit in August.
News Source: AGNHardware

Wanted: Inexpensive Headphones? - Mark @ 10:49 EST

If you are on the market you might want to check out this post in our forum either to get or give some tips - remember no registration is needed to post in our forum!

AirXoniX 3D Sound - Mark @ 10:44 EST

I just heard from Vladimir Savin of AxySoft about the 3D sound in the 1.8 MB AirXoniX Demo and he indicated that the game uses their own sound engine and the 3D audio is not using A3D or DS3D so it's only for two speakers. He noted that it's rather simple, but for a game such as AirXoniX its good enough. He also noted that they are looking to improve overall sound quality in the game. For more details check out their site linked above.

Portable USB MP3 Player Roundup - Mark @ 09:13 EST

Neoseeker has posted a Portable USB MP3 Player Roundup. They look at the benefit of the USB interface in general for file transfer and have info on what to look for in a player. The then look at four second generation players that all sport a USB interface. Specifically they look at the Yuan MP-300 Player, the Sensory Science RAVE MP 2200, the Diamond Rio 500 and the Creative Nomad II. All in all a nice article that's well worth checking out if you are in the market for a portable MP3 player.
News Source: Anandtech

Vortex Tuner v0.3 released - Mark @ 08:50 EST

According to a post in our forum by the programs author (Pavel Voronov) version 0.3 of the Vortex Tuner has been released. The Vortex Tuner is a configuration utility for people using Vortex 2 cards with the 2048 drivers. Pavel offered the following info on the new version:

-Added Xtalk cancellation and routing controls
- Added registry applying controls
- Added EAX 2 files and install button
- Changed interface, added values indicators
- No dll files needed to work now
- Some documentation about options

Saturday, July 29, 2000

Demo Reports: Catechumen and AirXoniX - Mark @ 22:10 EST

I installed both of the above noted demos today. Catechumen does not have advertised 3D sound support and based on my tests today that's because it does not have 3D sound support, but its the type of game that would benefit from it...AirXoniX on the other hand is advertised to have 3D sound support but using a SB Live and Aureal SQ2500, I don't detect any and its not the kind of game that would benefit from 3D sound as all the action on the game board is right in front of you, at least on the 4 levels I have tried. The latter is only a 1.8 MB download so very painless to give it a try for yourself. I am checking with designer/publish (Axysoft) to find out what's up with the advertised 3D sound support in AirXoniX.

Voice Communication in TF2 - What does it mean? - Mark @ 16:45 EST

TF2Source has posted an interesting article that speculates on how built in Voice Communication (which is supposed to be in TF2) will affect gameplay and the overall way we think and view the people we play against/with. Here's a taste:

We know virtually nothing about those who share our same hobby. But, we will. With the advent of TF2 just around the corner, and the news that voice-communication will be here sooner than we thought in the next TFC patch, we are about to meet our opponents. It could be a very startling experience for a lot of us as those 'Players' gain voices and your clan leaders start barking commands. Will the stereotypes that we have set up in the community hold true, or will they all come crashing down on our heads? That is the question of the day.

Music from American McGee's Alice - Mark @ 16:33 EST

As part of the American McGee's Alice Week, Daily Radar has posted a blurb on the music in the game and they also have an MP3 for your sampling pleasure. Here's a snip:

The music for Alice reflects much of the game's nature: dark, edgy and slightly disturbed. Vrenna has combined "traditional" industrial tools (lots of keyboards, drum loops and the like) with samples of toy instruments. This MP3 file we have is obviously influenced by his work with Nine Inch Nails, with a toy piano loop running throughout.

Rocket Arena: UT 1.40 Released - Mark @ 16:27 EST

The first official release of Rocket Arena:UT has been uploaded! Here's a news item from Planet Unreal that sums it up rather nicely:

The new version, which has been in the works for several months, also features four new maps thanks to Shinigami, BigBird, DavidM, and Pagan Pete. Also added was the RA:UT menubar, which is a custom GUI enhancement to give you easy access to all RA:UT commands straight from UT's easy interface. Instagib, "bouncy" rockets for improved rocket jumping, and spectator mute options have been created as well. Bot play has been improved tremendously, and now you can play RA-style games with any existing UT maps. Head on over to the RA:UT site for download locations and a full list of additions!

Maximum PC Announces Fall Music and Audio Special Edition - Mark @ 16:19 EST

Maximum PC magazine will publish two special issues this fall: The Power User Handbook, the annual PC power reference guide, and Music and Audio, which will be devoted entirely to PC-related music and audio technologies. Music and Audio follows on the success of the Imagine Media January 2000 one-shot, Digital Musician, and the Maximum PC February 2000 MP3 issue, which was one of the best sellers of the year, selling 7% above average on newsstands. According to the announcement, Music and Audio will provide the PC enthusiast with all the information and tools he or she needs for playing, recording, and creating music on the PC with optimum performance. It will feature a roundup of MP3's, a list of the top 50 MP3 sites, music recording and creating how-tos, and extensive hardware and software reviews. For some additional details you can check out the full press release.

Attacking piracy at the source: CDs - Mark @ 15:52 EST

That's the title of an article over at C/Net News. Here's a snip from the intro:

While the recording industry battles in court to halt online music swapping, it also is seeking to stop digital downloads at their source. Nearly all of the music traded on the Internet comes from CDs, which can be easily copied, or "ripped," as MP3 digital audio files. Analysts point to CDs as the biggest hole in the music industry's strategy for thwarting online piracy. Efforts to plug the hole, which have been in the works for years, came a step closer last month when a multi-industry forum known as the Secure Digital Music Initiative (SDMI) accepted the final proposals for the second phase of an audition of anti-copying technologies.

The recording industry wants to make it harder for consumers to directly copy CDs, but it faces enormous hurdles. First, any barriers to copying must be "backwards compatible"--meaning the new technologies would have to work on old CD players that don't screen for pirated material, and vice versa. In addition, the industry must tackle considerable nontechnical issues, including potential consumer backlash and legal uncertainties over curtailing copying for personal use. Some analysts said the group may already be too late, as individual labels including EMI Recorded Music and Sony Music Group are moving forward with their own copy-protection plans.

Altec Lansing ADA880 review - Mikael @ 07:26 EST

3Daccelerated has posted a review of Altec Lansing's Dolby Digital system. They found the system to sound pretty good but no direct comparison to any other system beyond sound is close to the ProMedia in loudness. Worth noting that the speaker does not provide the rear input you want if you have a 4-speaker soundcard. For a second opinion you can read my review

Soulbringer interview - Mikael @ 06:49 EST

Daily Radar has chatted with Soulbringer's producer Don Kirkland. Here are two interesting bits:

DRUK: What about the 3D engine? Obviously the visuals are a 3D engine, bu the audio is also 3D as well isn't it? What does this bring to the game?
DK: It's a proprietary engine which was written entirely for this game. We wanted to be able to capture the epic feel of the game and we needed an engine that would be able to do things fast. We wanted it to be fully 3D, instead of the usual top down pictures or sprites, but we needed something that would be able to have a lot of creatures on screen at once. The 3D sound brings a lot of atmosphere to the game as well, one of the levels in the game that has the best ambient feel is a level where we didn't put any ambient sound at all, and just left all the sound to be generated in 3D.

DRUK: Do you think Soulbringer is different enough to stand up against the competition?
DK: Yes I think it definitely is different enough to do that. Soulbringer is a role-playing adventure game. It has a very story based feel; it is you living the story and having the story presented in such a way that you can control the pace and the ordering of some of the events. The other big thing we've worked on is avoiding making it so linear that you're just following a set path. We've tried to aim for a middle ground so there is a story you have to follow and there are events that have to happen, but we've broken it down so that the order in which you discover and do them is up to you.

