how do you see the different streams turis? i wanna check that out. i always forget that the DX API covers audio as well as video. probably cause there haven't been any real advancements in audio in fucking years. i remember creative tried to launch their "gamer" edition x-fi soundcard with "audio RAM". but then no apps supported it, and it flopped. same with the "PhysX" hardware, it was a good idea, but never took off. So what are we stuck with? nearly all PC games are reduced to 16bit resolution, usually no more than 48khz resolution. which means that people's snazzy 24-bit 192khz soundblaster cards are useless. let alone something like "audio RAM". This is one area where the consoles are superior, if you think that BC2's sounds are amazing, listen to them with fully uncompressed HD audio on a PS3, you'll shit your pants. what we're getting is the gimped library of sounds.

ionno, i'm pissed that there haven't been any real advances in audio in the consumer market. CDs were what, 1980? 30 years ago? and we still haven't progressed past that. infact we've gone backwards. it's all MP3's now. all music CDs are 44.1khz 16-bit. even though the recording tools used support muuuch higher formats, it's all gimped. the only advances have been when it comes to compressing sound with better efficiancy like MP3's. no reason why they can't sell "audio dvds" with just uncompressed sound, we're at blu-rays already, and HVDs (holographic versatile discs) are right around the corner... it's fucking stupid.  So today all anyone hears are super compressed MP3s on their ipods, and then when they hear "normal" CD quality stuff on their PC games, they think that it sounds good. weird how back in the 80's you could argue that everything sounded better, as there was no compression going on. and in the 70's before that, when everything was analogue...