Realtek AC'97 Audio Update

Transferred from my first blog.

UPDATED (October 5, 2008); SEE BELOW

Don’t you just love freeware? ‘Had another bout of insomnia after my work shift and couldn’t concentrate on working. I turned to thoughts about tweaking my PC again. ‘Sifted through my Cryostorage folder (yep, I never got around that Demolition Man movie haha!) and found an audio driver that I downloaded weeks ago. ‘Never got around to installing it due to my busy sched (and the massive amount of unwinding it demands to get the kinks out of my system ha. Ha. Ha.). So I did. And oh boy, Andrea Corr never sounded so good!

The AC’97 audio codec update I downloaded was better than the previous one; treble and bass got boosts that went through the ceiling. Of course I got a Logitech X-530 for a sound system for my rig but that’s straying from the point (140-watt surround sound for your Doom 3 anyone? *Evil grin*). You have gotta love the Net and the colossal count of resources it offers!

For those who are curious, Realtek audio drivers for integrated sound solutions can be found here. (These are to be used only for motherboards that have integrated sound solutions made by Realtek! Needless to say they are stable but we have different PCs. Install at your own risk.)

Bass output was a bit too powerful, but a quick adjustment on the control panel quickly brought it down to levels that were relatively tame.

Now for the ultimate test, — the reason why I bought the speakers in the first place —— I’ll take the speakers for a spin in Tribes. I wanna hear the screams of fellow players amidst the cacophony of exploding godhammer rounds.

…. and then somehow wake up at 1pm to prepare for a panel interview; someone’s going to be promoted and I want to grill the candidates down to a tasty brown hue before one of them ascends.

UPDATE 1: I installed v4.01 and it sounds incrementally better. That’s right; incrementally. But definitely better.With drivers, you don’t hope for a single update to blow you to audio/video/performance nirvana. They sort of creep up the improvement meter with every install, never bringing loud ooohs and aahs from you but there will come a point that you will exclaim "Omg, I listened to the din he’s listening to now?" when you hear what a neighbor is listening to (which is being delivered by the exact same v1.0 pre-Devonian base driver you had).

The first time you update drivers however, heh, la dee da, you WILL listen to each and every favorite track you have and repeat every part where you distinctly hear changes in the delivery of bass and treble. Speaking of tracks, I use Aquasky’s Original Crime: Most Wanted as a subjective audio benchmark. (time segment 3:09-4:58 specifically)

You can view the Youtube upload here but the downloadable version is so much clearer. I’ll post it here when I find the mirrors.

(Found the site. Get Aquasky’s Original Crime: Most Wanted movie! Trust me if you’ve got good speakers it’s worth it!)

Meanwhile, good day to all my friends and officemates who refuse to update. How are those fins? No legs sprouting out yet? Tut, tut. I wish to see you here with me on good ol’ terra firma.

UPDATE 2: v4.04 now out. I normally am VERY vigilant about audio updates but for the second time I learned of the news from Tweakguides. (Posting news that I got from other sites without citing them goes against my conscience.)

UPDATE 3: For those who are using v4.03 and above, you may notice a slight distortion when you pick the "Powerful" settings in the Sound Effects Manager. I've been using these settings since its very good for gaming but in 4.03 and 4.04, the distortion was bothering me so much that at first, I switched back to 4.02 when I couldn't seem to get rid of it. My mistake was thinking that the higher frequencies (treble) were the ones messing the audio quality when the lower ones (bass) were actually the culprits.

Try using the "Rock" settings; these will reduce your bass levels and eliminate the distortion effect without removing the "ooomph" factor when in gaming. However, if you like the treble levels of "Powerful," you can tweak the equalizer so that you will have "Rock"-level bass and "Powerful" treble levels.

Default "Powerful" settings in the Sound Manager.



My hybrid settings: I set my equalizer to "Rock" and copied "Powerful" levels for the high frequency range.

You can access the Sound Manager by following this path: Start > Settings > Control Panel > Sound Manager.

Why bother updating to 4.03 or 4.04? They have improved bass and treble separation; except for the unfortunate bass distortion, audio clarity is further improved with these drivers.

Enjoy earth shaking and glass shattering sounds with this one!


Update: V4.06 has been out for quite some time now. This new version got rid of the slight bass distortion when using the "Powerful" settings. Cymbals are also much clearer now.

Settings I'm using with this new version. The somewhat minimized bass guarantees that high frequency sounds have more "bite."