Elite Force interview and preview - Mikael @ 06:43 EST

Systemlogic.net has posted an interview with RavenSoftware's sound director Kevin about his work on Star Trek Voyager: Elite Force. Here's a taste:

SystemLogic: Can you tell me who and which kinds of music have influenced your work on EF the most?

Ravensoft: I used the Voyager TV show as a guide. Our game is supposed to feel like you are in an episode of the show. The way the show goes into commercials or segues to a new scene is reflected in some of the cinematics in the game. I tried to use the same types of instruments we hear in the show's music.

I also listened to music from the other series like Next Generation and some Star Trek movie soundtracks. I think the sound of Star Trek music has been well established through the years and it would be a mistake to draw influence outside of that genre. I tried to absorb the sound and feeling of that music enough so that I would create music in the same style.

10-step guide to Creative Rhythmania! - Mikael @ 06:26 EST

Soundblaster.com has posted a 10-step guide to Creative Rhythmania!

Ever heard of the Doppler effect? - Mikael @ 06:24 EST

Soundblaster.com's EAX Learning Centre has posted an article about how we perceive moving sound sources through the Doppler Effect.

Samsung SD-612 vs Toshiba SD-M1402 - Mikael @ 06:14 EST

PenstarSystems has posted a comparison of Samsung's SD-612 DVD-ROM drive and Toshiba's SD-M1402 DVD-ROM drive. Both drive have specs claiming up to 40x CD-ROM and 12x DVD-ROM speed. The Samsung drive has many other new features like Auto-Balancing Spindle motor, Adopted ARS (Acoustic-noise Reduction System) and can read CD-Audio Titles. Not sure if the two first features is anything more than cool names but the last is useful if you happen to have Audio CD's with a data track that includes info about the CDs title, track names, and times. Not sure if any CD-audio player supports that feature though. The review include some CD-ROM speed and CPU usage tests and impressions of DVD-ROM performance and the noise these two drives produce. I have to say the CD-WinBench test results seems rather odd, makes you wonder if the Samsung drive was semi-broken.
News Source: Anandtech

Rune Developer's Diary update - Mikael @ 06:00 EST

A new developer's Diary update for the Unreal engine powered Rune has been posted on Voodoo Extreme. Here's the only sound related bit:

The sound department has been going over the levels and making certain that the ambient sounds and music are perfect, as well as finishing up the necessary creature and Ragnar sounds.

New NOMAD II MG Firmware - Mikael @ 05:56 EST

Creative has released new NOMAD II MG Firmware (2.00.01) for users running Windows 98 & Windows 2000 only.

Terminus 1.62 patch - Mikael @ 05:44 EST

Yet another patch for Terminus has been released. You can find download links and check out the fixes at Avault

More Napster news - Mikael @ 05:39 EST

Cnet has more details about Napster's win in the appeals court. As mentioned earlier today it's just a temporary reprieve until case receives a full hearing. Napster is now required to file a legal brief by Aug. 18 which the music industry needs to respond to by Sept. 8. After the briefs are filed, the court will schedule oral arguments.

For a lot more analysis and info about the case you should check out Cnet's in depth coverage where you will find an interview with the Napster CEO, fans plans CD boycott, Napster asks fans to purchase CDs (they call it CD buycott) and a lot more.

Diablo II MP3 and review - Mikael @ 04:09 EST

Blizzard has posted another Diablo II MP3 of the week. This one is titled 'Cave'. The music in Diablo II is amazing according to most if not all reviews I've seen so far. Like this one posted on Electric Games:

Sound effects are well done, and the music is top-notch. It is both beautiful and haunting without ever dominating the action taking place on the screen. It remains in the background, setting the mood properly.

Napster Wins Appeal - Mikael @ 02:57 EST

ZDNet reports that the Appeals has granted Napster a Stay. That means Napster will NOT be shut down before the trial is over, and of course never if they win the case.

New Interview @ EAX.Creative.com - Mikael @ 02:47 EST

Creative's EAX site has posted an interview with Charles Deenen and Craig Duman, two sound gurus from Interplay. In the interview they talk about their work on IceWind Dale, what audio setup they have, sound effects in movies vs games and a lot more. Here's one interesting q&a:

What would you like to see in hardware over the next couple of years? What would you like to see in soundcards next?

[Craig] I'd like sound cards to keep up with the video cards. Most video cards now have 16-32 MB of Ram on them. You could perhaps use the space to store sounds, as well as plug-ins, etc.

[Charles] Audio hardware still has a long way to go. I'd like to see really good reverb algorithms on soundcards, algorithms to smear sounds to allow "distanizing" of sounds, good formant splitting, pitch-shifting to allow voices to slightly change in a game if needed and wanted. Also, built in dynamic range compression has been on my wish list towards Creative Labs for a few years now (*smile*). That would allow the user to set his PC to "whisper" mode and still hear all sounds in the full-range, similar to how Dolby digital dynamic range compression works.

EMI and MP3.com Settle Copyright Infringement Suit - Mikael @ 02:36 EST

EMI and MP3.com announced yesterday that they have entered into a settlement of claims under the copyright infringement suit originally brought by affiliates of EMI and other record labels against MP3.com, in conjunction with MP3.com's My.MP3.com system. At the same time, EMI announced that it has entered into a non-exclusive, North American license with MP3.com for use of EMI-controlled recordings on My.MP3.com's ``Beam-It(TM)'' and ``Instant Listening(TM)'' software services. These services are designed to allow, among other things, users to insert into their My.MP3.com Music Manager (i.e. personal locker) copies of CDs they already own. You can find more details in the press release

In early June MP3.com settled with BMG Entertainment and Warner Music Group. MP3.com still have to settle with Sony Music Entertainment and Universal Music Group unless they want to face them in court late August. For a bit more details on these settlement you can read this Reuters report.

Labtec Inc. Reports Record Revenue - Mikael @ 02:21 EST

Labtec yesterday reported its third consecutive quarter of more than 50% revenue growth and its fifth consecutive quarter of earnings per share improvement. For the fiscal first quarter ended June 30, 2000, the Company achieved record net sales and record EPS for a first quarter.

Labtec also reported that gross sales of its PC Voice Access(TM) line of headsets, microphones and accessories grew 94.3% in the quarter and now equals its multimedia speaker line as a percentage of Company revenues. Each now accounts for approximately 36% of gross sales. Meanwhile, the multimedia speaker line realized gross sales growth of 23.5% and maintains its number one market share position. Labtec's personal audio line of headphones for MP3 players and other consumer electronics products also enjoyed 43.4% growth in gross sales. You can find more details in the press release

Turtle Beach Santa Cruz - Mark @ 01:12 EST

Just a quick note to point out that Turtle Beach's web site has been updated with information on their new sound card, the Santa Cruz. This is the same hardware that VideoLogic will be selling in Europe under the SonicFury name. The cards offer upto 6 speaker analog output as well as SPDIF out and in terms of 3D audio they use Sensaura's technology which means 4 speaker HRTFs on 32 hardware and 16 software DirectSound3DT streams. API support is A3D 1.0, DS, DS3D, EAX 1.0/2.0, I3DL2 as well as Sensaura's MacroFX and MultiDrive. There is also support for Sensaura's Virtual Ear. The bundles of course will differ between the Santa Cruz and the SonicFury and you can get more details on each from the respective pages. Thanks goes out to Aidan Keogh for the pointer. We expect to be able to offer some early impressions of at least the cards in early August.

