Audio lowers when others enter room - sometimes

[JHawk]

When I'm in a room by myself the audio is fine. But usually when someone enters, the audio level lowers but I can hear the other person fine - sometimes it's just their breathing. When they leave and I'm alone, the audio returns to a hearable level. I saw some posts related to this from 2017 but am unsure if this is some kind of feature or not. At this point if I do rent a movie, I\ll opt for a private room, although it would be nice to be able to have friends watch with me but not at the expense of audio I can barely hear.

[Peregrine]

When streaming to other people, Bigscreen routes the audio through the Bigscreen Audio driver, but when you are by yourself, it has no need to. The reason you're hearing different volume levels is most likely because you have the two devices set at different volume levels.

Make sure that both volume levels from whatever playback device your VR headset is and the Bigscreen Audio Stream are balanced as depicted in the figure. Using the traditional volume controls such as Volume Mixer or the volume slider will throw it off balance in most cases.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1943815862

[JHawk]

I found the settings you were talking about and set it so both volumes are the same, yet it still changes volume level depending on if I'm alone or with other people in the room. One is the BigScreen Audio Driver, and the other is my Index HMD. Both are set at 100%. Am I missing something?

Looks like I did. I was playing around with the settings for my Index HMD and there is a tab called 'Spatial Sound'. When I set that to 'Windows Sonic for Headphones', the sound no longer lowers when someone enters the room. Another setting I noticed was 'Loudness Equalization' in the 'Enhancements' tab. Seems to make a difference as well.

[JHawk]

It may be something with the Valve Index headset. I sat through a movie on PlutoTV and the sound would randomly change as people came and went. Sometimes when it was lower I would disable and reenable 'Loudness Equalization' and the sound was hearable again. Then I noticed that the \Spatial Sound' setting had disabled itself so it seemed to make no difference. Another time people could hear me speak, but I heard no voices or any other noises - interface, dropping tomatoes, etc...

One other thing, is there a volume control for when I'm in the lobby? I have one when I'm in a room...

[JHawk]

Ok, just downloaded the patch that just came out and I'm still having issues. When people enter a room my volume drops. I can go in to settings and change them so the volume is back up, but after everyone leaves and someone else enters, the volume drops. This doesn't seem to be widespread as I would imagine if it were, there would be more people reporting this. Are there any other Index users having this issue?

[TragicDelight]

I'm suffering from multiple issues with my valve Index in Bigscreen.
1. Press control stick in for menu stops working randomly, then works again after a minute.
2. Same as you, audio when people join dips to 15% it sounds like and slider is at max.
3. For months now the the Pluto hosted content is upside down but public rooms are fine.
4. As of most recent BS update the content in public rooms including my own streamed screen is BLACK with audio. Anyone who is hosting content from their desktops to the big screen I cannot see it's BLACK. If i switch it to either of the 3D settings then I can see the content in 3D but in 2D still BLACK.
NONE of this stuff is happening on my Rift S...
I really want to use my comfortable premium headset over the Rift S. Can the Valve Index get some more love? I'll post my hardware specs for testing purposes. EVERYTHING and all Drivers are up to date.

Msi 2080ti Gaming X Trio
Z370F Asus Motherboard
970 pro Samsung NVME m.2
I7 8700K 5ghz
Kraken X62 AIO (with CAM software)
32 GB 3200mhz Cas14 trident Z RGB (Samsung B-die (8X4)
1000W 80+Gold ThermalTake PSU

[JHawk]

Quick update. I hooked up my Acer headset for WMR and it has the same issue, albeit not as pronounced. So it seems to not be solely the Index headset. It is just a pain to always have to go in and adjust the volume manually, or re-enable certain features to get it back to a good volume level, only to have it change when people come and go again.

[Awesome!]

Funny, I have this same issue but in reverse -- audio is too low when I'm alone, but when others enter my room the audio gets loud.

Valve Index
1080ti
i9-9900k
32 GBs DDR4
M.2