Tactile Immersion - General Discussion - Hardware & Software

[anton_Chez]

Nah DSP won't do too much for the exciters, I wouldn't think. It's not like you can boost the low end on them, look what happens when you're even a little bit over the limit with them, the just die. I hated that, always wondering how long they were going to last when using them at a level that made them worth being on. Look I tried them, I've now got the biggest BK unit and I could barely feel them with the BK Mini's going, really. I can understand why they would appear to be worthwhile using, having them all over the seat. But in a grand scale, especially once you move up to the biggest units, I fail to understand where they fit in. It's just so mismatched with the other hardware.

I'm glad to be rid of the wiring and stuff on the seat as well. My build is pretty clean now and the power from the Concert is amazing. I have to say, the low end that Rod speaks so highly of is absolutely true. It also sounds much less "noisy" than some of the other models I've had, if that makes any sense. Like the rumble is super clean and I don't feel like I'm getting any other weird noises from it. Which I very much like. I can't wait to get the TST and see how it couples with it to give the higher end wheel slip and engine vibe effects.

My advice (take it for what you will, I'm sure it will get shat on eventually) is if you are considering investing in anything other than a totally budget tactile build (something like adding a BK Gamer 2 to your seat or a handful of pucks) 100% go for a BK Concert powered with an NX1000D. That alone will destroy pretty much anything you can throw at it AND you can add another BK CT to it (absolutely unnecessary) or, what I've done, a TST Silver, which will give a completely different feel and approach to the tactile effect and will complement the Butt Kicker very well.

Now, to find out if I killed MY NX1000D....

 

[RCHeliguy]

I agree the BK Concert is a pretty quiet transducer. The Aura's are also pretty quiet transducers. I previously tried a TST "style" transducer, but I got a cheaper one. Don't do that! The cheaper one was very loud and had less power than the Aura's did. I pulled it off my rig nearly immediately and gave it to someone.

I have a digital preamp that I could put between my computer and amp, but I haven't tried it yet, so I've not applied any equalization to my BK CT yet. I've been happy with it, and it's very powerful, but I doubt it's optimized. I got a pretty good deal on an NX4-6000 so I've been using that 4 channel amp to drive all my transducers.

 

[anton_Chez]

I doubt the unit I bought (TST Silver) is worse than one of the Aura's. Even the cheapest model of TST is rated at 10x the effectiveness of a single Aura and the Silver is the next one up from that I'm pretty sure. To me, going above the Silver gets you a slight bump in power handling, as well as a slightly lower Hz range. They are ALL the same physical size and all are rated @ 4ohm. Combined with a BK Concert, I reckon the TST Silver should compliment it quite nicely. I ran a little test with the BK Mini running at the same 4ohm as the TST will, while still powering the Concert. Seems to be more than enough power for the large unit even with conflicting impedance's on the different channels. The TST only needs around 100W so I think the amp should be fine for both units.

 

[RCHeliguy]

I got the TST209 which is about half the cost of the TST239 Silver.

It also CLAIMS to be up to 10 times the force of the Aura. My guess is that is at higher frequencies where the Aura doesn't reach well, or it requires a lot more power. At the time I was running a 100W amp to it and it is rated for 100W rms but up to 350W peak. So maybe my amp was the fail point, but I thought it was too much like a speaker. It has an audible frequency response of 35-17,000 Hz. To me it was too loud while not producing enough omph.

By comparison the Aura has a very narrow range but is very efficient and handles 100W well. The TST claims to run up to 15-800 Hz for tactile and maybe my expectations were too high.

The Silver produces peak of 2.2 lb-ft/watt and the 209 is only 1.6 lb-ft/watt.

Are you saying your Silver isn't noisy and doesn't sound like a speaker to you?
Also how high do you have your volume set on your 1000D to drive them?

 

[anton_Chez]

I don't have the Silver yet, it's still in the process of being shipped. Unless they have not updated the shipping info, it's taking incredibly long to actually get to a shipped status. Been probably 4 or 5 days now and nothing has updated.