ABIT Announces ARCADIA Digital Audio System - Mark @ 00:49 EST

You may recall ABIT's announcement of their Emodulator Home Theater System back in June. They have now updated the name and announced much more details on the systems. Its now called the ABIT Arcadia Digital Audio System and its a complete 5.1 solution including a 5.1 sound card (called the Arcadia AU-10 that uses the new version of the FM801 from ForteMedia), a full-use remote control, and a six-piece speaker set. There are actually two versions of the package that use the same sound card but different quality speakers. The Arcadia SP-50 Speaker Set is ABIT's top-of-the-line 5.1 channel set that uses a wooden casing for the subwoofer and metal casings for the five egg-shaped satellite speakers and a fair bit more power than the SP-51. The SP-51 Speaker Set is also a 5.1 design that comes with a wood encased subwoofer and what they describe as hard casings for the five satellite speakers. For additional detail on the system specification you can check out the full press release. We hope to be able to offer our early impressions of the SP-50 in early August!

Friday, July 28, 2000

AirXoniX Demo - Mark @ 23:01 EST

AirXonix is a modern 3Dimensional remake of old popular arcade game. You operate the flying device, which moves above a surface of the game field. Your task is to fill the most part of the game field. For this purpose it is necessary to fly by above the blank site and to cut off a site without balls (thus balls should not cross your trajectory). Avoid contacts with mines, which move on the filled sites. The time for current level is limited. Collect bonuses for updating life, score, time and slow down all balls and mines. This game contains some new features compared to the arcade version including bonuses, different ball types and new enemies. There are 5 types of game with 7-20 rounds each, and different skill levels. All objects in the game are fully 3Dimensional. The best part is according to the download info the game sports 3D sound. I will download it later tonight to check out the audio. The demo is only 1.8 MB (no that's not a typo) and you can grab it from 3Dfiles.

Star Trek: Klingon Academy Patch - Mark @ 22:56 EST

Interplay has released a new patch for Star Trek: Klingon Academy that will update the US, UK and German versions of the game to version 1.01. A partial list of fixes is on the 3Dfiles download page where you can grab the 6.1 MB patch. A full list is on Interplay's Klingon Academy page and also included with the patch. There is nothing audio related mentioned in the list but the list of fixes and enhancements it quite large so if you have the game it looks to be a must have. The game was on Aureal's list for A3D 1.x and I also have reports from readers noting that it has a menu option for DS3D. However, so far I haven't seen any review make a comment about the 3D sound.

Spatializer Announces New Family of Comprehensive Digital Audio Enhancement Solutions - Mark @ 22:31 EST

Spatializer Audio Laboratories Inc. announced the introduction of the Spatializer DigitalFX series of DSP-based audio enhancement algorithms specifically targeted and optimized for several key and emerging audio devices and platforms. The Spatializer DigitalFX series is a comprehensive audio enhancement software solution based on the Company's renowned Spatializer N-2-2 virtual surround sound technology and Vi.B.E, the Company's virtual bass enhancement technology, combined with additional audio effects tailored for specific product applications. The press release has a summary of the different options but I will point out a couple of them here.

Spatializer Digital OntheGoFX is targeted specifically for portable MP3 player devices and according to the announcement, in addition to the core technology, it sports a highly effective headphone algorithm as w, which produces a highly immersive audio experience. Spatializer Digital PCFX combines the entire suite of respected Spatializer audio technologies into a single, comprehensive and cost effective software audio solution for the Wintel platform. Since the product runs on the host CPU, with minimal CPU utilization, no discrete chip is required. Spatializer Digital PCFX provides Spatializer 3-D stereo, Spatializer N-2-2 virtual surround sound for DVD playback, Vi.B.E virtual bass enhancement and enCompass, Spatializer's positional audio technology for computer games utilizing the Microsoft DirectX API. One thing I am unsure of is just where enCompass is being used. For lots more details on the digital audio enhancement suite you can check out the full announcement.

MidiLand and 3DsoundSurge Contest Winners Announced! - Mark @ 20:11 EST

MidiLand has announced the winners of the contest that they sponsored here at 3DsoundSurge over the past few weeks. We would like to thank all of you who took the time to share your dream multimedia system impressions with MidiLand. They note that all the responses have been forwarded to their Research and Development team. Some of you may soon be seeing your "dream system" on the market under the MidiLand name! Now on to the winners! You can check the results at our Winners Page. If you have not heard from MidiLand already be sure to contact them right away. Details are on the winners page where you can also find a link to MidiLand's news page for additional MidiLand contests.

Creative's jukebox delayed - Mikael @ 15:46 EST

Reuters reports that Creative Technology said earlier today that the first shipment of its portable MP3 jukebox player would begin in mid-August, not July as originally planned. The reason for the delay, according to Low Chee Seng, senior vice president of Creative Labs Asia, is to make improvements in terms of usability. The Reuters report also mention that Creative Technology does not rule out entering the mobile phone market.

Spatializer N-2-2 Included in Two New Portable DVD Players From Toshiba - Mark @ 13:00 EST

Spatializer Audio Laboratories Inc. announced today that Toshiba Corporation has incorporated Spatializer N-2-2 Virtual Surround Sound in their first line of portable DVD-ROM/Video Players. Toshiba MED300AS incorporates a 5.8-inch low-temperature polysilicon TFT LCD with a resolution of 800x480 dots to play DVD without any loss of resolution. The resolution is four times better than that of an amorphous type. The MED200AS is the world smallest and lightest portable DVD video player without a LCD screen. Both models can connect to a PC and feature Spatializer N-2-2 with both on-board speaker and headphone settings. They can be used as a 4x DVD-ROM drive and 24x CD-ROM drive to read CD-ROM, video CD, music CD, CD-R and CD-RW. I would guess that the headphone setting is the big part of this deal from our perspective as the speakers on a portable unit will be at best lacking. For more details and links to the respective companies you can check out the full press release.

UltraPlayer Software Ranks Highest in Independent MP3 Audio Quality Tests - Mark @ 12:53 EST

UltraCo Incorporated has announced that their UltraPlayerAudio Software received the highest ranking in an impartial head-to-head test comparing the audio quality of 20 of the most popular media players. Their Neutrino MPEG Audio decoder passed all of the five rigorous tests with flying colors. The tests were performed by PhD candidate David Robinson under an independent research grant from the Engineering and Physics Research Council. The results of the extensive test are available for viewing at www.ultraplayer.com/company/dectests.asp. I have only skimmed it briefly but it looks to be very interesting reading if you are into MP3 playback. You can go directly to the study via this link. For more details check out the links above as well as the full press release.

EMusic announces New MP3 'Subscription' Service - Mikael @ 12:40 EST

EMusic.com earlier this week launched a new ``EMusic Unlimited'' subscription service that allows consumers to pay one low monthly price to download as much music as they want from EMusic's digital collection of over 125,000 MP3s -- and financially compensates musicians and record labels for their work. You can find more details in the press release. As we mentioned earlier this week Jupiter Communications released a survey where they said the US Music Online market will be led by Industry Shift to Digital Subscriptions. You can find all the details about this survey in Jupiter's press release.

Today Emusic announced their financial results for the 4th quarter that ended June 30. The revenues was $3.8 million, a 20 percent increase over the preceding quarter. It wasn't even close to cover their costs considering they posted a loss of $13.6 million. I guess they expect to have an amazing growth the coming years.

MP3 Users Buy More CDs Than Non-MP3 Consumers - Mikael @ 12:26 EST

A recent survey by Gartner Group, Inc. shows MP3 users are buying more CDs than non-MP3 users. Gartner surveyed 40,000 U.S. households in February, and this survey revealed MP3 users are purchasing three more CDs on average in a six-month period than non-MP3 users. You can find more details in the press release including some analysis to the results.

