# Why is there nothing like discords audio codec for streaming?



## TheNatural (Aug 24, 2017)

How is it that Mumble and Discord can make a voice sound absolutely perfect, with fantastic compression, gate, EQ, noise cancellation with what is ostensibly freeware, yet the end solution for streamers is to basically have an isolation booth, 200 dollar compressor, 200 dollar mixer, 400 dollar microphone, hum eliminators, line isolators, acoustic padding, virtual audio cables, expensive software, and a relatively noiseless environment? 

I am genuinely curious. 

Recently, I have been setting up my dream streaming situation. I have a Behringer 1204, and DBX 286s, A shure SM7b, AN 8 channel hum eliminator, and I still can't get my voice to simply sound as good as it does to my friends listening to me on discord. 

I live in a studio apartment (a nice one, but with wood floors and a high ceiling) and my current settings and setup still leave me with background noise that is basically unacceptable and unprofessional sounding. 

It's extremely frustrating.


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## Fenrir (Aug 24, 2017)

Because the codecs that Mumble and Discord use are specifically designed to recreate human speech. As a trade off, other audio types used there will sound terrible.

Nearly all the features you're asking for have absolutely nothing to do with the codec, however. OBS has a compressor, noise gate, and noise cancellation filters. The only thing missing is an EQ, but you can use a VST plugin for that which OBS does support.

Have you checked the filters menu for your microphone device in OBS?


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## TheNatural (Aug 24, 2017)

Fenrir said:


> Because the codecs that Mumble and Discord use are specifically designed to recreate human speech. As a trade off, other audio types used there will sound terrible.
> 
> Nearly all the features you're asking for have absolutely nothing to do with the codec, however. OBS has a compressor, noise gate, and noise cancellation filters. The only thing missing is an EQ, but you can use a VST plugin for that which OBS does support.
> 
> Have you checked the filters menu for your microphone device in OBS?



I absolutely have, I have used basically every VST filter under the sun, the most recent of which has been reaper. The realfir standalone makes every small noise in the room that should be picked up sound like a robotic mess, almost mimicking static. And the output quality overall ins't as high. Gate doesn't help remove any ambient noise and makes time when a voice is active sound muddied. 

My question still remains, why could there not be a filter like the ones used in discord only for picking up the sound from a microphone? I've heard of people running a local mumble server to run their voice through using a virtual cable. I just don't see why there couldn't be something like that for OBS. Sure, it could be CPU intensive, but it would at least be a solution without having to through basically soundprooofing a room to sound like I do to a guildmate on the other side of the globe. 

Also, my apologies, but I thought the Opus codec was responsible for the audio processing discord does on the fly. My mistake.


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## Fenrir (Aug 24, 2017)

Have you tried installing the CoreAudio AAC encoder? The MediaFoundation (used on Windows by default) is honestly pretty meh quality, and the CoreAudio encoder (Apple's) is significantly higher quality overall, and widely regarded as one of, if not the best available. We can't ship with OBS because of licensing, but if it's found on the system OBS will be able to use it. Check the guide here, and see if it helps any: 

http://obsproject.com/forum/resources/obs-studio-enable-coreaudio-aac-encoder-windows.220/


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## TheNatural (Aug 24, 2017)

Fenrir said:


> Have you tried installing the CoreAudio AAC encoder? The MediaFoundation (used on Windows by default) is honestly pretty meh quality, and the CoreAudio encoder (Apple's) is significantly higher quality overall, and widely regarded as one of, if not the best available. We can't ship with OBS because of licensing, but if it's found on the system OBS will be able to use it. Check the guide here, and see if it helps any:
> 
> http://obsproject.com/forum/resources/obs-studio-enable-coreaudio-aac-encoder-windows.220/



I check that out and give it a shot. I appreciate it!


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