Quake Sound Resampling Project
A: An attempt to replace some of the 11KHz Quake wavs with the 22-44KHz/16bit ones found in the Quake1 Test released by id in Feb '96.
Q: Why?
A: The tests higher frequency wavs should sound much clearer than the ones shipped in the Demo/Commercial version of Quake.
Q: But i like the Quake sounds - i don't want different noises!
A: These are the original Quake sounds - id just downsampled most of them to 11KHz for the final release so these should sound exactly the same, just much crisper.
Q: Why are there two seperate pak files and why are they so large?
A: The first (largest) pak contains the Commercial versions wavs, all resampled to 44.1KHz - This does not enhance sound detail, but is required to avoid the "splashy" distortion found when trying to play 11KHz wavs with a 44.1KHz mixing rate in Quake.
The second pak contains the Tests wavs common to Quake - these have been resampled to 44.1KHz also in order to standardize the sampling rate at 44.1KHz and to avoid distortion from playing its 22KHz samples at a 44.1KHz mixing rate.
The Q1 test contains many other sound samples which never made it to Quakes final version - the player death ones are particularly amusing :) Its still available for download out there; Google should find it.
Q: Sound seems distorted when lots of sounds are being played simultaneously.
A: Use a slightly lower master volume setting in Quake eg. volume .5 at the console.
Q: I can't hear any difference from normal?
A: Not all of the sounds have changed - listen to teleport, spawn, armour pickup, shotgun, grenade fire as examples of some that are changed.
Are you sure you followed the instructions properly?
Use a modern Quake/QW client such as ZQuake or FuhQuake with +set s_khz 44 on the command line.
MoreQuakeworld (MQWcl) users - the command line option for this client is -sndspeed 44100 or just use mqwcl2.exe as it defaults to 44.1KHz mixing anyway.
Failing that, try listening with headphones for clarity, and if that doesnt work pay a visit to your G.P. and have your ears syringed :-]
Download Higher Definition Quake Sound Paks (16Meg RAR file) (Update 09/04/04 corrects single-sample errors in sgun1.wav and shotgn2.wavs.)
OR alternatively...
Download and use THESE instead - Their volume is scaled by 72% prior to resampling to 44.1KHz to totally avoid clipping problems so should sound marginally better than the set above (some clipping in the first set as a result of resampling)
Download Higher Definition Quake Sound Paks 72% level (16Meg RAR file)
Follow the instructions found in About.txt on how to use with your Quake/QW installation.
stay, 08/04/04