RioPort cuts new deals - Mikael @ 12:08 EST

RioPort earlier this week announced Release 2.0 of Its Media Device Manager Services and Technologies, Including Support of Microsoft Windows Media Player 7. For the details read the press release. At the same time they announced several licensing agreements. Read the press releases for more details of each license agreement:

1. RioPort Licenses Media Device Manager and Audio Manager Jukebox Software to Human Information Technology for New C@MP MP3 Players
   
2. Samsung Signs With RioPort to Provide Technology and Software for Next-Generation Yepp Portable Digital Audio Devices
   
3. RioPort Licenses Technology and Jukebox Software to Sewon Telecom for Future SDMI-compliant Portable Digital Audio Players

Napster alternatives booming - Mikael @ 11:33 EST

Plenty of the 21 million users of Napster's services have already started to look elsewhere. seems already court-ordered shutdown is proving to be a boon for other music-sharing sites. This includes sites/services like Napigator, Angry Coffee, Gigabeat, Gnutella and Scour. The two last ones even had to post notices on their Web sites saying extensive traffic had forced them to shut down. For more details read this Zdnet story or this article from News.com. Gnutella also released a press release claiming they reached over 1 million new unique users since the Napster injunction.

MP3.com's CEO also thinks his company will benefit from Napster woes but didn't mention any track surge now. MP3.com services is very different than Napster and 3 out of 5 major record labels have no issues with what MP3.com does anymore. You can read more about what MP3.com's CEO had to say on Yahoo

If you want to know more details about how to getting started using Gnutella you should this guide from Cnet. Cnet also posted a separate guide on how to get the best search results with Gnutella.

Yamaha Announces New YST-MS201 Multimedia Speakers - Mark @ 08:04 EST

Yamaha Corporation of America, Consumer Products Division has announced a new, three-piece YST-MS201 powered speaker system. The system features 30 Watts of total output power and Yamaha's exclusive Active Servo Technology which Yamaha says results in a deep, powerful bass. The stylish YST-MS201, which includes two slant-baffle satellite speakers and a wood subwoofer, will be available in August 2000 at an estimated street price of $49.95. For more details you can check out the full press release.

Napster Appeals Shutdown Order - Mark @ 07:46 EST

As expected, Napster asked for an emergency stay Thursday to block a judge's ruling that could knock it out of business and stop millions of fans from downloading free music. Lawyers for Napster filed their request with the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco one day after U.S. District Judge Marilyn Hall Patel ordered the company to halt the trade in all material covered by major record label copyrights by midnight Friday. For more you can check out the full Reuters story on Yahoo as well as this CNet story carried on Yahoo.

Even More On ST:DS9 Demo 3D Audio - Mark @ 07:34 EST

I just heard from Pete Clare from Sensaura and he confirmed my test results posted yesterday with the demo. Specifically, the DS9TF demo does do 3D sound by default without requiring any options settings. There is no use of any reverb APIs. There is no use of any flavour of A3D interface. Lastly he noted that the Miles Sound System is use but he thinks that its there for the MP3 music playback and that the main game audio engine is still galaxy.dll.

Thursday, July 27, 2000

Evolva Patch - Mark @ 21:34 EST

The patch brings the game to version 1.2.944 and add a new "diffuse bump mapping" mode available on GeForce, GeForce 2 and Radeon video cards, as well as performance improvements, multiplayer fixes and other tweaks. Evolva supports DS3D with EAX. You can grab the 4.1 MB patch from 3Dfiles.

Star Trek Deep Space Nine: The Fallen Demo Info - Mark @ 21:31 EST

I have downloaded the demo and done some very quick tests with the Sound Blaster Live and Aureal SQ2500. A couple of surprising bits. First off the demo has none of the usual audio menu options that we have become used to in Unreal and UT. There is no way to enable or disable 3D sound but it appears to be enabled by default. However, on the SQ2500 there are some sounds that are always behind me when the demo starts that are in front with the Live (the thumping noise). A few other bits seem a bit odd with the SQ2500 for me as well and in very brief play 3D sound is not too prominent. I also don't notice any wavetracing or EAX effects and the normal console command to enable A3D did not do anything. The other bit that surprised me is on top of the [Galaxy.GalaxyAudioSubsystem] the config file also shows a [Miles.MilesAudioSubsystem] to go with the Miles.dll file in the system folder. This is definitely something different from other Unreal, UT based games. As noted, there is no menu option in the demo to select between the Galaxy and Miles sound system so I am not sure which engine is being used by default. I will do some more tests a bit later but if you have some impressions of the demos audio and 3D sound or EAX we would appreciate hearing them.

No 3D sound in Dark Reign 2 - Mikael @ 05:22 EST

Dark Reign 2 was supposed to support A3D 2.0 and is still on Aureal's list but VoodooExtreme offered the following bit in their review of Dark Reign 2:

Also, don't look for any 3D sound support, because it isn't here. The only saving grace for the sound is the cool music

Star Trek Voyager:Elite Force preview - Mikael @ 04:31 EST

Ga-Source has posted a preview of the Quake3 engine powered Star Trek Voyager: Elite Force. They think it both looks and sounds very promising, here's the sound bit:

It would take a pretty inept developer to get this section wrong. I mean, ST sounds have been used and heard so many times that to get them wrong would be a crime. Fortunately, Raven are neither inept nor are they guilty for the crime listed above. The sound effects and vocals are spot on, using the well-used sound effects database as well as the entire cast of the show to only add to the atmosphere put on by the graphics.

Overall, there's not much to comment on here. The sound effects, music, and voice, were good enough to get by, if not better than that. They comment the graphics and action perfectly, as they should.

Sigma Preview - Mikael @ 04:22 EST

ActionTrip.com has posted a preview of Relic Entertainment's upcoming 3D accelerated RTS game, Sigma. Here's two interesting snips, first a bit the gameplay:

The thing that will make Sigma stand out of the myriad RTS game is a HUGE number of units. Now, when I say HUGE, I don't mean huge like when describing an ordinary RTS. HUGE means 16000 creatures of specific outlooks and some four billion combinations of their characteristics. The trick was to successfully combine the sixty basic animals, each of them having about seventy AI attributes. Combining animals should prove a simple task for the players. The game currently supports only two-animal combinations but it should support up to four-animal combinations when it's finished. You just have to drag the desired animals to the sigma machine and then determine which one is to be dominant. The results will be obvious both in the appearance of the produced animal and its statistics. The goal of these experiments would be to create superior life-forms, and I conceived my favorite: armored turtle body, head and claws of a panther, and sparrow wings. These weird mixtures will grow even more bizarre if the programmers manage to implement mixing of already mixed species.

Star Trek Deep Space Nine: The Fallen demo released - Mikael @ 03:52 EST

The demo for the Star Trek Deep Space Nine: The Fallen has been released. It is a genre-defining 3rd person action/adventure powered by an enhanced version of the Unreal Tournament engine. Playing as Sisko, Kira, or Worf, you must race against to find the ancient Red Orbs that hold the key to the Final Reckoning - and the destruction of the universe. Since the game uses the Unreal Tournament engine it's likely it will support DS3D with EAX and A3D 2.0 with wavetracing. If you have the bandwidth you can find out for certain by downloading the 89 MB demo.

