windows vs. linux difference in sound quality?

eean · Posted: Fri Apr 23, 2004 4:50 am Post subject:

my gripe with Linux audio, is with the SB Live! 5.1 ALSA there are too many controls in alsamixer. I don't know what most of them do.

And the default is terrible. It starts off with the volume muted. Can't get worse then that. And other controls seemed poorly set as well, I had to fiddle around with it for my music and what not to sound right.

You can probably fiddle with most of these things in Windows as well in the more esoteric sound card programs. But you don't have to, it sounds fine by default. Maybe the folks writing the drivers (which, I think in this case, is mostly folks from Creative) must be leaving it up to the distros to figure out. Which seems silly, since their the ones who would best be able to make good default levels.

This probably has a lot to do with Linux's bad reputation for sound.

Once set though, I notice no difference between ALSA and Windows. I did notice an improvement from OSS to ALSA.

darksbane · n00b Joined: 15 Apr 2004 Posts: 28 Location: Fredonia, NY

I have a hard time believing one OS has better sound than another, unless the drivers are -really- bad. I'd suggest playing with your volume, I find that maxing out certain volumes distorts the sound.

I have a SB Live. Actually, it does sound a bit nicer while using Gentoo. Something about having a perfectly running system makes everything better.
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Tokabola · Posted: Fri Apr 23, 2004 5:47 am Post subject:

Im using an Audigy platinum, and as a musician sound quality is extremely important to me.
I have tested the sound with professional equipment and found that ALSA gives as high a quality sound (measuring dynamic range, signal to noise, and harmonic response) as Windows. I did find that ALSA can overdrive the soundcard and have to turn ALSA output to <= 80%. I had to do this in Windows also untill the latest drivers were released.

I use this box for live recording of concerts and found that Windows routinely crashes after 45 to 50 minutes of continous recording. Linux hasn't crashed with recording times up to 5 hours straight!

Guess which OS I'll be using in my studio. :wink:

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eean · Posted: Fri Apr 23, 2004 7:12 pm Post subject:

geordie · Posted: Fri Apr 23, 2004 7:29 pm Post subject:

I get great sound with an Audigy, alsa and external amp. The speakers are very high quality though. From what I remember of w****** I don't think there is any difference.

geordie

ao · n00b Joined: 05 Jan 2004 Posts: 38

equilibrium · Apprentice Joined: 29 Jun 2003 Posts: 213 Location: UK

I had lots of problems with various soundcards and have ended up using my old sblive and now it seems pretty good. I can't hear much difference but I only mainly use headphones and occaisonaly my stereo+speakers. I guess creative soundblaster have been around for a while

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spitzwegerich · Posted: Sat Apr 24, 2004 3:55 pm Post subject:

I have a Terratec EWX 24/96, and there are no problems using it on Linux. And, no, I won't install windoze only to check how it sounds there.

I can approve that with some soundchips the alsa mixer must not be set above ~80% if you don't like distortions.
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triad · Posted: Sun Apr 25, 2004 12:11 am Post subject:

atom wrote:

Jeremy_Z · l33t Joined: 05 Apr 2004 Posts: 671 Location: Shanghai

It just depends of the driver, my fortissimo 2 definitly sounds worse. Moreover i can't set up my rear speakers

Chaos · Posted: Sun Apr 25, 2004 6:43 am Post subject:

spitzwegerich · Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2004 7:05 am Post subject:

Ard Righ · Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2004 5:10 am Post subject:

I'd just like to point out, that even though the drivers for linux are made by the community, the windows drivers made by Creative are crap in comparison.

If any of you play games for extended periods of time in Windows on an Audigy card, you may have noticed using EAX settings will cause sound to get corrupted with a nice hiss, squeak, and high pitched whine. I've updated my drivers to the latest from Creative, and still notice sound issues.
This has been a known issue in Windows support for Audigy cards, which I believe is fixed somewhat with Audigy 2 cards in Windows in the latest Creative drivers.

I guess the Linux sound support really does depend on the drivers. Windows drivers are not perfect, even if they are made by a manufacturer.

The EMU10K1 drivers for linux have never given me the headaches I've had in Windows

lunarg · Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2004 10:16 am Post subject:

qmic · n00b Joined: 29 Feb 2004 Posts: 68

I have high-end stereo (Primare - somebody knows that company?), and i cannot say that sound is noisy, but it seems to have worse dynamics and too loud medium tones, i have not bass boost or treble boost in my amplifer and i won`t use equalizer because it`s distort`s sound (no in that meaning what are you thinking about). In reply for somebodys post - jacks are VERY important.

Ephemeral · n00b Joined: 26 Jan 2004 Posts: 13 Location: uk

Thought i'd revive this thread, since this is exactly what ive noticed, and i feel helpless...

My Terratec Aureon Sky 5.1 definitley sound better in M$ than on Linux :cry:

lukaz · Posted: Fri Jul 02, 2004 11:38 am Post subject:

i have a hoontech/staudio/esi dsp24 and a terratec ews 88mt both cards using the envy 1712 chip and yep it signal to nois is under windows better. in terms of latency is alsa with the right patches not bad but the esi-windows-driver for my dsp24 just fucking rocks - 1ms latency @ 96!

@chaos
the terratec card are not bad but i would no more buy one because i use them also under windows. the driver there are slow and also the interface is a crappy thing... even tough i like the ews88mt for multitrackrecording. for that purpose the latency doesn't matter. have a look at esi's juli@ or m-audio cards!

pontifikas · Posted: Wed Jul 28, 2004 8:50 pm Post subject:

In my opinion, Sound is one of the last remaining strongholds, preventing Windblows from kneeling before Linux(add ATI to those :evil:

).

Alsa has made astonishing progress even in the last 2 years, but is still miles away from windblows.
But this is not ALSA's fault. Blame the constructor's who turn their back to such a numerus community as the Linux and BSD.

Btw I've heard rummors that there are developer's(propably people with golden ears) trying to come up with descent sound drivers for....Windows, since they find Creative's(or other's) to be fairly...poor!!!!

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Matty C · n00b Joined: 29 Jul 2004 Posts: 3

Malakin · Posted: Thu Jul 29, 2004 1:05 am Post subject:

Flash is _VERY_ slow.

The only reason notebook drives would be quieter then desktop drives is their rotation speed. Doesn't look like you can still get 5400rpm desktop drives but any Seagate drive is very quiet, I'm rather obsessive about having a quiet computer myself.

DeepThoughts · Posted: Thu Jul 29, 2004 1:28 am Post subject:

Matty C · n00b Joined: 29 Jul 2004 Posts: 3

ao · n00b Joined: 05 Jan 2004 Posts: 38

Malakin · Posted: Thu Jul 29, 2004 5:53 am Post subject:

msimplay · Apprentice Joined: 20 Jun 2004 Posts: 161

Alsa is making great progress with the soundcards it seems
although the relatively new intel8x0 sounds ploppy on linux
it does in windows aswell as i don't think it has bass and treble control

Anyway i remembered mandrake 9.2 not sure wether it was using Alsa or not but i know it was using Alsa in Mandrake 10 and it was a huge improvement on my Audigy Card infact the sound finally matched Windows
the treble bass and tone emulate the creative mixer controls on windows

All in all i'm not at all disappointed with Alsa great quality sound and in my experience it doesn't break up as much as the windows ones when at higher volume levels