My first Windows 8 experience

[PeterSt]

but it does suddenly sound another thing from attended , and I don't like it

To me this reads as Attended not sounding good, implying that Unattended sounds good.

But did you want to say that ?

Peter

[manisandher]

Huh? It seems totally clear to me that Stefano does not like Unattended.

Mani.

[stefanobilliani]

i do mean i prefere attended :-)

[PeterSt]

Ok, totally clear now. Thanks.

[PeterSt]

What part, if any, of the audio foundation in Win8 does XXHE utilize?

Jud, I already typed a sort of extensive reply, but it is/was a bit moot because a. the answer you seek is not known anyway and b. what I was suggesting in that not posted post by now is proven by me ...

Later.
Peter

[PeterSt]

... But since I have proven it anyway, if you provide me a picture of the WASAPI audio stack, which does not seem to exist for W8, I can show you.

I don't mean the picture about hardware offloading (like it in XP still worked) or anything about ARM/Surface WASAPI capabilities ...

Peter

[manisandher]

... what I was suggesting in that not posted post by now is proven by me ...

Ah, maybe I should delete the two threads I've just started on CA and WBF, asking if anyone has any insights about what might be causing W8 to sound weird.

Looking forward to hearing what you've come up with though...

Mani.

[Jud]

... But since I have proven it anyway, if you provide me a picture of the WASAPI audio stack, which does not seem to exist for W8, I can show you.

I don't mean the picture about hardware offloading (like it in XP still worked) or anything about ARM/Surface WASAPI capabilities ...

Peter

I will see if I can get hold of something, because I'm very curious to learn something about this, regardless of the happy fact (for all of us) you have found what you were seeking.

[Jud]

... But since I have proven it anyway, if you provide me a picture of the WASAPI audio stack, which does not seem to exist for W8, I can show you.

I don't mean the picture about hardware offloading (like it in XP still worked) or anything about ARM/Surface WASAPI capabilities ...

Peter

I will see if I can get hold of something, because I'm very curious to learn something about this, regardless of the happy fact (for all of us) you have found what you were seeking.

Well, I was not successful.   

The nicest diagram I could find was from back in Vista days.  I only found a couple of interesting pages of comments that seem to me to directly contradict each other, and the WASAPI page from the MS Developer Network library.

http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/winappswithnativecode/thread/a6785334-f7f5-4f4c-b02c-0bfaf7e94643/

http://blog.cakewalk.com/windows-8-a-benchmark-for-music-production-applications/

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd371455(v=vs.85).aspx

But I hope you will be kind enough to give a little explanation anyway.   

[Scroobius]

Peter mentioned earlier regarding noise caused by a SMPS in a display on his hifi ring main.

My system has a dedicated and separately earthed (spike in garden) mains supply via a dedicated balanced transformer. NOS1, PC and the amp are the only items plugged into that dedicated supply. Alas Bluetooth and remote control do not work for me under W8 so a display and keyboard have returned to my living room. No real problem with that. The display is plugged into the house ring main (an outlet is nearby). And of course I did make sure that the earth of the display is completely isolated from the PC (connecting the mains ring earth to the hifi mains earth would have been a very bad thing to do with a balanced supply).

So after listening for a while last night I unplugged the display from the mains. The result was a noticeable (but not earth shattering) improvement in resolution. But with the display plugged in the SQ is still very fine indeed not edgy. But there is definitely an improvement without the display plugged in.

Nick - something else for you to hear in your visit. We could drive ourselves completely nuts with all the things we have to listen to this time ha ha.

Paul

[phantomax]

Hello,

I have been following the W8 thread green of envy from the distance because I had reflashed the Audiotrak Prodigy HD2 soundcard in order to use ESI drivers and ESI has not provided drivers for W8. Audiotrak has W8 drivers ( VIA Envy) but I was too afraid to revert the situation because I fried my previous soundcard messing with it. But despite of that I couldn't resist myself to jump into the bullring though I could use the MoBo soundard only and guess what, the W7(1.08 version) ESI drivers works in W8.
Is too early to give conclusions but the sound seems to be better overall. Although I am not a happy NOS user I am using  Peter's settings as starting point.
The only drawback is that I have some problems with unattended: cover doesn't appear and commands dont´t work properly. Probably this issue has been addressed somewhere but I have not read the thread exhaustively yet and besides that there is my low level comprehension issue (and not only in english I'm afraid)

Maxi

[PeterSt]

Good to be persistent Maxi.
And indeed, Coverart does not work in Unattended for W8.