Terminus v1.6 patch - Mikael @ 02:49 EST

Yet another patch (v1.6) has been released for Terminus. The only sound related one is that you can force software mixing. You can grab it from 3dfiles. Before you grab this patch I suggest you read this post to see if you may be better of waiting for the next patch.
News Source: Voodoo Extreme

Weapons Factory Released - Mikael @ 02:45 EST

The official 1.0 Weapons Factory has been released. It's a popular MOD for Quake III Arena. For more details and to download head over to the official site. You can also check out Daily Radar's review of a beta version of this mod posted earlier this month. Finally you can read our interview with Anvil.Chorus who at one point was the sound designer for this mod. He left sometime ago so not sure how much if any of his work that's included now.
News Source: Voodoo Extreme

Judge Shuts Down Napster - Mikael @ 02:06 EST

A federal judge late yesterday ordered Napster to halt the trading of copyrighted material, saying the founders of the popular music-swapping site have "created a monster". This means Napster will be shut down Friday at midnight PT. It's not a final ruling just an injunction until the trial is over, which will start later this year. The Judge order applies only to the swapping of copyrighted music on Napster. If the company filters out copyrighted material that is not approved by the artists it doesn't have to be shut down the service but doubt that many would continue to use it. Napster's attorney David Boies also said it would be very difficult to filter out all copyrighted material and he expect the service to be shut down until the trial is over unless they manage to seek a stay of the decision. Even if they fail doing that aficionados have created a way to run their own servers unaffiliated with the company and many of these servers will likely continue even if Napster is shut down. It's also worth noting that services like Gnutella and Freenet that are "peer-to-peer" networks that allow individuals to trade files without going through a central server will be much more difficult to shut down. It would require suits to be filed against individuals and according to a survey released yesterday 60% will continue to download music even if the court rules that it's illegal. For a lot more analysis to the courts decision today check out Cnet's in depth coverage

Wednesday, July 26, 2000

Optimize Your PC Audio (Continued) - Mark @ 23:46 EST

On Sunday we mentioned the first part of this article in the news. Well they had since added a few more sections covering subwoofer placement, equalization and speaker wire upgrades to the original section on satellite placement. First, to restate the original comments, when it comes to speaker placement, especially the front speakers, height makes a huge difference with placement at ear height being ideal. Most people don't do that which is why many PC satellites go for the compromise and have bases or stands that angle the drivers upwards. Next, their recommended rear speaker positioning is unusual - its not what is commonly accepted as correct for movies (still worth giving it a try and it may be a good compromise placement as it may work well for games and music where you do want to be able to pin-point rear channel effects and are not aiming for a diffuse sound field). When it comes to subwoofer placement it's worth noting that the only reason to put a subwoofer under your desk is if its crossover is too high resulting in some sound output that you can determine location for. For subwoofers with lower crossovers you can place it anywhere you want (keeping in mind the effects of walls as they note in the article). When it comes to equalization I must say I completely disagree with their recommended settings if you are aiming for neutral sound and I find that many multimedia speakers are in need of more midrange and not less as they suggest. You may not like neutral so you can give it a try but also keep in mind that you typically can't push software equalization like the one in WinAmp too hard without introducing some form of distortion to the signal. When it comes to speaker wire I agree it can make a difference but the impact will depend on more than the quality of wire you upgrade to. It will also depend on your speaker system and the wire you are upgrading from. Despite what may seem like a lot of comments the article is worth checking out.
News Source: 3D Audio Immersion

Diamond RIO 600 Review - Mark @ 20:16 EST

Electic Tech has posted a review of Diamond/S3's RIO 600 which comes with 32 MB of memory on board. They ended up with mixed impressions of the package, liking the unit itself but being very unimpressed with the software. For details check out the review.
News Source: Anandtech

KISS Psycho Circus - Review - Mark @ 20:00 EST

The Game Guy has posted a review of KISS Psycho Circus and come to somewhat mixed impressions over. They did think the audio was great though. Here's a snip:

I would have to say that the audio is one of the best parts of KISS Psycho Circus. Well, what would you expect from a game designed after a rock band. The sound is very well done for the cinematics and add greatly to the gaming effect. The in-game music is very well done and it even changes tempo depending on what is happening on the screen. I think that is also a great addition to the game, cause it adds to the feeling of being a frantic shooter with and itchy trigger finger.

Icewind Dale Review - Mark @ 19:46 EST

GameZone has posted a positive review of the AD&D RPG Icewind Dale. Here is a snip on sound:

Though you pick the vocal renditions for your party, about the only time they actually talk is when they are dying or acknowledging orders. Music is performed on a grand scale and the ambient noises are solid.

Sanity Demo Review - Mark @ 07:41 EST

Firing Squad has posted a review of recently released Sanity Demo. They come to the conclusion that its worthy of the 62.7 MB download. They also report that the game uses the Lithtech 2.0 engine (and not 1.5 as we previously reported) Regardless, both versions of the Lithtech engine use the Miles Sound System. I know that they were planning to implement 3D sound in the game and Miles Sound System 5.5 supports A3D 2.0 and EAX 1.0 but offers occlusion and obstruction calls that will work on all soundcards. Based on differing reports we are not sure how implementation of 3D sound has progressed or if its in this demo. Unfortunately there is not a word on sound in the review.

MidiLand MK-01 Mounting Kit Review and Contest - Mark @ 07:21 EST

3DHardware.net has posted a review of MidiLand's MK-01 speaker wall mount kit (threaded inserts required on the satellites) and just like in our review they come to a positive conclusion. They are also running a promotion with a bunch of great prizes from MidiLand (again similar prizes to what is up for grabs in our recently closed survey), including a full Dolby Digital system up for grabs.
News Source: Anandtech

Tuesday, July 25, 2000

Nomads Info - Mark @ 19:49 EST

Random Labs has posted new information on their upcoming game Nomads. Here is a snip on the game:

Armies of flying machines, biplanes and zeppelins produced by the factories all try to gain the upper hand in the battle for rare resources and valuable artifacts. The Wizard Engineer has to leave his floating platform to explore the unknown realms in the clouds, conquer and pillage other islands and acquire strange artifacts. Flying around with your hero in a fantastic, breathtaking and unlimited world in the clouds offers a new level of immersion, while classic and proven gameplay elements of realtime strategy, role playing and 3D action provide rock-solid gameplay mechanics and an easy learning curve.

Team Fortress 1.5 Stand Alone Version Released - Mark @ 19:29 EST

Real.com Games has released a standalone version of Team Fortress 1.5 as either a free (but limited) download (registration required) or as a full version for $30. What's unique is this version of TF 1.5 does not require Half-Life, and is completely compatible with existing TF servers and even user-made levels. You can get more details from the Team Fortress 1.5 page. To be honest that does not sound like such a great deal to me given that you will be missing out on some of the best single player action in history if you don't get the full version of Half-Life which includes Team Fortress 1.5 in the latest patch. At Gamestop you can pick up Half-Life for just $10.00 (plus shipping) more than the TF1.5 stand alone product, but I guess if you are just looking for an instant online gaming fix it may do the trick.
News Source: Blue's News

Max Payne Radio - Mark @ 19:17 EST

The following is lifted straight from the official Max Payne website:

(2000/07/25) It's now possible to listen to Max Payne music live on the net: Tune in your browsers for Max Payne Radio by surfing to the address www.mp3.com/stations/maxpayne. The station features the soundtracks for Max Payne E3 videos from 1999 and 2000. An MP3 player is required to enjoy Max Payne Radio.

For a lot more of Teque's music, visit his page at mp3.com. From his page there, you can download Max Payne E3 floor video soundtracks, 3DMark scores as well as many other compositions. Just go ahead and visit his page right away!

