X-sim onboard bass shaker device

[Fahim]

I been working over 10 hours on this and keep failing and wasting money.

Then I thought about the in software of x-sim on buttkicker/shaker.

I want to use buttkicker on standard 3.5mm anolog jack and use 5.1 optical sound at the same time for the racing game.

I went to the local elecronig store today and they sold me £60.00 x-fi sound blaster card which they said I can:

1)Run 5.1 optical for the movies , games
2)Run a analog lead into the buttkicker

ALL at the same time! = Fail. I feel upset and want to return it.

Is there anyway the x-sim software can help me out on this. I need 5.1 optical for the games 100%.

[yokoyoko]

You will need to have a sound card that can be dedicated to the transducer. This can be your motherboard’s sound device, a PCI sound card, or an external USB sound device. If you don’t already have a sound device that you can dedicate to the transducer, you will need to buy and install one. Most sound cards will work with X-Sim; however avoid the cheap USB thumb-style sound cards as they may not be compatible with the software. PCI sound cards are easy to find for <$10 and if you know somebody who works with PCs a lot, they probably have a bunch of old ones lying around and would be willing to give you one. It doesn’t need to be anything fancy.

In summary - you will need two soundcards! One for your game audio and one for the shaker. Every soundcard needs to be listed in the device manager seperate.

I would return the soundblaster xfi and get a cheap used soundcard for the shaker.

[Fahim]

I have tried this second sound card option.

It doesn't work for me because windows 7 only allows one at a time.

How can I dedicate this transducer to a separate sound card. When in audio deceive manager the green tick (in windows playback) can only apply to one audio output at a time.

[yokoyoko]

http://x-sim.de/forum/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=67&start=10 have a look at page 2 - the post from 01.nov.2012 13:39.

In the windows sound manager you choose the soundcard that gives the game sound. In x-sim you choose your shaker soundcard.

[Fahim]

So the x-sim plugin of the shaker does all the work. Sounds good.

But I rushed and gave back the x-fi sound card and bought a DAC unit from Ebay. When that comes I am going to...

Split the optical (spidf) into two and convert one of the outputs into analog and put the other one into the shaker device.

This means I can't use x-sim for shaker.

xsimsound.jpg (15.78 KiB) Viewed 5435 times

[yokoyoko]

So the x-sim plugin of the shaker does all the work. Sounds good.

But I rushed and gave back the x-fi sound card and bought a DAC unit from Ebay. When that comes I am going to...

Split the optical (spidf) into two and convert one of the outputs into analog and put the other one into the shaker device.

This means I can't use x-sim for shaker.

The attachment xsimsound.jpg is no longer available

Yes the second sound card is just used for x-sim (shaker) and you will have to set this up in the plugin!
Giving back the x-fi soundcard was a good idea - as it is to expensive for this task. Go to ebay for a cheap pci-soundcard. This will do the job. Just be aware that it does not use the same driver as your current soundcard for the game sounds.

The DAC will not work to use x-sim for a telemetry output to the shaker. As said you will need a second additional soundcard! With the DAC solution you could only use the low frequencies givenout by the game - but that is not as great as using telemetry outputs.

Here are two additonal documents (for better understanding) that you can find in the forum:

Tactile Transducer Setup Guide for iRacing 2-14-12.pdf

(1.04 MiB) Downloaded 1022 times

X-Sim BassShaker.pdf

(465.8 KiB) Downloaded 1050 times

[Fahim]

Well what I will do is.

Continue to do it my way. But also can buy a very cheap sound card second hand £10/12 euros
and see if it is better x-sim way.

Does x-sim work with the sound or with the car movement values?

I ask this because if x-sim uses the sound, how does a game like Assetto Corsa output to 2 programs. (you don't need to answer this if it sounds dumb )

[yokoyoko]

Here are nearly no dumb questions!

X-sim does not use the sound! this is the big difference and advantage. It uses the telemetry data of the game - this is f.e. car movement, road textures, curbs, rpm... all the stuff you can setup in the math-axis. Just like you do for the motion for your actuators.

[Fahim]

This is interesting.


What do you think then the pro's and con's do doing it sound way or value/telemetry way ?
Some must have advantage over the other.

Maybe I can get another butt kicker with amp and do it both ways lol
Or does telemetry way completely kick ass over sound way.

There's a lot of "ways" in this post. It's my way or the high way.

[RacingMat]

- if there is in the game a specific sound track dedicated to bass shaker: it's perfect!
the developper gives the exact frequence and volume he designed... but I haven't heard of such games yet! maybe in the years to come

- if you use the general sound track of the game, you will get some very good and appropriate vibrations!
... except when your lap time will be announced... not very good for immersion and realism!

- if you compute telemetry data, you can imagine many ways to translate this to vibration. The RPM and shift changes are easily translated and effective (see below). But low frequencies should have high volume (=vibration amplitude) and that's difficult to compute.

here is the detailed setup with 2 computers :
- 1 computer to send game sounds
- 1 other computer to send Xsim calculated signal to buttkicker via its own soundcard.
viewtopic.php?f=30&t=67&start=20#p7944