16 Bit PSX Doom SFX

Hi

A couple of months ago, I downloaded a wad that replaced the sounds for Doom II with the PSX sound effects. Recently I took a look inside the wad with an editor and discovered that the sound effects are 8 bit.

I always thought the PSX Doom sound effects were recorded at 16 bit? My reasoning for this is that they seem slightly clearer on my PSX Doom than they do on the PC conversion. Maybe it's just the echo effect in areas of the PSX edition, but if anyone knows if the PSX sounds are actually 16 bit, and of a wad that puts those 16 bit sounds in the PC version, that would be cool.

Recently I took a look inside the wad with an editor and discovered that the sound effects are 8 bit.

My guess is that this was done to keep the file size down to a reasonable level. I wouldn't be surprised if the sounds were originally 16-bit.

My reasoning for this is that they seem slightly clearer on my PSX Doom than they do on the PC conversion. Maybe it's just the echo effect in areas of the PSX edition...

There is a more recent version with higher quality sounds, but not made by elbryan42 however. I don't believe it can be found anywhere due to the anti-leak policy during the construction of the Doom64 TC. I have this particular wad but don't ask me to send it to you. Besides, the sounds on there are also 8-bit. It's not hard to convert them to 16-bit format if you must have them that way. I doubt there would be any real change in the sound quality.

revenant_fister said:

A couple of months ago, I downloaded a wad that replaced the sounds for Doom II with the PSX sound effects. Recently I took a look inside the wad with an editor and discovered that the sound effects are 8 bit.

No kidding. DOOM can only handle 11025 Hz/8-bit.

I always thought the PSX Doom sound effects were recorded at 16 bit? My reasoning for this is that they seem slightly clearer on my PSX Doom than they do on the PC conversion.

Or, more likely, it's the other way around: they seem slightly clearer to you because you always thought they were 16-bit. At a sample rate that low, you couldn't hear the difference anyway.

Eitherways, the PSX Doom SFX are pretty good, even if they maybe 8-bit. But you gotta wonder how they came up with those sounds.

Slightly off-topic, but what was the SNES doom's sound bitrate?
I assume the music was higher than the PC version, because the music from the SNES version is nicer, and less MIDIish.

SNES cartridges can only hold so much data. Some sounds remained unmodified like DSPOSIT1 since it's so small, but larger sounds like the baron's DSBRSSIT had the sample rate brought down a painful amount along with others. Some sounds were even excluded and some were used to replace some. All this squeezed into a 32 meg cartridge. Go figure.

About not being able to tell the difference between 8 and 16 bit sounds- record yourself saying something wcth sound recorder setting the bit rate to 16 bit, then play it back. Convert it to 8 bit and you will see it's easy to tell the difference between them. If it wasn't, DVDs would have audio at 8 bit instead of 16 like they do..

And BTW ZDoom and a bunch of other launchers can handle 16 bit sounds.

DVDs typically use 48 kHz, CDs 44. What sample rate did you use for your test?

KoRn said:

Slightly off-topic, but what was the SNES doom's sound bitrate?
I assume the music was higher than the PC version, because the music from the SNES version is nicer, and less MIDIish.

that's because the snes didn't use general midi, as far as i know. you can download a program called meridian that emulates the different sound softwares of the 8 and 16 bit systems. there's nothing quite like those nes static drum tracks.

Re: Never Again

Okay, then I'm not just looking for a wad with the PSX sound effects at 16 bit. I'm looking for one that has them at the rate they were originally sampled at in the playstation version. I think it would have been higher than 11,025 Hz.

And,

Re: Pregnant with Worms

Does that program allow you to play like, any midi tracks so that they sound like they did on the Genesis? Might have to download a few Streets of Rage midis if it does. BTW where do you get it?

Cheers.

http://meridian.overclocked.org/

there's a newer version than the one i have now, but as far as i know, you cannot use midis. you'll need to download the actual tracks from the game from one of zophar's many archives on the site. it's a really nifty program, and emulates the sounds near-perfectly.

So do you need a plugin to get the genesis music files to work?

revenant_fister said:

So do you need a plugin to get the genesis music files to work?

i don't believe so. you certainly don't need one on the version i have. i believe the plugins allow you to mute individual tracks in songs of the applicable file types. again, i could very well be totally incorrect.

revenant_fister said:

Okay, then I'm not just looking for a wad with the PSX sound effects at 16 bit. I'm looking for one that has them at the rate they were originally sampled at in the playstation version. I think it would have been higher than 11,025 Hz.

Email Ledmeister http://m1.aol.com/ledmeister/, he may know what rate they are sampled at and give you a pointer in the right direction.