I don't see how they will sound like a speaker if you're using Simhub to send telemetry data to it. I won't be using mine with audio tactile and in general 200hz is about as high as Mr Latte recommends to set any effects to. So to get sound out of that relatively low frequency is surprising.

I'm in the process now of troubleshooting why my amp in stuck in Protect Mode. Highly annoying now that I have everything set up and rewired neatly, mounted and ready for new (or old, as it were) effects testing. It turns on, fan blows for a couple seconds then stops and just sits there, protect lights showing on the front panel.

 

[RCHeliguy]

Have you seen this?

 

[anton_Chez]

I just watched a bit of it. He's playing it through a music output. We don't do that. This video is nearly 10 years old. There was nothing like SimVibe or Simhub around back then, either. The exciters I had are the same. They are like little speakers. But, when you limit the hz sent through them, you don't get sound.

 

[RCHeliguy]

It took me a little thinking, but there is ONE place I could actually mount this on my seat non-destructively. It would be vertically on the right side. I just hope it isn't distractively loud.

 

[Novopaine]

I'm in the process now of troubleshooting why my amp in stuck in Protect Mode. Highly annoying now that I have everything set up and rewired neatly, mounted and ready for new (or old, as it were) effects testing. It turns on, fan blows for a couple seconds then stops and just sits there, protect lights showing on the front panel.

Does it still go into protect if you disconnect the speaker leads from the Amp? If it does the amp is most definitely cooked.

I have my two Aura's mounted under the seat to a board similar to your BK mounting. Something I plan to test is doubling the thickness of the board or add some other bracing to minimize unwanted resonance from the wood itself. I can't help but think this would benefit you even more than I since your board is a little longer and that BK is more powerful. I'll post my results here once I get around to testing.

 

[No Depth]

So looking at BK Options for under my seat and the big ones are out. Attached link to some images of my rig.

https://imgur.com/a/5CA8Zso

Because of the V3 motion platform, I am kind of stuck looking at a BK Mini LFE if I want the thing mounted centered under the seat. With only 4” of clearance, the BK mini should be enough. Or look at Aura?

I can -maybe- do a BK advance if it mounts more under the thighs at the front of the seat(but it may intrude with the seat slider). Rear of the seat is no-go unless I mount a plate of sorts or drill into the lower back area.

So I could just get another BK mini LFE and amp to mount like the others. Just not certain yet. I mean that may shake me plenty underneath if bolted directly. My Concert Mini shakes the pedal deck well enough…

Thoughts?

 

[RCHeliguy]

My BK CT hangs off the back and is very powerful!

I used profile corner braces between the seat brackets and a piece of 40x40 profile.
Then I used a piece of 1/4" aluminum plate bolted to the top reinforced by a piece of 1/4" aluminum angle bolted to the side of the Profile. The two pieces of aluminum are through bolted

 

[anton_Chez]

I wouldn’t stress too much about getting a large unit on the seat. It doesn’t need it and it may actually be detrimental depending how you run it. On the seat is great for lower power / smaller units, because they don’t lose any force into other areas. But the large unit have so much power it doesn’t really matter as long as you get a good mount.

Amp stays in protect mode after unplugging speaker connectors, unplugging the mains, etc. so I’ll have to take it in to be looked at or go through warranty. Annoying since I finally swapped the fan not long ago, I’ll have to swap it back. Not to mention I finally got everything set up and tidied up, now I can’t play with effects for who knows how long.

 

[iv13]

Dear experts,

Im trying to achieve a sensation of traction loss in the back end of my rig. I already have some pedal rumble kits from here;

Pedal Rumble Motor Kit | Sim 3D​

And looking into expanding into tactile feedback!
This below is the back side of my rig (its a p1x).

Now, I am not sure what exactly do I need, or what kind of gear. Mind me, im not technically literate when it comes to audio details, so If i say something wrong, please dont hold it against me.