Starting Over? - Mark @ 18:55 EST

New Scientist Magazine has the following snip on the Secure Digital Music Initiative watermarking system and DVD-Audio:

"Record producers were appalled last week when they found they could hear a supposedly inaudible "watermark" designed to make DVD-Audio players reject copied discs. The industry's Secure Digital Music Initiative (SDMI) had chosen a commercial watermarking system, called Verance, which adds digital changes to music waveforms. The mark must be robust enough to survive MP3 transmission over the Internet, but remain inaudible when played on the yet to be launched DVD-Audio players. After the disastrous London demo, an SDMI spokesperson admitted: "We are starting all over again."

Adaptec & Microsoft Deliver Ability to Create Audio CDs With Secure Content - Mark @ 18:50 EST

Adaptec announced it has entered into an agreement with Microsoft Corporation under which Adaptec will offer support for Microsoft's Windows Media Audio format with their CD recording software applications. The two companies announced last week that Microsoft has incorporated Adaptec's CD recording technology in Windows Media Player 7, making it easy for music fans to create custom audio CDs for car and home stereo systems. Adaptec CD recording applications featuring Windows Media Format support will allow rights-managed digital audio content to be recorded on CD through this secure and trusted system. Adaptec's existing line of CD recording applications, Easy CD Creator 4 Deluxe and Toast 4 Deluxe, also allow you to burn photo, video and data CDs. For more details you can check out the full press release.

New QDX Format Provides Better-Than-MP3 Audio Quality? - Mark @ 18:41 EST

That's what QDesign Corporation says in their launch of a next generation technology designed to enhance the digital music experience for both consumers and content providers. According to the announcement the QDX format is distinguished by exclusive features that ensure unequalled ease of use and offers better-than-MP3 audio quality and an unprecedented level of flexibility for music download and streaming. The QDX technology is based on two fundamental concepts, audio quality and size scalability. Fully optimized for Internet streaming, QDX provides the highest audio compression at the highest quality, delivering -- in one single file -- both CD-quality audio at 128kbits (12:1 compression) and full-bandwidth stereo at 24kbits (60:1 compression). QDX also supports inherent bitstream scalability that offers users the unique Fit-To-Media and Fit-To-Stream capabilities. QDX's Fit-To-Media function allows consumers to simply click-and-drag personal playlists to portable players without ever needing to transcode or convert music files. Using QDX Fit-to-Media users can automatically store up to 2.5 hours of music on a 32MB portable digital music player, compared to the maximum of approximately 30 minutes of MP3 files. For more details, including info on a white paper, you can check out the full announcement.

Sanity: Aiken's Artifact Demo - Mark @ 12:34 EST

A 62.7 MB demo of Sanity is available for download from 3Dfiles. Thirty years in the future, the unused portion of the human brain will finally be unlocked and the full destructive potential of the mind unleashed upon the world. Experimental drugs will grant ordinary people the ability to generate and focus immense energy emissions with their minds. Labeled as Psionic for their ability to manipulate this energy, these gifted humans become overwhelmed by their complex new powers and often succumb to insane, destructive rages. As Special Agent Cain of the Department of National Psionic Control, players will undertake a perilous mission to protect the world from powerful Psionic criminals. The most dangerous of these is a dark and shadowing figure known only as Golgotham who has a devious plan to destroy all of humanity.

Sanity is using the Lithtech 1.5 engine which uses the Miles Sound System. I know that they were planning to implement 3D sound in the game and Miles Sound System 5.5 supports A3D 2.0 and EAX 1.0 but offers occlusion and obstruction calls that will work on all soundcards. Based on differing reports we are not sure how implementation of 3D sound has progressed or if its in this demo. If you are not sure if you want to download the demo you can check out a demo preview over at Evil Avatar. Unfortunately, the preview makes no mention of sound what so ever...
News Source: AGN3D

Vampire Review - Mark @ 12:24 EST

Sharky Extreme has posted a review of Vampire: The Masquerade - Redemption and were overall they were very impressed awarding the game a 9/10. Here is what they had to say on sound:

The sound is also invariably well done. The voice acting is excellent, with some characters particularly standing out. We couldn't help grinning at the wonderfully arrogant and dismissive Vampire Prince of Prague from clan Ventrue, and we doubt we'll ever forget the wonderfully voiced vampire punk-with-attitude called Pink (you'd best not pick a fight with him over his girly name though) who Christof meets in London. Even better than the regular sound though is the music, which is utterly top class. Most of the music in the Dark Ages cities is as dark and haunting as a midnight grave, fitting the location perfectly, be it a vampire infested cavern or the Jewish Quarter in Prague. When the action shifts to the 20th century, the music changes accordingly although the quality remains the same. The music in Vampire could just as easily be a high quality movie score and is certainly one of the best sound tracks to a game we've ever heard.

DirectSound and Music article - Mark @ 08:04 EST

As part of their on-going coverage of DirectX 8 and the Windows Game Developers Conference which took place in London a few weeks ago, EuroGamer today has posted an article looking at what Microsoft has in store for us in the next versions of DirectSound and DirectMusic. Its quite a nice article that's well worth a read. It even includes some MP3 from the Windows Game Developers Conference. One comment though - not all the features listed are new to DirectX8 - for example 3D positioning in hardware has been around since DirectX5.
News Source: Voodoo Extreme

MP3.com Financial Results (Q2) - Mark @ 07:53 EST

MP3.com has reported its second quarter financial results showing net revenues totaling $20.2 million for its second quarter ended June 30, 2000, compared with $17.5 million for the first quarter of 2000, and $1.9 million for the second quarter of 1999. This represents a more than 15 percent increase from the prior quarter and a 956 percent increase on a year-over-year basis. Pro forma net loss for the quarter was $5.2 million, or $0.08 per basic and diluted share, compared with $8.4 million, or $0.13 per basic and diluted share, for the first quarter 2000, and $6.3 million, or $0.22 per basic and diluted share, for the second quarter 1999. For more analysis of the results you can check out a Reuters report on Yahoo.

Rome MP3 Player Review - Mark @ 07:38 EST

Gaming in 3D has posted a review of the Rome MP3 Player. The Rome MP3 player uses a unique design - its shaped like a cassette and can be inserted into a standard cassette player for playback making it a good choice for use with car stereos. Thats the real strength of this unit as the design also leads to some limitations. For details check out the overall positive review from G3D.

Gecko MP3 Player Review - Mark @ 07:33 EST

Tweak Town has posted a review of the Gecko MP3 Player. According to the review the Gecko MP3 is a re-badged DNA MP3 Player for sale in Australia. The unit they tested came with a 32 MB memory card. The package also comes with a flash ram reader and writer, which is what interfaces with the computer via the parallel port. A USB model is available for an extra $20-40 AUD. Overall they were quite impressed with this unit.
News Source: AGNHardware

Advent AV290 Review - Mark @ 07:20 EST

Extreme Overclocking has posted a review of the Advent AV290 2.1 speaker system and were quite impressed with them. The review shows a list price of ~$50 and they compared the system to the Altec Lansing ACS33 for reference.
News Source: AGNHardware

Monday, July 24, 2000

KISS: Psycho Circus beta patch - Mikael @ 23:39 EST

A beta patch for KISS: Psycho Circus has been released with a huge number of fixes.

Half-Life: Opposing Force CTF 1.1.0.1 Update - Mikael @ 23:39 EST

This patch will update all Half-Life: Opposing Force to version 1.1.0.1. You can grab the patch from 3dfiles.

