Game Technologies: Audio / XACT - Game Technologies: DirectX, XNA, XACT, etc.
Recent update: 2008-3-21

Is it me, or are XACT notif. events partly broken in the Beta?

508 byte By PaulModzelewski at 2008-3-7
I'm using the WaveStopped and/or CueStopped events to build a simple dynamic music system, but the Cue object returned in the EventArgs of every Event has an empty string for the Name property. This makes the events useless, since I have no idea what Cue a given event pertains to. Is this a ...

Playing drum sounds in succession

314 byte By break_r at 2008-3-6
Hi,Is it possible to play short drum sounds (ie. kick, snare, hi-hat) in succession, one after the other without a noticable delay?On the cue stop notification I begin playing the next sound but there is an obvious gap between the sounds.So, is it possible to play short drum sounds ...

How to play Ogg files in DirectSound with C++?

46 byte By 鼯鼠 at 2008-3-5
How to play Ogg files in DirectSound with C++?

Playing drum sounds in succession

314 byte By break_r at 2008-3-3
Hi,Is it possible to play short drum sounds (ie. kick, snare, hi-hat) in succession, one after the other without a noticable delay?On the cue stop notification I begin playing the next sound but there is an obvious gap between the sounds.So, is it possible to play short drum sounds ...

Random Offset and Master Volume

1377 byte By hydrix13 at 2008-3-1
Hello. Long time watcher, first time poster.(August 2006 SDKversion 2.0windows version 9.14.701.0content version 40)I have been using Xact for only a month or so but I have found some bugs (that i want to make sure are bugs and not just me being dumb.)Master Volume: I am trying to adjust the ...

Audio Skipping in game

2407 byte By Strakian at 2008-2-28
Hey guys,I'm having a bizzare issue in my teams game. The first time a level is loaded, and played through the sound is spot on. After our victory screen comes up and you hit continue to go to the next level, the next level sound chops. It sounds like it's playing a fractional part of the ...

Cannot load XACT Data (InvalidDataException)

515 byte By dusda at 2008-2-27
I am attempting to load a set of XACT data files, similar to how the XNA Starter Kit does so. I get an InvalidDataException when it attempts to load the xgs file, however. "XACT could not load the data provided. Make sure you are using the correct version of the XACT tool."I am using ...

problems auditioning transitions

2501 byte By ReneC at 2008-2-26
Hi, I'm working on some interactive music and I'm having issues auditioning my transitions. Here's what I have going: XACT 2.0 August release A cue named "MusicLevel1" that has IsInteractive set to true. A variable named "Intensity" that has a range of 1-100 A sound ...

Xact to get soudn data

487 byte By EricBrown at 2008-2-25
I was wondering if any one could tel me how to get at the currently playing sound data in XACT, Iwant to try my hand at writing a simple spectral analyzer to learn XNA, with the hopeof throwing together a couple simple visualizers that can run on both platforms.My goal is to either play a ...

Play Wave Properties

369 byte By xgalaxy at 2008-2-24
I'm trying to change the Play Wave property 'LoopEvent' to 'Yes' but I get the error "Object reference not set to an instance of an object."I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong. I have a cue and track setup, with a Play Wave event, and it contains a sound. What am I missing?All I ...

Creative X-Fi support

217 byte By Jorne at 2008-2-23
Hi I was wondering if XNA / XACT can support the advanced features of Creative's X-Fi range of soundcards. I mean things like preloading sounds using X-Ram which is supposed to help increase frame rates.

How to play all sounds in a cue in a row?

300 byte By Zingam at 2008-2-22
How to play all sounds in a cue in a row? I've just started with XNA. I've added multiple .wavs into a wave bank then I created a cue and added all sounds to it. Now I want to play them in a row. I've set the property Ordered, etc. but when I call m_Cue.Play(); only the first sound is played....

How control Sound range that can be listen in XACT tool ?

