The Future of PC-Audio: Interview With Keith Kowal

red_ed writes "The Noise Report have an interview with Keith Kowal from VIA technologies' Audio division about the future of PC audio. Here's a snippet: 'I think the next big thing will be the widespread adoption of wireless speakers and headphones--cause none of us like a tangle of wires. From a PC infrastructure point of view I can easily see support for these devices being integrated right into the PC.'"

Re:Wireless clutter of wireless wires

[mordors9]

Excellent an excuse for having porn on my computer.... the neighbors garage door opener did it :-)

Cool! but.....

[satanicbyte]

When do we get the focused sound waves beamed directly into our head?

Re:Battery?

[cheide]

Second, and most importantly for any audiophiles out there, what happens to the sound quality? God knows how much money is spent on expensive speaker cables, so what happens when it goes wireless?

It would almost certainly be a digital encoding, so there would be no quality loss at all as long as there's enough signal strength.

Of course that probably won't stop some people from buying a Monster Air Ionizer, for "reduced quantum harmonic interference for your wireless signals!"...

the future of humans

[Anonymous Coward]

We lay in bed while the music, scenery, and environmnet surrounding us changes on a vague thought as we have 24hours/day of non stop orgasms.

which company is ready to build me a chip that allows this?

I've heard that story often

[Anonymous Coward]

I've often heard this kind of story as proof of the fidelity of a computer sound arrangement. I don't really understand it. Why would anyone call the police over recorded gunfire? It's not as if recorded gunfire was a rarity in 1994, or the fifteen years preceeding it.

I'm thinking particularly of the Pulp Fiction soundtrack, which had a track opened with loud gunfire and dialogue from the movie.

Anyone who hadn't seen the film might easily think gangsters had come by and opened fire... if, that is, they'd never heard a stereo before. Who can't tell the difference between speakers and real sound?

Not to mention that movie soundtracks less often have rough, growly monsters moaning in the background and driving FM-guitar riffs. Imagine you're sitting in a courtyard and suddenly you hear the sound of Doom from an 8-bit soundcard. You've never played a video game, but you also aren't Amish. Would you phone the police or figure it was a B-Movie?

So if you really, truly swear that this isn't a friend of a friend story, the conclusion has to be that people will report almost anything as possible gunfire, not that your speakers were in any way unusual. Doom's soundtrack was garbage in garbage out where realism is concerned.

Not meant as a personal attack on you. I had a friend in Junior High who tried to lay this bullshit about people calling the cops regarding video game SFX on me and I never properly responded to him about it.

Re:Security?

[iabervon]

I don't know about you, but I use wireless sound all the time. Wires just don't have the frequency response you want, and the impedance-matching with your ear is generally terrible.