silvertack

Still clinging to Windows XP, I’ve limited myself in the Halo department, to Combat Evolved.  I know it’s about time, perhaps even well past time to upgrade to Vista, however I’ve been putting off the change for as long as I can.  It seems as though post-poning Vista may have been a good financial decision however, as Windows 7 nears its shipping date, and I’d most certainly prefer upgrading to an OS with some promise.

You may have noticed while playing Halo CE, that enabling hardware-accelerated sound results in frequently distorted firing effects.  In this article, I will (hopefully) show you how to fix this problem.  The root of this problem is Halo’s limited support of audio cards.  Halo recognizes only eight audio vendors - Creative, Intel, C-Media, Avance, nVidia, Hercules, Diamond, and Aureal.  Even within these vendors, Halo recognizes mostly older sound cards.  When a soundcard is recognized, certain rules are applied.  If the soundcard is unknown (practically every onboard soundcard is unknown), no rules are applied.  I experienced this problem with an onboard soundcard - Realtek ALC888.  I was attempting to use hardware-accelerated output and EAX audio effects.  The ALC888 supports EAX 1.0 & 2.0.

The rules we have to apply are located within the game directory, in a file called “config.txt.”  Before doing anything, open Halo while holding Ctrl.  This will open a window with machine info.  You should see your video card and its code. Since I have no supported sound card and Halo does not list any options for unknown soundcards, I used my video card code to configure the sound options.  This is relatively easy, and most likely what you’ll have to do also.  If you have a listed sound card, use the sound card code to configure the sound options.  Take note of your hardware codes.

Now open the “config.txt” file in your game directory.  You’ll see a list of rules at the top and number of codes and hardware names throughout the file.  I use an 8800 GT and my code is 0×0611.  It was recognized as “unknown,” but I changed that by adding my code to the list of nVidia cards.  At the end of the nVidia section I added:

0x0611 = "GeForce 8800 GT"

I then added my sound options beneath that. The two options that we’ll be dealing with are “EnableStopStart” and “HeadRelativeSpeech”. I think what happens when your sound becomes distorted in a way that some parts of it are not being heard, is that it’s not processing the sound fast enough to output it to the speakers. What the command “EnableStopStart” does is enable faster buffer functions, which I suppose older and cheaper sound cards do not support. So changing this option could make your sound better or worse, however it’s likely to fix any distorted choppy audio effects. The command “HeadRelativeSpeech” changes the 3D sound processing mode from disabled, to head-relative mode. Here’s a definition I found from MSDN:

In head-relative mode, the 3-D properties of the sound source are all relative to the current position, velocity, and orientation of the listener. As the listener moves and turns, the buffer is automatically repositioned in world space. Head-relative mode can be used for sounds such as the listener’s own footsteps. However, most head-relative sounds do not have to be 3-D sounds at all.

In disabled mode, 3-D sound processing is disabled and the sound seems to originate from the center of the listener’s head.

If you’re experiencing choppy sound only when hardware-acceleration is enabled, I recommend you list these two options beneath your video card like so:

0x0611 = "GeForce 8800 GT"
        HeadRelativeSpeech
        EnableStopStart
        break

The “break” parameter is needed. Save the file and start Halo. If this doesn’t fix your problem, try enabling one and not the other. Using head-relative mode, cutscenes with speech in large areas tend to produce a lot of unnecessary reverb on low-end and onboard soundcards (including my ALC888). The game sounds a lot better with it on, but if you can’t stand the speech during cutscenes, remove HeadRelativeSpeech. Also, review the other options at the top of the file.

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