A sound card is an internal expansion card that provides input and output of audio signals to and from a computer under the control of computer programs. The term sound card is also applied to external audio interfaces used for professional audio applications.
Binaural recording is a method of recording sound that uses two microphones, arranged with the intent to create a 3D stereo sound sensation for the listener of actually being in the room with the performers or instruments. This effect is often created using a technique known as dummy head recording, wherein a mannequin head is fitted with a microphone in each ear. Binaural recording is intended for replay using headphones and will not translate properly over stereo speakers. This idea of a three-dimensional or "internal" form of sound has also translated into useful advancement of technology in many things such as stethoscopes creating "in-head" acoustics and IMAX movies being able to create a three-dimensional acoustic experience.
A head-related transfer function (HRTF) is a response that characterizes how an ear receives a sound from a point in space. As sound strikes the listener, the size and shape of the head, ears, ear canal, density of the head, size and shape of nasal and oral cavities, all transform the sound and affect how it is perceived, boosting some frequencies and attenuating others. Generally speaking, the HRTF boosts frequencies from 2–5 kHz with a primary resonance of +17 dB at 2,700 Hz. But the response curve is more complex than a single bump, affects a broad frequency spectrum, and varies significantly from person to person.
The Environmental Audio Extensions are a number of digital signal processing presets for audio, present in Creative Technology Sound Blaster sound cards starting with the Sound Blaster Live and the Creative NOMAD/Creative ZEN product lines. Due to the release of Windows Vista in 2007, which deprecated the DirectSound3D API that EAX was based on, Creative discouraged EAX implementation in favour of its OpenAL-based EFX equivalent – though at that point relatively few games used the API.
DirectSound is a deprecated software component of the Microsoft DirectX library for the Windows operating system, superseded by XAudio2. It provides a low-latency interface to sound card drivers written for Windows 95 through Windows XP and can handle the mixing and recording of multiple audio streams. DirectSound was originally written for Microsoft by John Miles.
3D audio effects are a group of sound effects that manipulate the sound produced by stereo speakers, surround-sound speakers, speaker-arrays, or headphones. This frequently involves the virtual placement of sound sources anywhere in three-dimensional space, including behind, above or below the listener.
QSound Labs is an audio technology company based in Calgary, Canada. It is primarily a developer and provider of audio enhancement technologies for entertainment and communications devices and software. The company is best known as a pioneer of 3D audio effects, beginning with speaker-targeted positional 3D technology applied to arcade video games and professional music and film soundtrack production. QSound was founded by Larry Ryckman (CEO), Danny Lowe, and John Lees. Jimmy Iovine served as SVP of Music and Shelly Yakus as VP of Audio Engineering in its formative years.
An output device is any piece of computer hardware that converts information or data into a human-perceptible form or, historically, into a physical machine-readable form for use with other non-computerized equipment. It can be text, graphics, tactile, audio, or video. Examples include monitors, printers, speakers, headphones, projectors, GPS devices, optical mark readers, and braille readers.
QSound is the original name for a positional three-dimensional (3D) sound processing algorithm from QSound Labs that creates 3D audio effects from multiple monophonic sources and sums the outputs to two channels for presentation over regular stereo speakers. QSound was eventually re-dubbed "Q1" after the introduction of "Q2", a positional 3D algorithm for headphones. When multi-speaker surround system support was later added to the positional 3D process, the QSound positional 3D audio process became known simply as "Q3D". QSound was founded by Larry Ryckman (CEO), Danny Lowe and John Lees. Jimmy Iovine served as senior vice president of music and Shelly Yakus as vice president of audio engineering in its formative years.
Sound Blaster X-Fi is a lineup of sound cards in Creative Technology's Sound Blaster series.
The Turtle Beach Corporation is an American gaming accessory manufacturer based in San Diego, California. The company has roots dating back to the 1970s where it developed sound cards, MIDI synthesizers, and various audio software packages and network audio devices. The company began making gaming headsets in 2005.
Aureal Semiconductor Inc. was an American electronics manufacturer, best known throughout the mid-late 1990s for their PC sound card technologies including A3D and the Vortex The company was the reincarnation of the, at the time, bankrupt Media Vision Technology, who developed and manufactured multimedia peripherals such as the Pro Audio Spectrum 16.
AMD Live! is the name of AMD's initiative in 2005 aimed at gathering the support of professional musicians and other media producers behind its hardware products. The primary focus of this initiative was the Opteron server- and workstation-class central processing units (CPUs).
GameCODA is an audio middleware product by Sensaura designed for game developers to create realistic sound environments in video games. It allows development for the following platforms: Microsoft Windows, Xbox, Xbox 360, PlayStation 2 and GameCube. GameCODA incorporates several audio technologies that were developed by Sensaura, which includes Sensaura's HRTF algorithms, MacroFX™, ZoomFX™ and EnvironmentFX™.
Hercules Computer Technology, Inc. was a manufacturer of computer peripherals for PCs and Macs founded in 1982.
The Wave Blaster was an add-on MIDI-synthesizer for Creative Sound Blaster 16 and Sound Blaster AWE32 family of PC soundcards. It was a sample-based synthesis General MIDI compliant synthesizer. For General MIDI scores, the Wave Blaster's wavetable-engine produced more realistic instrumental music than the SB16's onboard Yamaha-OPL3.
Ambiophonics is a method in the public domain that employs digital signal processing (DSP) and two loudspeakers directly in front of the listener in order to improve reproduction of stereophonic and 5.1 surround sound for music, movies, and games in home theaters, gaming PCs, workstations, or studio monitoring applications. First implemented using mechanical means in 1986, today a number of hardware and VST plug-in makers offer Ambiophonic DSP. Ambiophonics eliminates crosstalk inherent in the conventional stereo triangle speaker placement, and thereby generates a speaker-binaural soundfield that emulates headphone-binaural sound, and creates for the listener improved perception of reality of recorded auditory scenes. A second speaker pair can be added in back in order to enable 360° surround sound reproduction. Additional surround speakers may be used for hall ambience, including height, if desired.
Creative Technology Ltd., or Creative Labs Pte Ltd., is a Singaporean multinational electronics company mainly dealing with audio technologies and products such as speakers, headphones, sound cards and other digital media. Founded by Sim Wong Hoo, Creative was highly influential in the advancement of PC audio in the 1990s following the introduction of its Sound Blaster card and technologies; the company continues to develop Sound Blaster products including embedding it with partnered mainboard manufacturers and laptops.
Dolby Headphone is a technology developed by Lake Technology (Australia), that later sold marketing rights to Dolby Laboratories, sometimes referred to as Mobile Surround, which creates a virtual surround sound environment in real-time using any set of two-channel stereo headphones. It takes as input either a 5.1 or a 7.1 channel signal, a Dolby Pro Logic II encoded 2 channel signal or a stereo 2 channel signal. It sends as output a 2 channel stereo signal that includes audio cues intended to place the input channels in a simulated virtual soundstage.
The Central Research Laboratories, often referred to as CRL, was a British research laboratory that originally belonged to the EMI Corporation.
