DirectXTK | Audio |
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WaveBank is a container class for an XACT-style wave bank that contains individual waves packaged together for more efficient loading and memory management. Sounds in an in-memory wave bank can then be played back as one-shot sounds or via SoundEffectInstance. Streaming wave banks can be played with SoundStreamInstance using non-buffering asynchronous I/O.
The
WaveBank
objects always owns the audio data. It must be kept 'alive' until all playing or streaming sounds using it have been stopped.
See XWBTool for more information on building .xwb
files.
DirectXTK for Audio uses XAudio2. It does not make use of the legacy XACT Engine, XACT Cue, or XACT SoundBank.
Related tutorial: Making use of wave banks
Header
#include <Audio.h>
Initialization
std::unique_ptr<WaveBank> wb;
wb = std::make_unique<WaveBank>( audEngine.get(), "wavebank.xwb" ) );
For exception safety, it is recommended you make use of the C++ RAII pattern and use a std::unique_ptr
or std::shared_ptr
Note that in-memory banks may still be loading the wave data asynchronously after the return of this constructor. You can see if the wave data has completed loading by calling IsPrepared. If you call Play or CreateInstance before the wave data has loaded, then the thread will wait until the load is complete before returning.
Play one-shot sounds
To play a sound in a in-memory wave bank as a 'fire and forget' sound:
wb->Play( index );
- index is 0-based
To play the sound in the bank as a 'fire and forget' sound with volume, a pitch-shift, and/or pan setting:
wb->Play( index, volume, pitch, pan );
- volume default is 1
- pitch ranges from -1 to +1, playback defaults to 0 (which is no pitch-shifting)
- pan -1 is fully left, +1 is fully right, and 0 is balanced.
If the wave bank contains 'entry friendly names', you can also use them to trigger a one-shot:
wb->Play( "Bang" );
wb->Play( "Bang", 0.8f, 0.f, 1.f );
You can also make use of the C/C++ header generated by XWBTool or the legacy XACTBLD3
to avoid 'magic numbers' in your code:
#include "wavebank.h"
wb->Play( XACT_WAVEBANK_WAVEBANK_BANG );
If using literal values for the index, you may get
error 2668: ambiguous call to overloaded function
. Forcing the literal to an unsigned value will resolve it:wb->Play(1u);
.
Note a C++ exception is thrown if attempting to play a one-shot sound from a streaming wavebank.
If the specified index or name is not found, then no one-shot is played and there is no C++ exception thrown.
Playing the sound
To play a sound from an in-memory wave bank with full control, looping, and dynamic pitch-shifting/volume control/pan settings:
auto effect = wb->CreateInstance( 2 );
if ( !effect )
// Index not found in wave bank
To play a sound with positional 3D audio:
auto effect = wb->CreateInstance( 2,
SoundEffectInstance_Use3D | SoundEffectInstance_ReverbUseFilters);
if ( !effect )
// Index not found in wave bank
If the wave bank contains 'entry friendly names', you can also use them to create an instance:
auto effect = wb->CreateInstance( "Bang" );
if ( !effect )
// Name not found in wave bank
auto effect = wb->CreateInstance( "Bang",
SoundEffectInstance_Use3D | SoundEffectInstance_ReverbUseFilters);
if ( !effect )
// Name not found in wave bank
You can also make use of the C/C++ header generated by XWBTool or legacy XACTBLD3
to avoid 'magic numbers' in your code:
#include "wavebank.h"
auto effect = wb->CreateInstance( XACT_WAVEBANK_WAVEBANK_BANG );
if ( !effect )
// Index not found in wave bank
auto effect = wb->CreateInstance( XACT_WAVEBANK_WAVEBANK_BANG,
SoundEffectInstance_Use3D | SoundEffectInstance_ReverbUseFilters);
if ( !effect )
// Index not found in wave bank
Note a C++ exception is thrown if attempting to create a sound instance from a streaming wavebank.
If the specified index or name is not found, then CreateInstance returns a 'nullptr'. Client code should be sure to check for this condition. This is done because typically games do not consider missing audio content to be a fatal error during development.