For now, the idea is to get some kind of traction loss feedback (thats not too loud if possible).
I would prefer avoiding higher frequency motors (toothbrush sounding ones) for this purpose.

Any ideas in how can i achieve this? What kind of hardware do i need? And where would i attach it?

 

[Mr Latte]

Gees so, reading above, I must encourage people to buy DSP for the exciters because it won’t do much for them at all?. Also that a TST unit won’t generate any noise/hum or can also benefit too from DSP?

Both points being mentioned by someone that hasn’t yet owned the TST nor clearly has used DSP with the exciters. So no sorry Anton I can’t agree with those points you made. I wish you would just follow the advice given and not pick/choose what you want. It would be much easier to then obtain good results from your hardware.

Hum sound from TST can happen because of harmonics generated from the tones used for effects. How many times do I have to mention the tones input for effects are not only what gets generated? Harmonics going beyond 120Hz is an example for both TST and exciters that they will become more audible. Some audible tone isn’t bad but needs controlled within the crossover to users taste.

Isolation IS important and is a crucial element, but apparently nope you can just plump a large BK on a board to your rig after having one for 5 mins, then make such a call or like these other points. Tell people no need to have its primary energy go into the seat. This does not mean directly bolting your seat for such a large unit but FFS how much time is spent talking about isolating seat and pedals sections? How else do we help control the individual effects for front/back people?

A large unit will also benefit from improved isolation not just $2 bobbins on eBay.

Why not actually compare your own early attempts at installing with other recommendations made.

So I wish people offering other advice would speak from a position of testing and trying different approaches not from just theory or presumption.

I have shown a Stage 1 option for a rig and explained how it uses all the different units regards harmonics and getting the best from the 1-200 Hz by applying a new approach to effects.

Those that can’t get the exciters to offer much, if they are getting drowned out then clearly these people do not follow the recommendations I have made from how to use them with the other units.

 

[anton_Chez]

It's fine dude. I won't be following anything you have to say, to me or otherwise, anymore. I've tolerated your condescension for FAR too long, defended you in other threads where clearly people felt like you were being a D*CK and rightfully so.

I have OPINIONS, and EXPERIENCE, in pretty much everything that I've said. Instead of being happy that you basically baited me into buying a TST, you throw down the most bullsh*t reason to be mad over. That I suggested you won't hear audio from the low levels of hz that Simhub tends to use. If you can, SO WHAT? Does it affect ANYTHING we've been discussing here? It doesn't, in the slightest.

My opinion is that the exciters are DOG SH*T. DEAL WITH IT. I have used them. No DSP on Earth is going to make them any more than what they are, absolutely worthless when you have even semi decent hardware to match with them.

Have you sat in my chassis? Do you understand what it feels like coming from what I had previously, to what I have now? No. So how can you possibly suggest that anything I am experiencing is sub standard. I offer MY OPINIONS, real opinions from someone who has a standard chassis that anyone can buy. Not that abomination that you've shown off yet I'd hazard a guess that you've barely even sat in over the past 5 years of attempting to not only achieve tactile nirvana, but actively and positively alienated nearly EVERY SINGLE PERSON that you've come into contact with on these forums and most likely abroad as well.

There is NO ONE CORRECT WAY to do ANYTHING, let alone something as ambiguous and tedious as implementing tactile onto one's sim rig. I have no idea how you can sit there, claiming to know it all, yet completely shut down any suggestion of sharing profiles/effects while still claiming that no one will corroborate with you in honing them. I am extremely grateful that I have saved the many iterations of your work over the years, at least what I've been able to find, and I'm also extremely grateful for the help from years ago until now, that you've provided me in achieving an enjoyable level of tactile in my own build. But I can no longer sit here and pretend that the reason that tactile is the way it is, is because it's clumsy, or shrouded in mystery. No, the reason that it's the way it is, for the most part, is YOU.

