I've just spent about an hour searching through this forum for suggestions on the best sound card for running Trainz (2010 in my case) and haven't really found very much; lots of little bits and pieces but not much that really adds up. If there's a good thread I missed, please smack me and point me in the right direction.
To clarify what I'm looking for, I've been very disappointed in the sound in Trainz for one reason only: the very poor trackside listening experience, expecially when an approaching train sounds its horn. (Note that I'm not talking about the Doppler issue, which Trainz 2012 apparently addresses.) I do most of my Trainzing at trackside rather than in-cab, and I've tried at least 7 or 8 trackside whistle posts and other "sound horn" triggers, and they all seem to do just one thing: trigger the Hornz command in the approaching locomotive. The problem is (at least on my PC) that those horn sounds can be heard all over the route when running in Driver, even 30 or 40 scale miles away. The result is a cacaphony of constantly sounding horns when a lot of whistle posts have been placed in multiple locations.
Another trackside issue is the dropping out of one or more audio threads when a train passes (for example, crossing bells frequently drop out when locomotive and bogey sounds become audible). Apparently there is a limit (either in Trainz or the sound card) of how many discrete audio channels can be handled simultaneously. (Note that I'm not talking about channels in the sense of left, right, etc.--the speakers themselves continue to produce sound, just not all the sounds that should be present).
Is this a function of what sound card is being used (and if so, what sound cards work properly in this respect)? Or is it a built-in limitation of Trainz? I'm looking at purchasing a new PC during the next month and am hoping to choose a sound card that will give me the best Trainz experience possible.
My current card is a Creative Labs X-fi Xtreme Gamer, running on an Intel Core 2 Duo processor with 4 GB of memory (32-bit Windows XP).
Any suggestions based on your own experiences will be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
--Lamont
PS: Incidentally, if there are any trackside whistle posts that actually generate their own sounds (as opposed to triggering the Hornz command) I'd love to know about them.
To clarify what I'm looking for, I've been very disappointed in the sound in Trainz for one reason only: the very poor trackside listening experience, expecially when an approaching train sounds its horn. (Note that I'm not talking about the Doppler issue, which Trainz 2012 apparently addresses.) I do most of my Trainzing at trackside rather than in-cab, and I've tried at least 7 or 8 trackside whistle posts and other "sound horn" triggers, and they all seem to do just one thing: trigger the Hornz command in the approaching locomotive. The problem is (at least on my PC) that those horn sounds can be heard all over the route when running in Driver, even 30 or 40 scale miles away. The result is a cacaphony of constantly sounding horns when a lot of whistle posts have been placed in multiple locations.
Another trackside issue is the dropping out of one or more audio threads when a train passes (for example, crossing bells frequently drop out when locomotive and bogey sounds become audible). Apparently there is a limit (either in Trainz or the sound card) of how many discrete audio channels can be handled simultaneously. (Note that I'm not talking about channels in the sense of left, right, etc.--the speakers themselves continue to produce sound, just not all the sounds that should be present).
Is this a function of what sound card is being used (and if so, what sound cards work properly in this respect)? Or is it a built-in limitation of Trainz? I'm looking at purchasing a new PC during the next month and am hoping to choose a sound card that will give me the best Trainz experience possible.
My current card is a Creative Labs X-fi Xtreme Gamer, running on an Intel Core 2 Duo processor with 4 GB of memory (32-bit Windows XP).
Any suggestions based on your own experiences will be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
--Lamont
PS: Incidentally, if there are any trackside whistle posts that actually generate their own sounds (as opposed to triggering the Hornz command) I'd love to know about them.
