[geeks] Best Vista story I've seen

[Joshua Boyd]

On Tue, Feb 20, 2007 at 12:21:41AM -0500, Charles Shannon Hendrix wrote:

> Yes, it is nice to see OpenAL finally make headway, after so many
> years.  Linux games used it a lot, especially those from now-defunct Loki
> Games.  I'm kind of surprised to see Microsoft adopt it.  Anyone have any
> information on why?

I don't know that MS is adopting it so much as they are not going out of
their way to block it.
 
> Also, Microsoft's heavy DRM and authentication system relies on control of
> the entire API including sound... so how can they support cross-platform
> OpenAL?

Well, if a game company chooses to use OpenAL, they can't very well
complain to MS if sounds from the game are ripped via OpenAL.  

> So far, I have yet to see accelerated OpenAL or EAX's capability, but I
> imagine that it will come if Microsoft is really serious about pushing its
> use.

I used to play some games on a PC with one of the earlier soundblasters
to support EAX.  I don't know how much benefit I got from it as I wasn't
using surround.  Perhaps unrelated, but the system would use the sound
card to decode AC3, DTS, etc (when using the Creative Labs DVD playing
software along with a DXR3 card).  That part was cool.  Until lightning
took it out the drive (and the replacement refused to play nice), I had
a Pentium 200mmx as a dedicated DVD player w/ surround sound processing
attached to the family TV. 
 
> It would help remove the hammer lock Creative has on game sound, and give
> other sound card makers a more level and open playing field, and give game
> companies one less excuse for not writing portable software.

Creative is one of the major sponsors of OpenAL.  Aureal was one of the
other big names, but I don't know if they are still around.  Nvidia
sponsers OpenAL, but I don't know to what extent their hardware will
accelerate it.