See SoundEffectInstance.
Play streaming waves
To play waves from a streaming wave bank, create a stream instance:
auto stream = wb->CreateStreamInstance( 2 );
if ( !stream )
// Index not found in wave bank
If the wave bank contains 'entry friendly names', you can also use them to create an stream instance:
auto stream = wb->CreateStreamInstance( "Bang" );
if ( !stream )
// Name not found in wave bank
You can also create the stream instance with 3D effects just as above for sound instances.
Note a C++ exception is thrown if attempting to create a sound stream instance from a in-memory wavebank.
See SoundStreamInstance.
Properties
-
IsPrepared: Returns true if the WaveBank has completed loading the wave data. For streaming buffers, they are always prepared after the constructor returns (only the metadata is loaded into memory).
-
IsInUse: Returns true if the WaveBank is currently playing as a one-shot or there are SoundEffectInstances referencing it.
-
IsStreamingBank: Returns true if the wave bank is a streaming type, false if it is an in-memory wave bank.
-
GetSampleSizeInBytes ( index ): Returns the size of the wave data in bytes. This will return 0 if the index is invalid.
-
GetSampleDuration ( index ): Returns the wave data duration in samples. This does not include any loops. This will return 0 if the index is invalid.
-
GetSampleDurationMS ( index ): Returns the wave data duration in milliseconds. This does not include any loops. This will return 0 if the index is invalid.
-
GetFormat ( index, WAVEFORMATEX* wfx, size_t maxsize ): Fills out a
WAVEFORMATEX
structure that describes the wave data format. This will return nullptr if the index is invalid, otherwise it returns a pointer to wfx. Since the format can be variable length, the caller provides the buffer and maxsize. See Wave Formats.
At least 64 bytes is recommended as this is large enough to contain
WAVEFORMAT
,PCMWAVEFORMAT
,WAVEFORMATEX
,ADPCMWAVEFORMAT
with coefficients,WAVEFORMATEXTENSIBLE
, or aXMA2WAVEFORMATEX
.
char formatBuff[ 64 ] = {};
auto wfx = reinterpret_cast<WAVEFORMATEX*>( formatBuff );
wb->GetFormat( 2, wfx, 64 );
- Find ( const char* name ): Returns the index, or -1 if not found or if there are no entry friendly names present in the wave bank.
Low-level access
FillSubmitBuffer is used internally, but can also be used when implementing your own XAudio2 source voices using the low-level interface access. Note that LoopCount is set to 0 by this function and should be set to a non-zero value by the caller. If looping is not desired, be sure to set LoopBegin and LoopLength to zero as well.
Care needs to be taken to ensure that any referenced WaveBank is not deleted while a source voice is actively playing back content from it or has pending buffers referencing it.
Content support
XAudio 2.9 on Windows 10 supports PCM, ADPCM, and xWMA.
XAudio 2.8 on Windows 8.x and Windows phone support PCM and ADPCM formats.
XAudio 2.7 on Windows 7 or later via the legacy DirectX End-User Runtime Redistribution (aka DirectSetup) supports PCM, ADPCM, and xWMA.
XAudio on Xbox One supports PCM, ADPCM, and xWMA. Xbox One exclusive app developers can also make use of XMA2.
XACT-style wave banks support 8-bit and 16-bit PCM (i.e. not 32-bit IEEE float PCM), ADPCM, xWMA, and XMA2 content.
XWB File Format
To aid in debugging, here is a simple console program for dumping out the content of a XWB in a human-readable form.
For Use
- Universal Windows Platform apps
- Windows desktop apps
- Windows 11
- Windows 10
- Windows 8.1
- Windows 7 Service Pack 1
- Xbox One
Architecture
- x86
- x64
- ARM64
For Development
- Visual Studio 2022
- Visual Studio 2019 (16.11)
- clang/LLVM v12 - v18
- MinGW 12.2, 13.2
- CMake 3.20
Related Projects
DirectX Tool Kit for DirectX 12
Tools
All content and source code for this package are subject to the terms of the MIT License.
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