Please, sit down, take a breath, and understand that not everyone is interested in achieving the mind boggling standards of tactile that you have in your own mind. I've actually acquired pretty much all the hardware that you've suggested to this point. Maybe not in scale, but I now have the two units that you've recommended for the longest time, along with the amp (if it's not fecking dead) to go with it. I AM ONE OF THE PEOPLE THAT ARE TRYING TO GET ON BOARD WITH THIS. Yet I come in here and get absolutely flamed for suggesting that isolation might not be the be all and end all for everyone seeking a decent tactile experience.

As much as I hated owning the SFX-100 system overall, THAT forum has encouraged the growth and participation that the tactile world should be envious of. There are SO MANY people that have been helpful, understanding and patient with users that may have not completely understood things, been a little inexperienced in some of the process. There were some that did things that I would consider ridiculous, unnecessary, or just flat out wrong, from my perspective. Never did I act in the way that I see members, myself lately being pretty much target number one, being smashed for suggesting things based on my own personal experience.

If you've read the past few pages since you've been away, you'd have noticed that I had an issue with my amp. Instead of actually offering any feedback or advice, since you seem to be the self proclaimed messiah of all things tactile, you instead take the time to demolish my idea of how I mounted my BK CT. Not thinking for a second that maybe I'd like to try different methods before settling on one for myself, to which I've not had the chance since I cannot power the bloody thing for the time being.

You're telling me that the exciters are not being set up correctly. You recommend to buy 2 X BK LFE + 2 X TST Silvers, plus the exciters. Then get mad because I suggest that I cannot feel the exciters, even with the BK Mini's I had before. WHAT IS THE POINT of buying such a massive amount of hardware, when you're going to scale it down to a level that it doesn't make the tiny little units worthless? I cannot even fathom the mental gymnastics it takes to make that a reasonable argument.

I'm done.

 

[Mr Latte]

Dear experts,

Im trying to achieve a sensation of traction loss in the back end of my rig. I already have some pedal rumble kits from here;

Pedal Rumble Motor Kit | Sim 3D​

And looking into expanding into tactile feedback!
This below is the back side of my rig (its a p1x).

Now, I am not sure what exactly do I need, or what kind of gear. Mind me, im not technically literate when it comes to audio details, so If i say something wrong, please dont hold it against me.

For now, the idea is to get some kind of traction loss feedback (thats not too loud if possible).
I would prefer avoiding higher frequency motors (toothbrush sounding ones) for this purpose.

Any ideas in how can i achieve this? What kind of hardware do i need? And where would i attach it?

Made some comments on this in the past if you search. Different approaches are possible with multiple exciters and iapplying delay to channels

 

[iv13]

Made some comments on this in the past if you search. Different approaches are possible with multiple exciters and iapplying delay to channels

Ok, help me out here;

what exactly am i supposed to search for?

 

[RCHeliguy]

Let me preface this with the fact that I once did software development in professional audio on a digital mastering console.

What Mr. Latte says about harmonics is absolutely true. so noise can come through transducers even if the effects you are generating are at much lower frequencies.

In addition these transducers also each have frequencies that are much more efficient than others.

I posted this earlier from the Clark Synthesis website. They are showing the amplitude of the signals from their TST line up and it is obvious that they have some frequencies were they will be much more powerful than others. These frequency graphs are from approximately 10-20Hz up to 800 Hz depending on the transducer.

I think equalizing the curves going to your transducers could be very valuable if done right.

If you have a powerful gaming computer, likely there are a pile of idle cores doing very little.

If you don't have a DSP in your amplifier, I'm finding that this free opensource software called Equalizer APO works well.

It's very efficient, has very low latency, and allows you to configure your equalization and filters in your computer.

Equalizer APO is driven by text files, but after you see how they are generated, they are easy to modify by hand.
However the Peace equalizer extension will allow you to configure this text file to get you started.

Install these in order.

