XAudio2 beta 1

As you might know, Directsound is deprecated due to poor Vista support, and XAudio2 is being developed to replace it in Construct.

This is the first beta. Effects and positional sounds are missing, but should be added soon. XAudio2 works fairly similarly to Directsound, but was designed to be simpler and even easier to use. Here's a quick overview of its features:

• Support for PCM/ADPCM/XWMA wave files, runtime-decompressed to keep a small memory footprint. Directsound previously only supported PCM WAVs. Encoders for ADPCM and xWMA to follow.
• Support for OGG files. These aren't runtime decompressed though, so they use the same memory as equivalent WAVs.
• 'Play music' actions support MP3 and WMA (anything windows media player can play). Same as Directsound had.
• Better caching (cache entire directory on startup, free large items from cache automatically...) Previously, Directsound cached files the first time they were loaded, which sometimes caused pauses the first time a sound was played.
• Volume metering (get level of output)
• Few other extras like audio statistics and customisable number of channels. Minor changes like everything now measured in decibels, which is more sensible than the 0-100 scale Directsound used.

I'd be interested mainly to see if this works on everyone's systems, especially Vista! I'm not sure what its dependencies are, so let me know if you can get anything to play or not. Before reporting a bug, try also running it as Debug. XAudio2 reports errors to the debugger.

Also you could make a backup of any games using Directsound and replace all actions with XAudio2 equivalents and see if everything works like before. Note that in my own testing, I found XAudio2 and Directsound don't seem to work well together in the same application, and crashes Directsound. I've no idea why they won't play nice together, but bear this in mind if you're replacing Directsound with XAudio2 (you'll need to delete Directsound from the application when you're done). Yet another reason to throw out Directsound

Anyway, let me know how things work out.

so do we just download it and drop it in our construct folders?

Yes, put the .csx files in to the Plugins subdirectory and Plugins\Runtime subdirectory of Construct's install, as per the ZIP file.

after doing that and starting construct it gives me an error which looks like this:

http://img385.imageshack.us/img385/1170/errorod0.png

and you cant find it in the plugin list

Try reinstalling Construct and allow the DirectX updater to complete. Does that fix it?

I always let direct x install when installing construct, I'll try again but should I uninstall construct first?

seems to work for me

edit: i'm on XP SP2

i can test on a vista machine tomorrow

ok for some strange reason after fully uninstalling contruct and taking the folder it left behind out, I re-installed it and threw the .csx files in their respective folders and I still get the same error message. When it was installing the direct x setup said it already detected newer or equivalent version so it didnt do anything. im on Vista 32-bit.

working good, i'm on XP

cool.rar

cool.rar

Is it supposed to have sound?

Because I don't hear anything.

BTW Ashley (or anyone who knows), what would you say is the best audio format for both Sound FX and Music?

I get the error as well.

Vista 32 Service Pack 1

BTW Ashley (or anyone who knows), what would you say is the best audio format for both Sound FX and Music?

For sound effects I would personally use WAV or PCM audio, mainly because they are uncompressed and that means they can load faster (no lag or delay). For music I would recommend MP3 format due mainly to file size, and the fact they don't need to be as responsive as sound effects.

~Sol

> For music I would recommend MP3

>

Actually I'd recommend OGG or WMA; MP3 has licensing restrictions and is poorer quality than the other newer formats. Licensing won't affect free games, but why have it hanging over your head if free alternatives exist and you might want to go commercial one day?

Also, am I right in saying that so far, XAudio2 works on XP but not Vista?

I dont know but my vista PoS laptop doesnt seem to work with it. but how can I tell if I cant even load the plugin in construct?

yeah on this vista machine at school, i get the same error as highimpact. though i can't mess with any of the directx stuff on this machine, so i can't really troubleshoot it.