Hey all, For some unknown reason, when I play my game on my new computer (vista) there is no distance attentuation. By this I mean sounds SHOULD be quieter the further away they are from the listener object.. however, on my new computer they are not - they play at maximum volume no matter what the distance. I know this isn't a problem with my game logic, because when I play the game on my older computer (xp) there IS distance attenuation, which means that I've set up the listener and source objects correctly. So I don't know if it's a Vista thing.. or just this specific computer.. but something is going wrong. Because running the exact same executable on these 2 computers is producing different results. Furthermore, when I ran it on both computers, I was including these 3 necessary files in the same folder as the .exe: alut.dll OpenAL32.dll wrap_oal.dll So it should be using the same .dll files as well! I tested that it actually was using each of these files by removing each one of them separately and trying to the run the program, and it wouldn't work. So I know that it's not using some version in system32 or something. Anyway, same executable, same .dlls.. different computer, different result. It's weird I say.. DAMN WEIRD!! Any ideas? Thanks, Ben.

What do you mean by OpenAL device?

I just got my friend who also has Vista to test this distance attenuation, and he had the same problem.

I went to the openAL website and found this link regarding Vista and OpenAL:

http://connect.creativelabs.com/openal/OpenAL%20Wiki/OpenAL%C2%AE%20and%20Windows%20Vista%E2%84%A2.aspx

It didn't really provide any solutions.. but had this to say:

"
OpenAL on Windows Vista
As already stated above, Microsoft® will be removing DirectSound 3D Hardware support from Direct X with the launch of Windows Vista. DirectSound and DirectSound3D will still function; however, they will no longer use hardware acceleration.

The native OpenAL devices on Sound Blaster Audigy and Sound Blaster X-Fi™ soundcards do not use DirectSound or DirectSound 3D and so they will be completely unaffected. For games that use these devices, nothing will change. The game will continue to enjoy hardware based 3D audio and effects.

The Generic Hardware device will no longer be available, as it requires the use of hardware DirectSound 3D Buffers. Instead, this device will gracefully, and automatically, fallback to using the Generic Software device, which will continue to work as before.
"


I'm not entirely sure what to make of this.. but would this suggest that I'm using "The Generic Hardware" device, which is why I'm not getting the nice 3D sound that I require?

Ok, cool.

I looked into that a bit but there were a few things I'm unsure about.

1) Is it portable (windows, unix, mac).

2) Does it have any annoying licensing issues (or at least.. more annoying than OpenAL)

3) How do I install it on windows? All I found were those tarball things..


Thanks,
Ben.

Ok, well I think I figured out how to build it with CMake and Visual C++.. I configured it to Release and it successfully compiled.

I replaced the existing openal32.lib in C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\VC\lib with the new openal32.lib. I also replaced the existing openal32.dll with the new one, and have it sitting next to my exe.

I recompiled my game with the new lib, and that worked. I double clicked on the game with the new dll, and that worked too. Everything was going fine until I started playing and there was no sound.. and now I don't know what to do.

I still have wrap_oal.dll and alut.dll sitting alongside my exe and openal32.dll, and I haven't changed any of my code. Could these be the problems? Do I have to change any of my code, or remove/updated either of the other 2 dlls?

Thx,
Ben.