570 byte By Henzrake at 2008-2-22
How control Sound range that can be listen in XACT tool ?for example, Some Sound can be heard in 0.5 mile.but Another Sound can be heard in 0.1 mile.Of Course, Volume is controled by distance.(close big, Far small)and If Distance between Emitter and Listener go over the range, Volume value is ...

IXACTEngine::GetGlobalVariable crushed application

1291 byte By DonSergio at 2008-2-21
I have code:// ...IXACTEngine* m_pXACTEngine// ... create m_pXACEngine and so onXACT_RUNTIME_PARAMETERS xactParams;ZeroMemory(&xactParams, sizeof(xactParams));/*fill xactParams excludeXACT_RUNTIME_PARAMETERS ::globalSettingsBufferSize; // == 0XACT_RUNTIME_PARAMETERS ::globalSettingsFlags; ...

XACT Cue Playback Latency vs. DirectSound

603 byte By guile0 at 2008-2-20
I'm currently working on a piece of sound software that performs realtime quantizing based on eventual in-game actions. Since I need to play sounds on beat, it's important that the time from the Play() call is made on a buffer/cue to the time it actually starts coming out the speakers is very ...

Creative X-Fi support

225 byte By Jorne at 2008-2-19
Hi I was wondering if XNA / XACT can support the advanced features of Creative's X-Fi range of soundcards. I mean things like preloading sounds using X-Ram which is supposed to help increase frame rates. </span>

XACT crashes instantly under Vista - fixed by run as admin

192 byte By ector at 2008-2-18
I have to set the XACT tool to run as admin to get it to run at all on Vista RC1. Is this supposed to happen? XACT shouldn't be doing anything requiring administrator... </span>

Volume Control In runtime....

370 byte By Henzrake at 2008-2-17
I Want to control Volume of each Cue In My Code.I use this code:Index = pCue->GetVariableIndex( "Volume" );pCue->SetVariable( Index, (XACTVARIABLEVALUE) fVolume );but Index Value is 65535....Of Cource, I Create and Link RPC In XACT Creation tool..please teach me...How can ...

unknown error code

218 byte By AaronB at 2008-2-16
when i call: theSoundBank->Prepare(index, 0, 0, &myCue); it returns 0x8AC70013 and sets myCue to null. GetLastError() returns 0. what does 0x8AC70013 mean? FormatMessage does not work on that error code.

How replay music in XACT?

191 byte By Henzrake at 2008-2-15
I want to replay Music(ex : BG) using "cue->play()" or "SoundBank->Play()" func is played Once.. How replay Music forever? answer plz....

InvalidCueException

1064 byte By dusda at 2008-2-15
Wow, I'm full of problems today. public static Cue Play(Sounds sound) { Cue value = soundbank.GetCue(cueNames[(int)sound]); value.Play(); return value; }This simple method takes in a Sounds enumeration, which I made based on the XNA framework starter kit. The enum basically is the string[] ...

Cannot load XACT Data (InvalidDataException)

502 byte By dusda at 2008-2-15
I am attempting to load a set of XACT data files, similar to how the XNA Starter Kit does so. I get an InvalidDataException when it attempts to load the xgs file, however. "XACT could not load the data provided. Make sure you are using the correct version of the XACT tool."I am using ...

Auditioning not working on Windows -> Problem solved

237 byte By SpaceDog at 2008-2-15
Using the XACT GUI, I have been unable to get anything to play through auditioning. I start and connect to the XACT Audio Console, get no errors, but the sounds just don't play. The in-game sound works fine. Anyone else experience this?

XACT crashes instantly under Vista - fixed by run as admin

184 byte By ector at 2008-2-15
I have to set the XACT tool to run as admin to get it to run at all on Vista RC1. Is this supposed to happen? XACT shouldn't be doing anything requiring administrator...

XACT and occlusion

1101 byte By ReneC at 2008-2-14
Hi all. Just a quick Q about how to go about setting occlusion parameters in XACT:I'm unfamiliar with exatly how occlusion data is generated within agame engine, and I'm trying to anticipate some needs for an upcomingproject.First off, would it be simple for a game engine to generate a ...

