I'm looking to learn DirectSound with DirectX 9. I'm reading Frank Luna's book on DirectX 9 but it doesn't mention anything about sound programming. Does anyone have any suggestions?
I'm looking to learn DirectSound with DirectX 9. I'm reading Frank Luna's book on DirectX 9 but it doesn't mention anything about sound programming. Does anyone have any suggestions?
Given Microsoft's predisposition to dump all things not Direct3D I would not rely on DirectSound. Instead I would go with a solution like OpenAL or FMOD to name a few. I built a sound library using DirectMusic and DirectSound and in the end they dumped all hardware acceleration components in Vista and W7. They also dumped DirectSound and have been dumping more and more of DirectX as time goes by. It makes sense though because the games industry as a whole does not use these libraries and to keep supporting them is not cost efficient.
Direct3D is definitely still viable but I would not rely on other DirectX tech like DirectInput, DirectSound, DirectShow (now part of the Platform/Windows SDK), etc.
HAL is missing, but for good reason. This means that all sound is now intended to be done by the CPU, which is not a problem with multi cores CPU's. This is a negative only for Creative because they use their chip to add EAX effects and without HAL, the chip can't access the sound.
Nothing wrong with Directsound. There is nothing wrong with OpenAL either but it is important to know how to do both, and in that order, if the pupil is interested in a career in the game programming industry. Why? Because DirectSound is not going anywhere.
It is also important to note that OpenAL was never created with the intention of replacing DirectSound or becoming a competitor for DirectSound. It was created to bring DirectSound functionality to the Linux platform.
Last edited by RoD; 09-18-2012 at 06:23 AM.