Equalizer APO

Download Equalizer APO for free. A system-wide equalizer for Windows 7 / 8 / 8.1 / 10. Equalizer APO is a parametric / graphic equalizer for Windows. It is implemented as an Audio Processing Object (APO) for the system effect infrastructure introduced with Windows Vista.

sourceforge.net

Peace Equalizer, interface Equalizer APO

Download Peace Equalizer, interface Equalizer APO for free. User Interface for Equalizer APO on Windows PC from Vista to 10. Peace equalizer is a Windows PC interface for Equalizer APO http://sourceforge.net/projects/equalizerapo. Besides an system-wide equalizer on your Windows PC, Peace has an...

sourceforge.net

There is a Configurator.exe that allows you to select the audio cards that you want to drive.

You can create the type of filter you need with the Peace extension.
Then when you reboot your computer the changes take effect.

The downsides are that you have to reboot for changes to take effect and that you may have to reinstall Equalizer APO after Windows updates since it inserts itself into your audio chain.

Below is a graph that has doubled up High pass filters at the bottom end and doubled low pass filters at the high end of the curve.
Using multiple filters works better than increasing the Q which will give you a big bump, but you can play with these curves yourself.

This is only specifying the left and right channel separately, but you can group channels together to share the same effects.

This makes it easy to apply filters for each type of transducer or exciter.

Channel: L R
<effects here>

Channel: RL RR
<effects here>

Channel: C
<effects here>

 

[Mr Latte]

It's fine dude. I won't be following anything you have to say, to me or otherwise, anymore. I've tolerated your condescension for FAR too long, defended you in other threads where clearly people felt like you were being a D*CK and rightfully so.

I have OPINIONS, and EXPERIENCE, in pretty much everything that I've said. Instead of being happy that you basically baited me into buying a TST, you throw down the most bullsh*t reason to be mad over. That I suggested you won't hear audio from the low levels of hz that Simhub tends to use. If you can, SO WHAT? Does it affect ANYTHING we've been discussing here? It doesn't, in the slightest.

My opinion is that the exciters are DOG SH*T. DEAL WITH IT. I have used them. No DSP on Earth is going to make them any more than what they are, absolutely worthless when you have even semi decent hardware to match with them.

Have you sat in my chassis? Do you understand what it feels like coming from what I had previously, to what I have now? No. So how can you possibly suggest that anything I am experiencing is sub standard. I offer MY OPINIONS, real opinions from someone who has a standard chassis that anyone can buy. Not that abomination that you've shown off yet I'd hazard a guess that you've barely even sat in over the past 5 years of attempting to not only achieve tactile nirvana, but actively and positively alienated nearly EVERY SINGLE PERSON that you've come into contact with on these forums and most likely abroad as well.

There is NO ONE CORRECT WAY to do ANYTHING, let alone something as ambiguous and tedious as implementing tactile onto one's sim rig. I have no idea how you can sit there, claiming to know it all, yet completely shut down any suggestion of sharing profiles/effects while still claiming that no one will corroborate with you in honing them. I am extremely grateful that I have saved the many iterations of your work over the years, at least what I've been able to find, and I'm also extremely grateful for the help from years ago until now, that you've provided me in achieving an enjoyable level of tactile in my own build. But I can no longer sit here and pretend that the reason that tactile is the way it is, is because it's clumsy, or shrouded in mystery. No, the reason that it's the way it is, for the most part, is YOU.

Please, sit down, take a breath, and understand that not everyone is interested in achieving the mind boggling standards of tactile that you have in your own mind. I've actually acquired pretty much all the hardware that you've suggested to this point. Maybe not in scale, but I now have the two units that you've recommended for the longest time, along with the amp (if it's not fecking dead) to go with it. I AM ONE OF THE PEOPLE THAT ARE TRYING TO GET ON BOARD WITH THIS. Yet I come in here and get absolutely flamed for suggesting that isolation might not be the be all and end all for everyone seeking a decent tactile experience.