Auditioning not working on Windows

237 byte By SpaceDog at 2008-2-14
Using the XACT GUI, I have been unable to get anything to play through auditioning. I start and connect to the XACT Audio Console, get no errors, but the sounds just don't play. The in-game sound works fine. Anyone else experience this?

Pause to Stop = Bug?

229 byte By Macheezmo at 2008-2-13
It seems that if I pause a cue, then try to stop it, it resumes the playback and it can't be stopped by any means whatsoever short of ending the program. I'm not sure if this is a bug or if maybe I'm not doing something right.

Who is using XACT?

744 byte By DuganPorter-Microsoft at 2008-2-13
If you are using or considering XACT for your product, could you let us know?Recently we heard from a developer who was about ready to ship an XACT title, and we had no idea. We try to provide as much direct support to early adopters as we can, help them with any problems they bump into, etc; ...

XACT Exceptions/Bugs

2094 byte By perun at 2008-2-12
Hi,I haven't found any XACT bugs related forum so I will put exceptions or bugs I notice in this thread.Exception: System.NullReferenceExceptionXACT: from August 2006 DXSDK Exception occured during loading other project. There were no wave/sound banks in current project.- Begin Dump Exception ...

ADPCM looping

1285 byte By ReneC at 2008-2-11
From the documentation:Because ADPCM uses sample "blocks" that are aligned one after theother, a wave compressed with ADPCM may have an unfinished, "partial"block at its end. The ADPCM decoder generates silence for the remainderof this partial block which will cause the wave ...

GetCue - Duplicates Sound Buffer?

979 byte By guile0 at 2008-2-10
Hi all, I've been checking out XACT/XNA a bit recently but wasn't going to commit to it just yet on my current project. That is until I just ran into a huge issue - I'm using Managed DirectSound in C# but don't see an equivalent to the C++ IDirectSound8::DuplicateSoundBuffer() function. I ...

XACT Audio / Minor Rant

2443 byte By XNA4ZX80 at 2008-2-10
<minor-rant>Can you please, *please* consider supporting a more low level way to play sounds than XACT.The Microsoft Cross Platform Audio Creation Tool (XACT) is a pain to use. I mean seriously how many devs do you have budget for to maintain this so called "IDE"? It might be ...

GetCue - Duplicates Sound Buffer?

987 byte By guile0 at 2008-2-8
Hi all, I've been checking out XACT/XNA a bit recently but wasn't going to commit to it just yet on my current project. That is until I just ran into a huge issue - I'm using Managed DirectSound in C# but don't see an equivalent to the C++ IDirectSound8::DuplicateSoundBuffer() function. I ...

Getting cue names

1039 byte By perun at 2008-2-8
Hi,I would like to ask about methods for getting cue names. XACT provide two ways to expose that names but both methods are not enought for me. Generating header with cue indexes oppose the main idea of XACT in my opinion because it involve programmer needlessly. Generating cue list is not good ...

XACT Audio / Minor Rant

2452 byte By XNA4ZX80 at 2008-2-7
<minor-rant>Can you please, *please* consider supporting a more low level way to play sounds than XACT.The Microsoft Cross Platform Audio Creation Tool (XACT) is a pain to use. I mean seriously how many devs do you have budget for to maintain this so called "IDE"? It might be ...

Play Wave Properties

382 byte By xgalaxy at 2008-2-7
I'm trying to change the Play Wave property 'LoopEvent' to 'Yes' but I get the error "Object reference not set to an instance of an object."I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong. I have a cue and track setup, with a Play Wave event, and it contains a sound. What am I missing?All I ...

ADPCM looping

1285 byte By ReneC at 2008-2-7
From the documentation:Because ADPCM uses sample "blocks" that are aligned one after theother, a wave compressed with ADPCM may have an unfinished, "partial"block at its end. The ADPCM decoder generates silence for the remainderof this partial block which will cause the wave ...

