Concern About Health And Tsw Sounds

Discussion in 'TSW General Discussion' started by facundo.dim, Oct 14, 2021.

  1. facundo.dim

    facundo.dim Active Member

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    This post is not about wrong loco sounds or that X loco doesn't sound like IRL.

    I bought TSW at the release, then I stopped playing until a few weeks back and I've been enjoying the game a lot with the content released since the first game. I always wondered if the 185.5 real sound was like that and how could anyone work several hours a day in such environment, I made some youtube search and some real life locos have an extremely loud sound in the cab, so I thought "good, is like the real thing".

    I have tinnitus since several years ago, when there is silence in the room (mostly at night when I go to sleep), I hear a sound similar to what you find when you put your ear near a seashell. This can't be cured, it's a permanent damage in the ears, I think it was too much years hearing music with headphones at high volumes.

    With the release of the BR 187 today and the very loud engine sound (higher than other locos), I experienced that seashell sound very loud (like never before) after playing with the new loco. I'm not saying this made my tinnitus worst, I already learnt to live with it. But this made me wonder if these sounds can make some real damage to people's health. I don't know about the noise frecuencies generated in TSW but machinery noise frecuencies are unhealthy.

    I know I can lower the volume, but all volume goes down and can't hear other sounds like Sifa, AWS, etc.

    So I ask DTG, if there is a possibility to implement a separate volume control for the loco sound inside the cab or the loco/train engine.
     
    Last edited: Oct 14, 2021
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  2. paul.pavlinovich

    paul.pavlinovich Well-Known Member

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    I thought maybe you could, but unfortunately both safety sounds and train sounds are on the SFX channel. Perhaps the safety sounds should be moved to another channel then you could do this.

    I too have tinnitus so I know the feeling. When I work in real locomotives I wear ear protection always. You might find this helps you if you use the plugs inside your headphones with the trains. I know this sounds weird but the plugs are designed to let speech and noises in safety frequencies through while getting rid of loud deep and loud high sounds.

    I just tried this with the 185 which is a loco I find a bit annoying after driving for a long time and I could clearly hear SIFA and PZB alerts but the locomotive cab sound was greatly reduced. They are very cheap. You can get them from any safety shop, most hardware stores and often places like service stations.

    Paul PXL_20211015_060559853 (1).jpg
     

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  3. facundo.dim

    facundo.dim Active Member

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    I used those things a few years ago. I'll try using it with the headphones, thank you.
    Sounds and loud music usually don't bother me, but the noises in this game are very different from the rest.
     
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  4. paul.pavlinovich

    paul.pavlinovich Well-Known Member

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    I have the same, if I listen to the same sound with similar tone for long periods it makes the tinnitus worse for hours, sometimes a day or two.

    Paul
     
  5. bescot

    bescot Well-Known Member

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    Another tinnitus person here. Also have vestibular disorder, and I'm deaf in the left ear so all I can hear is whistling in that ear. This was caused by a mixture of ear infections and sitting in the cab of trains where the cab door seals are just next to my left ear. I left the traincrew grades 10 years ago because of this. Sure I miss it, but I'm enjoying life still in the industry but in a office.

    Certain frequencies my ear picks up really makes the tinnitus worse. I cannot drive the 185 for example. I can't wear headphones and if I do can only use the right hand one!

    Protect your hearing guys.
     
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  6. paul.pavlinovich

    paul.pavlinovich Well-Known Member

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    Yes indeed.

    Another possibility is to add a mixer / equalizer into your sound stream. This way you could drop out the sounds that bother you most and keep the rest. I do have a relatively complex sound setup for my streaming, but you don't need to go that far. Simply taking the stereo line out from your PC and running it through a simple EQ of at least five channels and running your speakers or headphones of that device would be ok. You should be able to get a simple EQ cheaply. If you run speakers you'll likely need an amplifier as well if the speakers are not powered.

    Paul
     
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  7. xi haoyu china

    xi haoyu china Active Member

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    How is it like to have tinitus? I am curious to know, as I might have it soon too
     
  8. facundo.dim

    facundo.dim Active Member

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    Some people hear a constant whistle, others like me hear a sound similar to a seashell. Sometimes is like the "electric" sound of the BR 185. For me, I only feel this when it's quiet, so at night when I go to bed is the worst part. Hearing white noise helps to reduce the effect, is like you are cheating the brain. There are white noise playlists in spotify if anyone wants to try.
    My wife hates me when I turn on the phone and listen to white noise some nights. Not every night, I only use it when the tinnitus sympthom is higher.
     
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  9. dbrunner#4864

    dbrunner#4864 Well-Known Member

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    Sorry to hear about the hearing issues you guys are having. I experienced tinnitus and that constant ringing in the ear when one of my year would get clogged from water or wax, its not pleasant at all and i hope you guys managed to find a way to make things better for you.

    More advanced sound volume control would be beneficial for everybody, we should have the options to set the volume of each sound in game on a different slider. You could set the volume for wheels sound, horn, safety systems, engine, wind, rain etc on different slider for each, same as you can do in ETS/ATS.
     
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  10. paul.pavlinovich

    paul.pavlinovich Well-Known Member

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    I have the constant whistle and wind noise variety. It is usually worse in my left ear than my right. It does not interfere with hearing of speech or noises but when the world is quiet you certainly notice it. I did notice a down turn in high pitched sounds on my annual railway medical hearing test - not enough to put my off duty but its detectable. Most of the time I do not except in the quiet. I did find my test drive of the 187 before I refunded it had to be turned right down because the frequency was about the same as what I hear. I hope you don't get it. You do get used to it but its not pleasant.

    facundo.dim if you have a google assistant thing ask it to play white noise or "make sleep sounds" and you might find that helpful.