As much as I hated owning the SFX-100 system overall, THAT forum has encouraged the growth and participation that the tactile world should be envious of. There are SO MANY people that have been helpful, understanding and patient with users that may have not completely understood things, been a little inexperienced in some of the process. There were some that did things that I would consider ridiculous, unnecessary, or just flat out wrong, from my perspective. Never did I act in the way that I see members, myself lately being pretty much target number one, being smashed for suggesting things based on my own personal experience.

If you've read the past few pages since you've been away, you'd have noticed that I had an issue with my amp. Instead of actually offering any feedback or advice, since you seem to be the self proclaimed messiah of all things tactile, you instead take the time to demolish my idea of how I mounted my BK CT. Not thinking for a second that maybe I'd like to try different methods before settling on one for myself, to which I've not had the chance since I cannot power the bloody thing for the time being.

You're telling me that the exciters are not being set up correctly. You recommend to buy 2 X BK LFE + 2 X TST Silvers, plus the exciters. Then get mad because I suggest that I cannot feel the exciters, even with the BK Mini's I had before. WHAT IS THE POINT of buying such a massive amount of hardware, when you're going to scale it down to a level that it doesn't make the tiny little units worthless? I cannot even fathom the mental gymnastics it takes to make that a reasonable argument.

I'm done.

Thanks for your opinions and getting things off your chest. I don’t need the personal insults, nor have I claimed to be King of anything. I have criticised your actions but never insulted you.

I have no problems with people following my own recommendations and preferring other preferences or ways of doing things. If they find the recommendations made did not work for them.

[edit]
What I detest, is people taking parts of what I recommend then omitting or adding their own thing/methods to them. When what I offer has been designed/developed to work how it is recommended to be installed and used.

You giving off about the exciters, moaning when you don't follow the instructions properly. When you have owned a large BK for so little time, nor have used it properly as how I recommend combined with a TST. Yet here or other places you already are giving advice on them. Nor have you ever compared the BK installed with isolation to a seat to how you ran with installing it to form any understanding of how it altered the felt output.

I have every right to question or contest your "opinions" or "advice" based on purely what your own "experiences" are. Likewise, others are more than welcome to treat me the same based on what I have tried and tested.

This also applies for some of my effects, even when told, still people may be trying to use (like you have in the past) effects specifically for large BK to then talk about how they feel on smaller or budget units. Or specific effects layers meant for exciters and someone trying to use them on frequency-limited models.

I don't want hours upon hours of effort I put into things or a new approach to effects to be represented partially or other than how it should be experienced.

This is one reason why I moved my own effects experimentation to be conducted with users that HAVE bought the correct hardware and also importantly have it installed how is recommended.

With this approach then people get to feel what I have intended the effects to feel like and we can all use feedback for different preferences in how to then further improve or tune effects.



People are welcome to offer alternative ways to approach tactile. To then let us compare my efforts to others. I even challenge others to bring a better approach.

However, opinions do not help determine how we go about improving tactile. Especially when someone offers their opinions not based on testing/comparisons or even yet ownership of the product. Gees man really?

No, you have not experienced more advanced effects following how we use each unit and why it is used rather than individual units having to fully output effects. You have done your own thing with the recommended hardware. By all means let’s have your effects/settings.

Everyone testing my own approach so far has however has been impressed with what it achieves based on what they had before.
Some SFX owners even while each is very different, now preferring what the tactile offers over what the motion brings. Also actual race-proven race drivers have commented on how well it feels.

This, then validates I am not delusional or so far up my own ass to know my own approach to all this is pleasing others and offering a high standard of tactile immersion beyond what current or typical solutions offer.

Still, however, I will advance things with continued work to be done on effects.

 

[mgh24]

...Amp stays in protect mode after unplugging speaker connectors, unplugging the mains, etc. so I’ll have to take it in to be looked at or go through warranty. Annoying since I finally swapped the fan not long ago, I’ll have to swap it back. Not to mention I finally got everything set up and tidied up, now I can’t play with effects for who knows how long.

Oh man, that sucks. Hope you can get it up and running again!