Rocket Arena 3 Released - Mikael @ 23:39 EST

Quake III Arena modification, Rocket Arena 3, has been released. Here's the list of files you may want to grab:

Rocket Arena 3 Client Files (Win32, 60mb)http://www.planetquake.com/servers/arena/mirrors_7.shtm
Rocket Arena 3 Server Files (Win32 & Linux, 0.5mb)
http://www.planetquake.com/servers/arena/mirrors_8.shtm
Rocket Arena 3 Client Files (Linux, 60mb)
http://www.planetquake.com/servers/arena/mirrors_9.shtm
Rocket Arena 3 Soundtrack
http://www.planetquake.com/servers/arena/mirrors_2.shtm

Icewind Dale Review - Mikael @ 23:25 EST

PCGames-Central has just posted a very positive review of the AD&D RPG Icewind Dale. They say the game is your classic Advanced Dungeons & Dragons dungeon hack-and-slash type of game unlike Baldur's Gate that's more quest oriented. They found pretty much everything in the game to be done well including the story, the action, the graphics and sound, and the most important gameplay. Here's a bit about the music:

One feature of games that I usually do not enjoy much is the in game music. But this is one game that has some very nice music. When I approached the Dwarven castle, I not only saw huge statues but a single horn starting playing, supported buy one drum, and it emphasized the power of the structure. The music very nicely suits the atmosphere of IWD, from music that emphasizes the power of a structure to the eeriness of the catacombs.

Deus Ex Review - Mikael @ 23:23 EST

Boomgames has finished Deus-Ex and while they gave most aspects of the game a 9 or better the reviewer notes that "it's not a game that makes me sit here hour after hour playing, giving up living, eating, drinking, and sleeping". The other complaint is as usual the D3D code poor performance, they also say except for D3D and software mode the game isn't very stable. Not sure if he tried Glide or only complains about OpenGL. The sound and music part got an 8.5 score:

Impressive - everyone who speaks to you is audible. I'm amazed they fit the whole game onto one 700mb CD. People talk to you through your infolink, a thing in your brain which transmits a signal into your temporal lobe, or something, so only you hear them. People also talk to you in person, of course. The only time you don't hear what people say is when you read a datacube. Those are simply little notes laying around.

The music is good too. Lots of cool ambient techno, some hard techno, and the music is subject to change given a situation, like combat. In some parts of the game I just stopped playing and listened.

NFS: Porsche Unleashed review - Mikael @ 23:22 EST

Guru3D has posted a very long and detailed review of Porsche Unleashed which they think is a fantastic game with excellent graphics, sound effects and with gameplay being the most impressive, clearly the best auto racing game for the PC. They also note that even though it's mostly arcade-style racing the addition of the Evolution mode, the improved physics and damage modeling sim fans should also have a lot of fun. Here's the sound bit:

SOUND: The sound in the game is also very well done. From the squealing of the tires, to the crunching of the sheetmetal as you pound into a concrete wall or an opponent, it's all there, and very realistic. And while each track has a graphical theme, it also has its own unique sounds that accompany the different events taking place in the background. Each car even has it's own distinctive exhaust note. The music soundtrack is a mix between rock and upbeat techno, and for the most part goes well with the action. There is an option to turn it down or even off if it gets to be too much.

StudioAX releases Grand Piano One SoundFont - Mikael @ 20:36 EST

StudioAX has released the much awaited Grand Piano One SoundFont. StudioAX is, according to Live!Center, famous for its good sounding and extremely realistic piano SoundFonts. Check out their website for more info
News Source: Live! Center

Iomega Announces Support for Windows Media Rights Manager - Mikael @ 20:33 EST

Iomega Corporation has furthered its commitment to digital rights management (DRM) by announcing its products are compatible with Microsoftr Windows Media(TM) Player 7 that was released to consumers on July 17, and with Windows Media(TM) Rights Manager, Microsoft Corporation's digital rights management technology for audio and video. More details can be found in the press release

Ricoh MP9060A CDR/RW/DVD ROM Drive review - Mikael @ 20:33 EST

HardwareZone has posted a short review of Ricoh MP9060A CDR/RW/DVD ROM Drive. The drive can write up to 6X, rewrite up to 4x and has a read speed of up to 24x for CDs and 4x for DVD-ROM. The review includes some CD-ROM read tests and mentions DVD-ROM playback went fine using the bundled PowerDVD 2.55. Overall they liked the drive and gave it a rating of 4 stars out of 5.
News Source: AGN Hardware

Steinberg Announces Cubase VST 5.0 for Macintosh - 32 Bit Sound - Mikael @ 20:32 EST

Steinberg North America last week announced Cubase VST 5.0(TM), the newest Cubase VST Series for the MacOS. The Cubase VST 5.0 Series boasts a complete graphic makeover with many new features that enhance Cubase's usability and sound quality, including analog warmth with Magneto(TM) technology and 32-bit recording, output and mixdown in the top of line, Cubase VST/32. Furthermore the Cubase 5.0 series is optimized for Power Mac G4 with Velocity Engine for speedy audio processing. For more details read the press release

Using SoundFonts in Digital Orchestrator Plus - Mikael @ 20:32 EST

Live Center has posted an article on how to use SoundFonts with Digital Orchestrator Plus. The author of the article used an AWE64 but according to Live!Center it's done the same way with the Live.

Community of Napster Users Now Exceeds 20 Million - Mikael @ 20:11 EST

Napster announced last week that its community of users now exceeds 20 million people, as defined by the number of unique user accounts. Experiencing record growth since its inception just over a year ago, Napster's membership has doubled since the end of April 2000, and is expanding faster than such previous high-growth Internet application companies as Hotmail or ICQ. I wonder how many users they would have without all the free pr RIAA has given them :-).

Hollywood Gangs Up on DVD Hacker - Mikael @ 20:10 EST

In what studios hope will stem the spread of DVD piracy on the Internet, testimony got underway today in the Motion Picture Association of America's case against alleged hacker Eric Corley, who's accused of spreading information about how to crack the encryption code on DVDs, the infamous DeCSS (Decode Content Scrambling System), a free software utility that allows users to bypass encryption codes and copy DVDs onto their computers. In an interview Corley said that "Even if they succeed against us, there are 1,001 who will take our place", which refers to that there is already plenty of other sites that have the source code. For more details check out this article on Yahoo from last Monday and this Cnet article posted today

EMI and Microsoft Unveil the Largest Single Release of Digital Music by a Music Company - Mikael @ 20:10 EST

EMI Recorded Music and Microsoft Corp last week announced the availability of over 100 full-length albums and singles from EMI's catalog in the Microsoftr Windows Media(TM) Format -- the largest single release of digital music on the Web by a music company. This addition of over 90 hours of content for secure digital download represents the works of over 80 different artists with styles including rock, hip-hop, pop, jazz and contemporary Christian. The downloads will be sold online through major retailers at suggested prices comparable to those of traditional retail sales. You can read the press release for more details

Movie, music industries sue Ovitz search engine - Mikael @ 20:09 EST

Reuters reports that movie and music companies joined forces last Thursday by suing Scour Inc., a firm backed by Hollywood powerbroker Michael Ovitz that developed a search engine the studios say lets users trade films and songs on the Web. You can find more details about the case in the article.

Live Linux Guide - Mikael @ 19:22 EST

If you want some tips on how to get your SB Live to work well in Linux you should check out this Sound Blaster Live HOW-TO.
News Source: Live! Center

Napster promises plan to quell piracy concerns - Mikael @ 19:21 EST

News.com reports that Napster chief executive Hank Barry unveiled plans today to make his company's file-sharing technology safe for copyright holders. To achieve that Napster has entered into a research and development agreement with digital rights technology company Liquid Audio. Barry also said that Napster is examining several revenue models for the service. The models aim to make the service still feel free but would generate revenues to sustain its business. Napster currently makes no money.