Peter

[phantomax]

There is no way back to W7. Although it sounds very detailed (sorry Peter) and pleasant, there was a lightweight
presentation compared with W8. The sound in W8 is rich, fullbodied and crystal clear, by far more engaging and natural to my ears.

Maxi

[Scroobius]

At last I now have clean W7 and W8 installs - totally clean without any unnecessary software. For the first time in a long time both W8 and W7 (totally separate discs) work absolutely fine with no random stops and no error messages. No more bluetooth / RDC installs for me - oh boy have they caused problems on my system.

Listening to W8 versus W7 it is still the case that I much prefer W8 it is crystal clear, instruments sound more natural the individual strands of music are easier to follow. By comparison W7 sounds a tad opaque. Individual strands of music not so easy to follow. BUT I have to say there are times when the sound stage does sound odd. Since I heard mono with very strange effects returning to stereo sounds a little odd. But then again I put a high quality recording on and the sound stage is fantastic. Jury is out on that. But anyway for me those are not important the detail and timbre of instruments always is the most important thing for me and W8 sounds fantastic in those respects.

If there is a problem with W8 I just hope that fixing it does not reduce what I like about W8.

Paul

[PeterSt]

All right. So, it has gone quiet here eh ? Well, let's stirr a bit then. Ok, not to stirr deliberately, but it will happen anyway.

Many have spent much time on Windows 8 and I am not counting myself out. But it seems that the time spent is to no avail. Or rather at least I thought to better spend my time on Windows 7 again and which is what I sort of promised further down in this topic; apply the things learnt from Windows 8 and how to get that better, to Windows 7. And so I did the past two weeks (or was it only one week ? I forgot).

I started to post this 4 days ago but thought to wait till the listening session of the day had passed to be more sure. And so 3 more listening sessions passed and yes I am sure.

What I did I could have done just as well over 2 years ago and as I told before, just motivate me. And so, stupid Windows 8 motivated me. Let's say we can hear goodies from it but the baddies are overwhelming; and with the goodies as a reference, how to squeeze that out of Windows 7 ...

Easy ...

Ok, not so easy at all, and the result is that W7 is now on a tight rope, balancing from left to right and just not falling over. Just not. Or maybe it will at yours, but not here.

With these riddles in the background, this is what I could squeeze out :

- Stereo image as "separated" as W8, but integrated;
- Square sounds are way more profound but they now carry a roar. Envelope and decay are heard no matter their high frequency;
- Long lasting cymbals with a tonality in between "old W7" and W8;
- Detail in the mid which exhibits complete new instruments in known tracks;
- Unsurpassed undistorted higs (hey, PeterSt uses SFS=1 !);
- Freshness from older albums which were "dead"/flat before;
and last but foremost not least :
- Totally completely nothing wrong with it.

And W8 is totally wrong. Just because I say so. Ok, - think so.

Why am I posting this ?
Because I see more and more people runnning into problems for various reasons; Not everybody is easy on installing OSes and while "dual boot" sounds like space ships they upgrade and can't go back. This, while there's actually nobody who is happy with it and those who seem to be, have to be aliens.

Nobody should try Windows 8 only because it seems interesting.

It may be interesting all right, but all you will receive is a large dose of annoyance. You won't get it right because it is not right. And if it is, I personally can't get it there which is important.

So, I turned the world upside down and created a W7 which is so d*mn good that you won't have any reason ever anymore to try W8. There will be no doubt, and more importantly : all the "interesting" from W8 will be in W7, and all what's left in the comparison is the strangeness of W8.

Nobody needs to agree with this, and everybody not agreeing certainly is allowed to speak up as much as he wants. It is nothing to fight over you know. But it may be good to know that I gave up and without new insight it will stay like that.

Your new W7 will be up in something like 10 hours from now.
Peter