Search Unity

  1. Megacity Metro Demo now available. Download now.
    Dismiss Notice
  2. Unity support for visionOS is now available. Learn more in our blog post.
    Dismiss Notice

Audio Spatial sound with 4 speaker setup - rear speakers not working

Discussion in 'Audio & Video' started by kaiwen, Mar 12, 2023.

  1. kaiwen

    kaiwen

    Joined:
    Sep 12, 2013
    Posts:
    6
    I have a 4 speaker setup : a pair of stereo speaker in the front and a pair in the rear. On my Mac all works correctly in the Audio Midi setup app (including the audio tests) :



    But in Unity 2019.4 and 2021.3, regardless of which speaker mode I choose (Quad, Surround, 5.1) , no sound ever comes out of the rear speakers when an audio source is behind the audio listener.

    Next I switch the audio configuration to 5.1 in the Mac Audio and Midi App :


    Now, if I choose 5.1 speaker mode in Unity, I get sound out the rear speakers ! Hooray !

    BUT, now for lack of a front-center speaker I get no sound when the AudioSource is directly in front the the AudioListener :-(

    Does Unity only support 5.1 and above ? It seems hard to find clarity on this issue :

    This bug report was closed without any response :
    https://issuetracker.unity3d.com/issues/quadrophonic-audio-mixer-does-not-play-rear-channels
     
  2. SeventhString

    SeventhString

    Unity Technologies

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2023
    Posts:
    380
    Could this help? Just found another post in the forum on a similar matter.
     
  3. kaiwen

    kaiwen

    Joined:
    Sep 12, 2013
    Posts:
    6
    Thanks for your reply. The link doesn't seem to work for me (error 404).
     
  4. SeventhString

    SeventhString

    Unity Technologies

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2023
    Posts:
    380
    Darn sorry! It looks like it was taken down... this article had been linked a few times on the forum. Here's a discussion where it is also mentioned.

    Basically it describes a way to send sound to specific speakers by putting the samples in the corresponding channel. You can see Unity's convention on this matter here.
     
  5. jsahab

    jsahab

    Joined:
    Mar 2, 2024
    Posts:
    2
    Having exactly the same issue on Unity 2023.2.11f1.
    My soundcard is a Focusrite Clarett 2pre thunderbolt with 4 outputs, working on macos.
    With speaker mode set to quad in project settings, the two rear channels stay desperately silent, while the game configuration suppose sounds to be played by them : when the audio source is behind the audio listener it becomes silent.
    Can someone at the Unity team help for that ?