It didn't help to convince the record label executives gathered at the Jupiter Communications Plug.In forum that Napster will help to grow the music industry from a $40 billion business into an $80 billion business, which is what Napster claims. Can also be interesting to note that at the Internet Summit last week 68% of a group of Internet executives predicted that Napster won't survive the legal challenges against it. For more about that survey check out this story at Yahoo

Study: Net music market will shift to subscriptions - Mikael @ 19:21 EST

News.com reports that a study released today by Jupiter Communications shows that sales of online music will be led by an industry shift to charge subscription fees. The Jupiter Communications study also predicts that online music sales in the United States are expected to be about one-fourth of the total U.S. music market in five years.

MP3Board countersues RIAA - Mikael @ 19:20 EST

MP3Board last week filed its own claim against the Recording Industry Association of America, asking for redress for the RIAA's role in "temporarily shutting down the MP3Board Web site" because it links to copyrighted songs on other Web sites.

The site claims that it only posts links to content hosted on other Web sites, and that there is nothing illegal about such hyperlinks. MP3Board also announced that it's developing a system that will let copyright holders remove links to any site that have unauthorized content. For more about this case check out this News.com article

Win a Dolby Digital System (updated) - Mark @ 07:44 EST

I just heard from MidiLand that its time to close the contest so that it - if you are in, good luck and we will be letting you know as soon as MidiLand selects the seven winners. Thanks goes out to everyone who took the time to enter the contest. As a reminder, you may win one of five runner up prizes of MK-01 kits, two second prizes of the MLi-490 4.1 speaker system plus a MK-01 kit and a great grand prize that consists of an S4-7100 5.1 Dolby Digital ready 100 watt speaker system, an ADS-2000 Dolby Digital decoder and an MK-01 kit! You can still check out MK01 Review.

Diamond Audio Technology ProMedia Summer Sale - Mark @ 07:42 EST

I recently received an email from Diamond Audio Technology asking me to let you know about their huge sale on their ProMedia speaker line. While the sale is on you can get their excellent ProMedia 3025 system for just $49.95. You will be pretty hard pressed to pick up a better 2.1 system than the 3025 for $49.95. For why I feel that way you can check out our review of the 3025 system. They also have the other two ProMedia systems on sale. Again, its a great deal, especially the 2012 2 piece system for only $29.99. If you are looking for decent sound for very little money, it a great option at that price as I thought it was a good deal even at its full price. Lastly, their entry level 2010 system is going for $19.99, and like the other two you get more than your moneys worth. You can get all the details by heading over to the Diamond Audio Technology ProMedia overview page.

New Porche Unleashed Car (Porsche 928 GTS) - Mikael @ 07:10 EST

EA has released a new car (Porsche 928 GTS) for their DS3D supporting Porche Unleashed. It's not yet available from their website but you can grab it from their ftp site
News Source: 3dfiles

Icewind Dale v1.05 Patch - Mikael @ 06:56 EST

A new (v1.05) Patch was released for the DS3D with EAX supporting RPG Icewind Dale was released a few days ago but I don't think we ever mentioned it. You can find a list of fixes and download links at Avault

Gunship! patch - Mikael @ 06:56 EST

A patch for the helicopter simulation Gunship has been released. This customizable version of Gunship! allows you to alter the way the program behaves. You can find download links and more info at 3dfiles

The game is on Aureal's list (A3D 1.X) called Gunship 3 but seems like Hasbro Interactive intends to stick with just Gunship. As you may know the original Gunship was released more than 10 years ago. There is no mention of A3D or 3D sound on Hasbro's pages so not sure if it actually shipped with A3D support or not.

Summoner MP3 - Mikael @ 06:21 EST

A new MP3 "Jade Temple" (2.4megs)for Summoner was released last week. You can grab it from the official site's download page where you will find a bunch of other MP3s which I guess are all supposed to be part of the game once it ships this fall. The game was at least previously supposed to support A3D 2.0 and DS3D with EAX but according to the official FAQ only special audio feature that's determined so far is Dolby Surround on the PS2 platform. If you do a search for Summoner on our news page you will see several articles where the developers bind Summoner says they will use 3D sound though.
News Source: Voodoo Extreme

Neocron Preview - Mikael @ 06:11 EST

3dgameforce has posted a preview of Neocron, which is ambitious online "virtual city project" and 3dgameforce thinks it can prove to be a formidable foe to EverQuest, Asheron's Call and Ultima Online. Here's a snip from the intro:

What sets neocron apart from the current leaders in the online role playing game market and the slew of other online-only games currently under development, is its Bladerunner-esque, 29th century world. The Earth featured in neocron is not like the Earth of today; it has been ravaged by war, overtaken by smog and pollution, and humanity itself has taken on a very evil and untrusting guise. The city of neocron itself, one of three left on the planet that are shielded from pollution and complete with an artificial atmosphere and simulated weather, will be divided into four sections, or districts. Outside of the four districts will be an Outzone, where crime rules and the surroundings are very bleak and dreary.

Klingon Academy reviews - Mikael @ 06:09 EST

Scifi-Gaming and Gamerspulse has both posted their impressions of Interplay's action space sim set in the Star Trek world, Star Trek Klingon Academy. Scifi-Gaming found it to be a pretty good game giving it a rating of 7.5 out of 10. Strong points include the graphics and that it like no other game before it captures the essence of Star Trek combat. They complained a bit about the AI and that audio and video stutters sometime. When it comes to audio they only offered the following bit:

The voice acting of your ship's crew and just about anyone else in the game sounds very believable, there's a whole slew of authentic-sounding FX, and specially for the game written orchestral sound tracks all add immensely to the game's atmosphere.

Terminus review and 3D sound issue - Mikael @ 05:16 EST

GibWorld has posted a review of Terminus giving you all the reasons why you should not consider to buy this game. They think it's technology outdated by several other space combat games and the gameplay isn't up to par either. In the end they gave the game a score of 30%. The sound effects were just as poor as the rest of the game according to this review:

Music seems to be notable only by its absence from Terminus - I don't remember hearing a single tune throughout the time I played the game, although the music may just be eminently forgettable.The sound effects seem to exclusively consist of beeps, hisses or explosions - regardless of what's happening onscreen - leading to the conclusion that they only had a handful of sound effects and had to stretch them as far as they could go. The speech is very badly digitized and voice acting is poor, and these flaws were present to such an extent that I was forced to turn the speech off and the sound right down to play the game without so much irritation.

KISS demo review - Mikael @ 05:09 EST

If you are still wondering if you should bother to download the demo you should read 3Dactionplanets review of it. They found it to be extremely buggy, only the first of the 3 levels offering good game play and they certainly wasn't impressed with the sound:

Another topic that deserves mention about this demo is the sound, or, rather, the lack thereof. The problem with the demo wasn't actually the fact that the sound was bad, it wasn't really irritating in any way, it was the reuse of sound effects that really turned me off. For example, smashing an axe against a steel wall or a a wooden plank yielded the same hard clatter. This problem was shared with all the melee weapons. After a while of playing this game, one wonders how tough it really is to simply add in a few more impact noises. There is also blatant use of sound libraries. I am absolutely sure I've heard many of the sound effects in other games before. Once again, sound effects are only minor problems compared to that of gameplay.

The game is supposed to support 3D sound but as Mark mentioned he couldn't get it to work in the demo and so far no review has even mentioned 3D sound.
News Source: AGN

Soulbringer review - Mikael @ 05:00 EST

IGNPC has posted a review of Soulbringe