External loco sounds gone missing!

tony25 · Post by **tony25** » Sun Aug 25, 2002 12:23 am

I've just noticed that all my loco's external sounds have gone missing overnight! They used to work fine in all views, but are now only audible in the cabview. My once room-shakingly noisy 37's, 40's, 47's and 56's now whisper quietly past in views 2,3, and 4!!! Anyone else had this happen before, and whats the solution? The ONLY thing i've done to MSTS since my engines were growling away nicely before, is to copy the Enhanced Track Audio's ttype.dat file into my FictECML's UK1 folder. Is this the cause of it?

ChrisEllis · Post by **ChrisEllis** » Mon Aug 26, 2002 1:03 pm

i doubt it, i have the very same problem and it was discussed before, but if i recall there was no solution posted that anyone understood, it seems to happen with sound blaster sound cards and ur OS. anyone help?

BobLatimer · Post by **BobLatimer** » Mon Aug 26, 2002 8:57 pm

I had the same problem with my SoundBlasterLive Platinum 5.1.
No external sounds in view 2 if "pointing" at the loco - sounds re-appeared if Ctrl-right arrow to tender or wagon behind loco.

I think it started when I changed some settings on my sound card. After a lot of trial and error with the soundcard settings, I got the normal sounds back. Try changing the soundcard back to factory defaults - I think there is something in the software that came with the card that will do that.

mikesimpson · Post by **mikesimpson** » Mon Aug 26, 2002 10:17 pm

Just check that you have not inadvertently altered the sliders under Sound in the Options section of MSTS. If you move them to increase the ambient sounds, like cows Mooing, then you start to lose the loco sounds.

tony25 · Post by **tony25** » Tue Aug 27, 2002 6:23 am

Thanks for your replies. As i said, i haven't altered anything in MSTS - all external sounds and horns have dissappeared since i used MSTS last, which was about 3 weeks ago. I checked my sound options Mike, and all the sliders were set to maximum. So i clicked Restore Defaults and they didnt move. Also, all graphcs sliders are set to max, and all the check boxes are ticked. Again, with Restore Defaults, they didnt move. I assume this must be due to my 1gb of Ram, ATI Radeon 64mb 8500 Card, and Audigy Soundblaster? MSTS has run fine for months with all that hardware, and all game (ahem, sorry, simulator) settings cranked to full. I've even uninstalled my soundcard, downloaded the latest drivers, and reinstalled my soundcard, but the problem remains. The problem must lie elsewhere? Anyone got any other suggestions? Cheers.

Neptune50006 · Post by **Neptune50006** » Tue Aug 27, 2002 7:23 am

I've often found that if there's a lot going on graphics wise, the sim seems to ditch the sound. Probably so it can provide more processing power to the graphics dept. At the moment I'm working on an activity for the Woodhead route starting at Manchester, a notorious frame rate killer on its own, and noticed that as I added more AI traffic the sounds gradually disappeared, only to return once Manchester had been left behind.

tony25 · Post by **tony25** » Tue Aug 27, 2002 3:35 pm

I've spent the best part of today trying to iron out this problem (even so far as to throwing a sickie off work with a phantom bad back!) and what i've discovered is this... all engine sounds and horn growl away in view 1 at ALL times, but nothing in views 2,3 and 4. However, if i toggle quickly back and fore between views 1 and 2, the loco sounds will sometimes appear in 2 after a dozen or so attempts. Then the sounds will be present in 3 and 4. I spent a good half hour toggling views 2,3 and 4 and the sounds stayed, but as soon as i go back to 1 and out again, they're gone! Thats a strange one! However, the horn still never sounds unless i'm in view 1. I've tried this test with all my added locos (practically everything BR Blue on UKtrainsim) plus the default international locos. I even tried everything again after a complete uninstall and reinstall of MSTS, the official patches, FictECML, and Enhanced Track Audio. I haven't got much hair left to pull out after today, and have come to this conclusion........ when will MSTS 2 be out???!!!!!

scefhwil · Post by **scefhwil** » Tue Aug 27, 2002 5:41 pm

External sounds and audigy cards are a known, longstanding problem. This solution was posted originally by someone else on tr***s*m.co*.

http://forums.atomic-systems.com/viewtopic.php?t=4909

micksasse · Post by **micksasse** » Tue Aug 27, 2002 8:12 pm

Yep, I've got an Audigy card and have solved the problem now. Has the trainsim.com thread answered your question? If not, post again and I'll give details. Panic not!

tony25 · Post by **tony25** » Wed Aug 28, 2002 10:58 am

Thanks for your tips guys! Sure enough, that cured my problem! What i can't understand though, is i've been using my Audigy with maximum acceleration in dxdiag since i bought MSTS, and now for some strange reason i had to drop the slider down two notches to 'Basic' acceleration to get my sound effects back in all views! Basic????? Thats not a word in my vocabulary!!!! I was already miffed that the slider didnt have an option to go past Full Acceleration into 'Total Nutter Boy Racer Acceleration'!!!!! I'm beginning to wonder now about my Athlon 1900XP optimisation, and whether or not to try overclocking it? LOL. Anyway, thanks again for everyone's help and suggestions. See ya all in a few days with my next problem! Cheers.....

scefhwil · Post by **scefhwil** » Wed Aug 28, 2002 11:53 am

I think (but don't know for sure) that the issue is to do with the number of Streams (or voices) the sound card can support. The number seems to be less for hardware accel than software accel, and for 3D than 2D. So hardware 3D gives you alot less (maybe 32 to 64?) Streams compared to software 3D (maybe 128+?). All streams in the sim are given a Priority value so when the all available streams/voices are in use the lower prioiry ones are dropped in favour of high priority ones. It also seems that a degree of 'first come first served' applies to Streams of equal priority. Whistles have a lower priority than the engine sounds so are often the first to go.