EAX/SURROUND SOUND FIX (EAX 1 - 4)

A Universal EAX 1-4 and Surround Sound fix for many games.

IMPORTANT: If you're using a Creative Soundcard + Creative Alchemy, you DO NOT need this fix.

(Creative soundcards + alchemy have EAX support built in, although not for everything.)
https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/List_of_games_that_support_EAX

INTRODUCTION

Windows Support for EAX has been lost for years now and most modern games have moved to OPENAL. Unfortunately what this means for a whole generation of older games, is that if you want to go back and play a classic; you'll have to deal with downgraded audio because modern systems do not offer support for EAX 1-5.

For a long time there was little to no solution outside of installing Creative Alchemy, unfortunately this only works with Creative based soundcards, so if you're using Realtek or anything else you're out of luck.

Fortunately there is a fix!

Original New Vegas mod link:

https://www.nexusmods.com/newvegas/mods/65094?tab=description

Up to date DSOAL build:

http://vaporeon.io/hosted/dsoal-builds/

DSOAL GITHUB:

https://github.com/kcat/dsoal

This DSOAL plugin will essentially emulate EAX 1-4 support with help from an unobtrusive .DLL wrapper and .ini file, the beauty of this little plugin is it works with almost everything i've tested that uses EAX 1-4.

(It not only restores EAX, but often restores surround sound support for many games as well!)

INSTALLATION

• Download DSOAL and make a backup, keep in mind you can use this same plugin to restore EAX to just about anything so keep a copy on your desktop!
  
  
• Drag and drop the contents to your main Thief directory.
  (MOST GAMES INSTALL TO THE DIRECTORY WITH THE MAIN .EXE FILE)
  
  
• You can drag and drop everything if you like, but the only 3 files you need primarily are dsound.dll, dsoal-aldrv.dll and alsoft.ini.
  
  
• Right click on alsoft.ini once it's in your primary directory and click edit.
  
  
  
  
  
• Once you're done editing alsoft.ini to your liking, SAVE the .ini file and launch Thief.
  
  
• Go to Thief's Audio settings, after editing alsoft.ini. (As seen above.)

• You should now see the combination of Hardware Acceleration: ON - EAX :ON that was previously greyed out (unavailable) is now available to use. (As seen above.)
  
  

  CHANGE THESE INGAME SETTINGS:

  • Audio Channels: 48
    
    
  • Hardware Acceleration: On
    (We are now emulating DirectSound, that's why we are able to set this ON and activate EAX at the same time.)
    
    
  • EAX: ON
    
    
  • These 3 settings allow you to bring back Surround Sound audio and EAX to Thief.
    (And many other games!)

NOTES AND CREDITS

UPDATE 2024-01-14: For anyone else that has this issue, i noticed you'll be missing certain audio channels unless you enable "Channel Phantoming" in your Sounds/Playback/Speakers/Properties. This should fix the missing center channel mentioned by people in the comments.

Enable: Sounds/Playback/Speakers/Properties/Enhancements "Channel Phantoming" ON.*

UPDATE 2024-01-15: Here is a link to Hexaee's guide, using the same DSOAL process for Thief: Deadly Shadows. (Can help with troubleshooting.)
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2291848228

This same basic installation guide should work for just about any game that uses EAX 1-4, that you want to use this plugin with.

Thanks to Kcat for creating - and IDrinkLava for uploading this excellent audio tool. I take no credit for this plugin.

Any questions or comments are welcome.

[Vang]

Hello, trying to install your fix but Im a real noob at this. Im kinda stuck at the editing of the alsoft.ini . In the decoder sections there are open AL files that are refered but I don't have those. I went to the website of Open AL to install it but still nothing. I think I'm missing something x) can you please help me ? :p

[MF_Danyu]

For anyone who wants to copy and paste:

[General]
channels=
frequency=44100
stereo-mode=
cf_level=0
sources=256
slots=64
sends=16
sample-type=float32
resample=linear
default-hrtf=Built-In 44100hz
hrtf=true
drivers="-dsound,"
period_size=1024
periods=3

[reverb]
boost=2

[decoder]
quad=C:/Users/yourusername/AppData/Roaming/OpenAL/presets/square.ambdec
surround51=C:/Users/yourusername/AppData/Roaming/OpenAL/presets/itu5.1-nocenter.ambdec
surround71=C:/Users/yourusername/AppData/Roaming/OpenAL/presets/hexagon.ambdec
hq-mode=true

[Thumper]

Thanks! I'm glad it still works for so many people. Real surround sound makes a big difference.

[Xiaopang]

Thanks for this great guide! I do have an EAX-capable Creative sound card, but all I get is stereo, so I used your guide to run Thief with DSOAL instead for some 5.1 surround goodness :)

[Thumper]

Hmm i see, looks like OpenAL Soft has improved quite a bit over the years. That might be a better option these days, I haven't tried recent versions myself. This guide is from when DSOAL was the only option and everything else was quite primitive.

[᠌󠀡󠀡]

"This project(OpenAL Soft), on the other hand, looks much more mature, with an implementation that seems to know what it's doing, instead of being a mess of tweaks and hacks built on top of each other. It even gets EAX5 which DSOAL hasn't touched yet. Presuming there's no hidden pitfalls to map DSound EAX to OpenAL EAX (which I doubt, since it seems to be what Alchemy does), and this implementation holds up with various games, it would make sense to drop DSOAL's EAX and use OpenAL Soft's. The alternative would be to copy it out of OpenAL Soft and into DSOAL, but that seems like unnecessary duplication and extra work since DSOAL basically relies on OpenAL Soft at this point anyway." [github.com]

BTW Using DSOAL creates extra layers between OpenAL Soft and the output, which cause extra latency and overhead. It's just unnecessary to use it on NewDark Engine games unlike Thief 3 which uses DirectSound3D.

[᠌󠀡󠀡]

I mean it's made by the same guy... and he openly states that:

"I'm completely in the dark when it comes to how the EAX API is supposed to work, so what I ended up doing with DSOAL is finding the similarities between it and EFX and, also working with my understanding of DirectSound, worked out a logical mapping for functionality. Start with that, and add in a bunch of trial and error, comparing the output of DSOAL vs Native or Alchemy and tweaking things to make DSOAL sound more similar, and that's how I got EAX2 in fairly decent shape. EAX3 and 4 have proven to be more complicated, particularly when it comes to the obstruction/occlusion/exclusion filters and multiple FX slots, which still has issues." [github.com]

[Thumper]

DSOAL has also improved quite a bit over the years as well.

[Thumper]

At that point you're really just trading one plugin for another in any case. One of the reasons i prefer DSOAL is the quality of the sound, I experience less popping and audio stuttering like you mentioned - it also works better on a 5.1 system for me at least. Although i'm sure OpenAL Soft has improved, this fix still works exactly the same as it did when i released the guide.

[᠌󠀡󠀡]

FYI "Footsteps lagging behind" is only an issue when using basic OpenAL on linux/wine with stereo headphones setup(at least). It's fixed once you actually use OpenAL Soft and since 2022 you can also use EAX( source [github.com]). There is no need to search for channel phantoming settings. I don't think DSOAL is necessary anymore in most games, especially NewDark based which don't rely on Direct3D at all. Most of these audio guides need updating.

BTW There might be an audio popping issue on linux in NewDark based games. The issue seems to only occur on 1.23 version of OpenAL Soft and up. So stick to 1.22.2. if this happens( source [www.ttlg.com]).