Fall Xbox Update Ungarbles the Voices on Your Headset

[gregoryg]

Fall Xbox Update Ungarbles the Voices on Your Headset

The next Xbox 360 update overhauls how Live delivers voice chat, allowing you to hear other players curse with crystal clarity.

Every Fall, Microsoft releases a large firmware update for the Xbox 360, adding new features and fixing problems with the existing ones. While this year's update is largely intended to ready current systems for the Kinect add-on, it will also address at least one outstanding complaint about the Xbox Live service. According to Xbox Live Studios head Jerry Johnson, the next system update will overhaul the service's audio infrastructure, leading to a significant improvement in the sound quality of voice chat.

The sound quality delivered through headsets has long been a complaint from outspoken gamers, with some even preferring to chat on a separate laptop through a voice client like Skype or Ventrilo.

Johnson noted that the choice of the current low bit-rate codec was motivated by average internet speeds when Xbox Live launched in 2002. He explained, "We launched and we said we required broadband. We required a 64k connection, which not many people think of as broadband any longer. But that was the minimum requirement to run the service at the time."

He added, "It's time for us to move on. Especially if we want to think about broadening - a crackly headset on the top of your head - not what people think of when they talk about popular entertainment."

The Xbox 360 Fall update is scheduled to launch just prior to the November 4th release of the Kinect.

Source: Eurogamer [http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2010-08-26-xbox-headset-sound-quality-to-improve]






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[Darktau]

All I saw was: 360 catches up to pc, lol.

But in all seriousness, hope they don't up the quality too much, my internet connection can be a bit messy with just party chat at the moment -.-

 

[Jack and Calumon]

Well that's good... shame we know big firmware updates mean, don't we, from all 3 of the consoles?

Bricked Systems...

Calumon: So many good consoles gone... and Jack's still works!

 

[Hybridwolf]

Oh good, maybe they can fix that horrible, horrible, party glitch which is so annoying halfway through a match in any game. I'm sick and tired of that happening.

 

[SalamanderJoe]

Yay! All I need now is to be able to actually go into parties with my mates... wait a sec though, does that mean those kids with screechy voices are going to come in even louder?! NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

 

[TheBoulder]

That'll help me understand that one British kid who always wants to play Halo 3 with me.

 

[Jared]

Well nice to see them actually doing something baout it...can never understand anyone ><

 

[mjc0961]

So, I guess this would be one of those improvements we get due to them dropping Xbox Live support for all the original Xbox games, right?

 

[Icehearted]

I've never had too much trouble, but then racist 14-17 year old gamers all sound the same to me. I just hope they include some notifications options. I would like to keep them all on except for when a friend comes online. Fricking annoying seeing that pop-up every two minutes.

 

[Nouw]

Oh goody, now I can actually hear what other people are saying. I need to buy a WireLess one...

 

[Schlagwerk]

I never had a problem with voice chat, but then again I only used it with Halo 2 back in the day.

As a side note, who uses Ventrilo for XBL? Hell, who uses Ventrilo at all? It's terrible.

 

[FinalHeart95]

YES. I'm always in parties, so this is great!

As long as it doesn't mess with my party connection, anyway.

 

[DazZ.]

I don't get why the option to choose wasn't there in the first place. Even if some people had 64k connections the ones that didn't could choose do broadcast/receive at better quality.

But then again I don't understand why a lot of things aren't implemented in a hell of a lot of systems.

 

[2fish]

... wait a sec though, does that mean those kids with screechy voices are going to come in even louder?! NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

That was the first thing that came to mind. I will only allow this if they also add a voice ager to people who fail the voice test. If you make me want to tear my ears off, you must be given a monotone voice over until you have a voice that doesn't make the other players ears bleed.

 

[Vilcus]

Hooray, no more pretending I understand half of the people on Xbox Live. honestly it usually isn't the sound quality alone that makes them impossible to understand. It's the fact that most of them either never actually learned English (they can't speak properly or something, I don't know), or their accent creates a mini language barrier.

 

[duchaked]

ummm okay? not really too big a deal I don't think

 

[Phoenixlight]

Hmm looks like I misread the title, I thought it said Fail Xbox Update but this looks pretty good.

 

[Anti-Robot Man]

Chat was already pretty clear for me, though I do end up getting disconnected from party chat fairly often (which I assumed was a bandwidth issue). If it's more bandwidth for this vs more bandwidth for gameplay I favor the latter.

 

[Marik2]

YES. I'm always in parties, so this is great!

As long as it doesn't mess with my party connection, anyway.

Yep took the words out of my mouth

 

[Danzaivar]

64kb broadband. Brilliant!