Is Dolby Atmos for headphones a gimmick?

[AshDeekEmPusi]

Does it really sound better than stereo for you guys?

[bshock]

It's faux surround sound but it does sound better than stereo to me. Not sure there is a whole lot of difference really.

[󠀡Dibelabbes]

Spatial audio (or 3D audio or HRTF or however you want to call it) is real and works, but how good is vastly dependent of the algorithm used and also of the game. I have that for +15 years with the Soundblaster XFI at the time and more and more games have good implementations now, exceeding what you can do with external software and a 5.1 input signal.

This game has two build in spatial audio modes that work fantastic (make sure to also turn on RT Audio in the advanced settings). The Atmos mode that the game also has doesn't sound right to me (I had Atmos on in Windows and all) and I assume that is really just for Atmos speaker setups.

Bottom line if you are still only listening to plain stereo you are doing it wrong.

[Vaelant]

It's worth it but I'm pretty sure you have to buy a license on Windows to enjoy it.

Dolby Atmos looks at how many speakers you have and uses software to "solve" sound placement in 3D Space. For headphones it'll shape the audio based on positional information so the player can accurately tell where it's at in space. It's object based surround sound - so rather than limiting the sound to distinct channels and artists working to represent sound characteristics themselves (like they have with surround sound and engines that don't have binaural or surround sound features) - it'll blend them more accurately across the speakers you have. It'll also do vertical sound placement, so you can tell if that sound is above or below you. In other words, it's more than virtual surround sound, it's directional sound that does a great job with 3D content because it can use that 3D information to tell the software exactly how the audio should change to represent that location. I have headphones and it reminds me of binaural audio (look it up).

A simple way of looking at it is thinking of it as an advance audio engine that really wants to handle 3D sound placement well.

This game also has ray-traced audio. While I can't speak on exactly what the engine is doing here, I'll assume that it'll look at what is in-between the audio source and the player and then changes the characteristics of it dynamically and/or provide additional information to make that sound source more accurate. In combination with Dolby Atmos that means you'd be able to point out the direction something is at, and it'll sound like what you'd expect it to sound like. Rain behind glass has thuds without being too clear, sounds behind walls are muffled, etc.

I bought the license and I've enabled it for this game, Dolby Atmos on PC rarely has apps that use it (most that do give you the option, this one relies on the Licensed version I believe) so the price for it is the biggest thing on whether or not you want to jump in. That said; audio purists will say that any virtual surround sound is wrong. I'd argue that in a game engine - all sound design typically uses tricks to make up for what ray-traced audio and Dolby Atmos tends to solve and this just saves Developers from doing a lot of busy work with surprisingly good results. Basically games don't want to deliver perfect audio to the player because the real world has imperfections, without tricks or adjustment - it'll all sound like it's coming from a studio instead of in a damp forest or a massive open area. Windows has another spatial audio engine you can enable for free that may or may not work with this.

Ultimately I enjoy it and think it's a killer addition. If you like tinkering with audio - one of the biggest selling points on this game is that it has the ability to play with these two features and I'm happy that they implemented it.

[Icy1007]

Originally posted by Vaelant:

It's worth it but I'm pretty sure you have to buy a license on Windows to enjoy it.

Dolby Atmos looks at how many speakers you have and uses software to "solve" sound placement in 3D Space. For headphones it'll shape the audio based on positional information so the player can accurately tell where it's at in space. It's object based surround sound - so rather than limiting the sound to distinct channels and artists working to represent sound characteristics themselves (like they have with surround sound and engines that don't have binaural or surround sound features) - it'll blend them more accurately across the speakers you have. It'll also do vertical sound placement, so you can tell if that sound is above or below you. In other words, it's more than virtual surround sound, it's directional sound that does a great job with 3D content because it can use that 3D information to tell the software exactly how the audio should change to represent that location. I have headphones and it reminds me of binaural audio (look it up).

A simple way of looking at it is thinking of it as an advance audio engine that really wants to handle 3D sound placement well.

This game also has ray-traced audio. While I can't speak on exactly what the engine is doing here, I'll assume that it'll look at what is in-between the audio source and the player and then changes the characteristics of it dynamically and/or provide additional information to make that sound source more accurate. In combination with Dolby Atmos that means you'd be able to point out the direction something is at, and it'll sound like what you'd expect it to sound like. Rain behind glass has thuds without being too clear, sounds behind walls are muffled, etc.

I bought the license and I've enabled it for this game, Dolby Atmos on PC rarely has apps that use it (most that do give you the option, this one relies on the Licensed version I believe) so the price for it is the biggest thing on whether or not you want to jump in. That said; audio purists will say that any virtual surround sound is wrong. I'd argue that in a game engine - all sound design typically uses tricks to make up for what ray-traced audio and Dolby Atmos tends to solve and this just saves Developers from doing a lot of busy work with surprisingly good results. Basically games don't want deliver perfect audio because you don't hear all audio sources perfectly as if they're in a studio. Windows has another spatial audio engine you can enable for free that may or may not work with this.

Ultimately I enjoy it and think it's a killer addition. If you like tinkering with audio - one of the biggest selling points on this game is that it has the ability to play with these two features and I'm happy that they implemented it.

My Corsair Virtuoso XT heatset has Dolby Atmos support and includes a Windows license for Atmos.

Sounds great.