[Feature Request] Custom volume-gain curve

[YUCLing]

For me, how the gain works feels to be different from my original Windows volume works.

The loudness in different volume has changed greatly, it would be nice if I can use a custom curve instead of a simple lerp.

[codeabuse]

Implemented in #4
Awaiting approval. Anyone can grab my version and build the app.

[not-holar]

I wanted to keep the relation between the slider positions 1 to 1, because VoiceMeeter's volume slider already uses the db scale, which is already non-linear and is the most "correct" way of scaling volume regarding perceived volume.

As per the used API's docs:

fMasterVolume
Specifies the current master volume level of the audio stream. The volume level is normalized to the range from 0.0 to 1.0, where 0.0 is the minimum volume level and 1.0 is the maximum level. Within this range, the relationship of the normalized volume level to the attenuation of signal amplitude is described by a nonlinear, audio-tapered curve. For more information about audio tapers, see Audio-Tapered Volume Controls.

It links to this article, which describes that Windows uses the db scale for volume changes too: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/coreaudio/audio-tapered-volume-controls

The only difference being that Windows' scale goes from -96 to 0, while this addon app's is from -60 (the minimum possible of voicemeeter) to 0.

The more accurate way of achieving parity with Vindows would be to set the minimum value to -96 instead of -60 (which would probably truncate some of the bottom range of the slider, but would be completely 1 to 1 with how Windows does volume sliders)

[codeabuse]

There must be something missing. If I switch to my Realtek audio device, the perceived volume curve is completely different than one with Voicemeeter, but to the higher side: 50% via VM is much less louder than same 50% via Realtek, although considering -96 == 0% the Windows variant must be less loud.

[not-holar]

There must be something missing. If I switch to my Realtek audio device, the perceived volume curve is completely different than one with Voicemeeter, but to the higher side: 50% via VM is much less louder than same 50% via Realtek, although considering -96 == 0% the Windows variant must be less loud.

That's interesting.

Audio devices with their own drivers (Realtek included) could implement gaining in any number of ways (Voicemeeter making the amazing decision to ignore it completely), with some even doing it on the hardware side.

I guess it would make sense that some of them would stray from the recommendations provided by Microsoft.

If so, it could make sense to provide different curves to match common devices.

Though I would still try making just the bottom and top values of the lerp configurable at first to see if it's sufficient.

[codeabuse]

Though I would still try making just the bottom and top values of the lerp configurable at first to see if it's sufficient.

I tried to and it didn't helped. With VM the volume curve is very low and I'm always at 75..80% while before that I was comfortably sitting at 50%, occasionally raising for some movies. My exponential curve helped me back to 50% .

It also may be useful for some users with similar issue, but the feature needed to be optional. I tried to quickly hack-in additional menu item for toggling between curves, but its seems like for now any menu event quits the application 😅

[not-holar]

Though I would still try making just the bottom and top values of the lerp configurable at first to see if it's sufficient.

I tried to and it didn't helped. With VM the volume curve is very low and I'm always at 75..80% while before that I was comfortably sitting at 50%, occasionally raising for some movies. My exponential curve helped me back to 50% .

It also may be useful for some users with similar issue, but the feature needed to be optional. I tried to quickly hack-in additional menu item for toggling between curves, but its seems like for now any menu event quits the application 😅

the GUI stuff is very messy currently, I would probably just stick with an auto-created config file in the same folder

if the user is downloading an additional app for controlling the volume and setting it up for autostart, editing a basic config file with notepad would probably not be too difficult

[codeabuse]

@not-holar https://youtu.be/NqZWlvj9Usc
The video illustrates awfully low sound at 50% with linear scaling. And also I implemented the menu to select curves 😏