So in my never ending quest to find good virtual surround for headphones I have a new favorite.

Sycraft

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Redscape Audio. This one is seriously good. It isn't perfect, I still prefer my speakers slightly... but to be fair I have Genelec speakers, which are about as good as they get. It is competent software, sets up a virtual speaker device that hangs around, even if the software is shut down (so apps don't freak out) that'll work with WASAPI (shared or exclusive) apps, DirectSound, MME, etc. It also can be switched to ASIO mode. It then outputs to the sound device of your choice via ASIO or WASAPI. Its room virtualization is very good, some of the most convincing I've heard and it is nice an adjustable. You can control how live the room is, where the virtual speakers are located, etc.

What makes it the top though is head tracking. Like Waves NX is has a headtracker you can get that that is what it takes to go from good to great. Virtualization without headtracking always sounds wrong because it sounds like you've bolted the speakers to hour head and they move with you. The headtracker is wired, which does mean you have another wire to run but it also means it updates a lot faster than Nx, which gives it a more convincing result. On top of all that, it has a PEQ built in so you can adjust for your headphones' response if you don't have an outboard EQ.

Also works great in Windows 11, some of the ones I've tried have been abandoned and don't work in modern OSes.

I'm real pleased. Not perfect but the best I've yet personally tried. Not too expensive either. $40 for the software, $100 for the software and headtracker. Worth giving a look at if you want good surround but can't always blast your speakers :).
 
Redscape Audio. This one is seriously good. It isn't perfect, I still prefer my speakers slightly... but to be fair I have Genelec speakers, which are about as good as they get. It is competent software, sets up a virtual speaker device that hangs around, even if the software is shut down (so apps don't freak out) that'll work with WASAPI (shared or exclusive) apps, DirectSound, MME, etc. It also can be switched to ASIO mode. It then outputs to the sound device of your choice via ASIO or WASAPI. Its room virtualization is very good, some of the most convincing I've heard and it is nice an adjustable. You can control how live the room is, where the virtual speakers are located, etc.

What makes it the top though is head tracking. Like Waves NX is has a headtracker you can get that that is what it takes to go from good to great. Virtualization without headtracking always sounds wrong because it sounds like you've bolted the speakers to hour head and they move with you. The headtracker is wired, which does mean you have another wire to run but it also means it updates a lot faster than Nx, which gives it a more convincing result. On top of all that, it has a PEQ built in so you can adjust for your headphones' response if you don't have an outboard EQ.

Also works great in Windows 11, some of the ones I've tried have been abandoned and don't work in modern OSes.

I'm real pleased. Not perfect but the best I've yet personally tried. Not too expensive either. $40 for the software, $100 for the software and headtracker. Worth giving a look at if you want good surround but can't always blast your speakers :).
This is really interesting, head tracking is a must if you want to get a proper listening experience out of headphones. This combined with a proper electrostatic headset might make head-fi finally plausible for me.
 
This is interesting. I usually listen on just two speakers or my headphones so i may look into this. thanks and good find!
 
I didn't like head-tracking by Nx personally but I do like good working surround sound algoritms, is it even possible to turn off head-tracking in case you don't like it? Reason I don't like at least the one by Nx is because it's "far too aggressive" in the stereo volume alignment according to your head position, feels like you are muted way too much in the ear pointing to the other direction, in reality it's just a very subtle change, so would be nice if you could adjust head-track "intensity" I suppose as I'm more the person who prefers a "subtle" effect.

BTW, does the https://www.redscapeaudio.com/pages/preview#media_link link work for you guys? Doesn't play any sounds to me.
 
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You can turn off the headtracking if you don't like it. If headtracking isn't your thing you can also just not get the headtracker and save $60. It is accurate headtracking and virtualization, so it sounds the same as if you move your head in relation to speakers. Subtle if you move a tiny bit, very noticeable if you move a lot, just as it is with real speakers.

The media doesn't seem to work in MS Edge, but works fine in Firefox for me.
 
OK yea worked in Firefox, neither in Chrome/Edge. I might give this one a go, been using Dolby Atmos for Headphones with some games that has worked quite okay but this might be slightly better. I notice the typical slight smoothened out highs from the demo like typically is the case with these surround algorithms, probably due to subtle increased reverb but since it includes a pretty nice looking EQ I guess you can quite nicely tweak it out if that would bother you and this comes with a 15-day money back garantuee too so.
 
Didn't work well for me because the sound quality took a big hit and EQ can only partially help to restore a bit better balance from the big bass boost / mid-highs drop but yea I prefer's Dolby Atmos for Headphones no noticeable impact to sound quality.
 
OK yea worked in Firefox, neither in Chrome/Edge. I might give this one a go, been using Dolby Atmos for Headphones with some games that has worked quite okay but this might be slightly better. I notice the typical slight smoothened out highs from the demo like typically is the case with these surround algorithms, probably due to subtle increased reverb but since it includes a pretty nice looking EQ I guess you can quite nicely tweak it out if that would bother you and this comes with a 15-day money back garantuee too so.
I find that is mostly down to just how speakers and headphones difference in sound. Speakers have a natural dropoff in frequency in room, often called a "house curve". So speakers with a perfectly flat response in an anechoic room will have more bass and less treble in an actual room. You can easy have a 5-10dB drop from 100Hz to 20kHz. Headphones can be designed/equalized to mimic that, of course, but not all do. You can look up the "Harman Curve" if you want to see the result of research in to what a headphone response would look like to match flat speakers.

Net effect is I find that highs are often brighter, and more detailed, on headphones just because of how they are being right next to the ears. If that is what you are used to, then ya I can see that virtualization software might sound off. For me, the metric of how good it is is how close it gets to sounding like my speakers. This does that quite well, IMO. However I'm a speaker guy. For years I didn't have headphones, I only listened on speakers. I moved to an apartment so I had to get rid of the surround sound system and downsize to smaller (though higher quality) speakers, hence my renewed interest in this.

Thing is, when it comes to sound reproduction there is no One True Way(tm). The right answer for you is what you like. As Duke Ellington said "If it sounds good, it IS good!" so use the solution that sounds the best to you :)
 
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