VersionNotFoundException

2774 byte By perun at 2008-2-7
I get this exception in XACT from August DXSDK.This looks like .NET related error. I've found it's raported by other .NET users.I can repeat it:I play two cues in repeat mode and watch variables in Variables Settings window. I change one of the variables by slider and sort rows by ...

XMA on windows?

349 byte By Sniffy at 2008-2-6
Now that the Feb SDK XACT is out, I see it now supports ADPCM. However, we would really like the Windows XACT to support XMA format on PC (like it does on Xbox360). We need the better compression rates that XMA gives over ADPCM. Is there any chance of this happening, or is XMA something ...

IXACTEngine::GetRendererCount memory overwriting

165 byte By irarabesc at 2008-2-6
The IXACTEngine::GetRendererCount method takes one parameter of the pointer to WORD type, but writes by that pointer a DWORD value. DXSDK version is August 2006.

XACT build files only in Xbox folder

464 byte By ToniGreco at 2008-2-5
Hello,I have Visual Studio (C#) 2005 Express, DirectX SDK August 2006 and XNA Express.I follow tutorial in XNA help to use XACT, but when I build it create file onlyinside Xbox folder, notthing in Win folder.On caption of XACT application it say "... (XACT) v2.0 (Xbox 360)".If I use ...

Getting cue names

1026 byte By perun at 2008-2-5
Hi,I would like to ask about methods for getting cue names. XACT provide two ways to expose that names but both methods are not enought for me. Generating header with cue indexes oppose the main idea of XACT in my opinion because it involve programmer needlessly. Generating cue list is not good ...

Capturing microphone in Managed DirectX 10 (2.0.0.0)

799 byte By travio_peth at 2008-2-4
Hi all,I was wondering if anyone has been able to record microphone input with managed directx 10 (i'm using c# but any language will help!).Previously it was done in DirectSound, using a CaptureBuffer and an elusive "Read()" function (now missing in 2.0.0.0). I have read a number of ...

XACT and occlusion

1101 byte By ReneC at 2008-2-4
Hi all. Just a quick Q about how to go about setting occlusion parameters in XACT:I'm unfamiliar with exatly how occlusion data is generated within agame engine, and I'm trying to anticipate some needs for an upcomingproject.First off, would it be simple for a game engine to generate a ...

Auditioning not working on Windows

237 byte By SpaceDog at 2008-2-4
Using the XACT GUI, I have been unable to get anything to play through auditioning. I start and connect to the XACT Audio Console, get no errors, but the sounds just don't play. The in-game sound works fine. Anyone else experience this?

how change pitch of playing sound?

410 byte By perun at 2008-2-4
Hi,is there direct way to change pitch of all (or group) of playing sounds? I want to implement slow motion effect and need to do some pitch shifting to sychronize sound to time speed. I noticed that in XACT one is able to shift pitch only about one octave up/down what could be not enough to ...

CreateInMemoryWaveBank returns -1966669817

664 byte By edenxiii at 2008-2-3
With the release of the April SDK, our team decided to use XACT instead of DA, but we're getting a strange return code from CreateInMemoryWaveBank: -1966669817. I've never seen this HRESULT code, not can I find what it means. The debug output reports:Error: Invalid wavebank signature in ...

SetChannelVolume

148 byte By SpaceDog at 2008-2-3
I read in another post here that SetChannelVolume is not supported on Windows. Is this still the case with June SDK? The method always returns S_OK.

How replay music in XACT?

191 byte By Henzrake at 2008-2-2
I want to replay Music(ex : BG) using "cue->play()" or "SoundBank->Play()" func is played Once.. How replay Music forever? answer plz....

Question for CreateInMemoryWaveBank

1312 byte By Fatming at 2008-2-2
I want to load *.xwb file,this function is from "XBUtil.h"HRESULT XBUtil_LoadFile( const WCHAR* strFile, VOID** ppFileData, DWORD* pdwSize ){// use as big as file size memory "CreateFile" and get file size to "malloc" buffet and go to "ReadFile" and ...