    Paul
     
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  11. kevin.charb81

    kevin.charb81 Well-Known Member

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    I would certainly make use of a slider for sounds.

    Certain sounds scare the hell out of my dogs, typically those which sound similar to a smoke detector beeping (turning on the master key for the M7, safety system on Boston’s FP40 and ACS-64).
     
  12. DTG Matt

    DTG Matt Executive Producer Staff Member

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    Thank you for this thread, really useful - we're always trying to see what adjustments or settings we can make to the game to help make it more accessible. We've talked about having some ability to dial back the "drone" sounds like diesel engines, or the motors - and it sounds like there's even more reason to do so from this thread. Not making any promises at this point of course, but just wanted to drop a note in here to say - I hear you, and will add it to the things we're discussing.
     
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  13. Veryfatbloke

    Veryfatbloke Member

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    I also suffer from tinnitus, with the added bonus of having to wear two hearing aids. My tinnitus is the high pitched whistling type in both ears. Normally I can get by with it but more often these days I hear it as soon as I wake up, it doesn't stop me from sleeping though. Mine is also probably due to listening to very loud music through headphones. I have great difficulty in hearing high pitched sounds without my hearing aids, sometimes even when I am wearing them.

    I used to play using a laptop, but have recently upgraded to an all singing all dancing PC, and I also now have a separate room where the PC is based. I can crank up the volume without upsetting the rest of the family or the neighbours! When I was using the laptop and having to use the laptop speakers I did find it very difficult to hear all of the sounds particularly when using TS2021, there is one UK multiple unit which has a very high pitched DVD sound. On one occasion I was playing in the living room and both my wife and son could hear it but I could not. I've also used a pair of noise cancelling headphones on occasions but I found that these made my tinnitus much worse when I took them off.

    I work from home now, and it doesn't look like I will have to go back to the office on a regular basis, so when I am on a Zoom call I use a pair of bone conducting headphones. These are ideal for that purpose and because I am in a quiet environment, my wife works at home but can't work with any noise at all, I find them very good. However, I have tried them for trainsimming and the sound quality isn't the best.

    It's good to know that DTG are looking into the sound issues, and at least I know my hearing isn't to blame for the fact that I don't hear all of the signal warning sounds on London Commuter.
     
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  14. facundo.dim

    facundo.dim Active Member

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    I see that we are a few with hearing problems. I found very helpful information here, thanks for sharing your experience and how you manage to deal with it.

    Thank you Matt, I hope you can implement some kind of sound options to enjoy the game even more.
     
  15. jamesthepershing

    jamesthepershing Active Member

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    Maybe lower your game volume?
     
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  16. OldVern

    OldVern Well-Known Member

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    Ultimately if you feel something in the game is affecting your hearing, avoid it. There have been some games in the past that caused me motion sickness and I simply stopped playing them (one of the old Star Wars console games was the chief offender). For the same reason I try and avoid movies made with “shaky cam” or anything with strobing, even though I’m not epileptic.
     
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  17. facundo.dim

    facundo.dim Active Member

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    It seems you didn't read what I said. I usually use the same volume for all games. If I use a lower volume, all volume goes down not only the engine. I don't know if this is worsening my condition or not, it would be great for anybody to have options for volumes. More than 85 db is danger to the ears, some sounds are not mixed properly, that makes people uses high volumes to compensate and be able to hear the lower sounds.
    Machinery sounds are one of the worst for the human ear.
     
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  18. bluetiger#2496

    bluetiger#2496 Member

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    If the high pitched sounds are what bother you and you are on a PC, I would recommend using an equalizer program to alter the sound profile. Some of the German locos begin to give me a headache after awhile, so I use EqualizerAPO to eq the sound before it goes to my headphones I'm just using a basic low pass filter with the corner frequency at 5000Hz. That seems to fix the problem for me without affecting the sound all that much. You can also eq out specific frequencies if you know which frequencies bother you. If you need help setting up an eq, feel free to write here or message me and I can help you set it up.
     
    Last edited: Oct 16, 2021
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  19. facundo.dim

    facundo.dim Active Member

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    Thank you!!! Downloading now.
     
  20. rat7_mobile

    rat7_mobile Well-Known Member

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    That is assuming a few things
    1) that we all own an equilizer
    2) THat we can connect an equilizer to the computer
    3) that we all know how to use an equilizer
     
  21. bluetiger#2496

    bluetiger#2496 Member

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    So, EqualizerAPO is a free program that you can download from the internet. It uses almost no processor or ram, and doesn't require any hardware beyond your computer. It is merely a software equalizer that can digitally modify the output of your soundcard. And yes, I admit that equalizers can be complicated if you've never used them before, which is why I gave my own settings as a suggestion. In the equalizer, it is as simple as adding the module for a low pass filter and then setting the frequency, which I provided. If you are wanting help setting it up, I am willing to help.

    I understand that this is something that we might expect DTG to get involved with, but to be fair, people complain if the sounds aren't realistic too. Most, if not all, of these locos require earplugs to work on in real life. Therefore, getting the sounds accurate enough without making them hurtful to anyone is hard. Everyone's hearing is slightly different, and frequencies that may bother one person could be unnoticeable to many others. Therefore, I just tweak things to get them comfortable for me.
     
  22. rat7_mobile

    rat7_mobile Well-Known Member

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    I appreciate the offer of help to set it up, but that would be too complicated to me
    Do not worry, I was previously call in because I said that all the 101, 146, 185, 187 are all the same sound and look wise, whiche they are except for the number painted at the front :)
    And you are right all of the German locomotive would not even be allowed in Canada due to their helth hazzard, and the same is true for the USA subways, at last the one we have in the game, even in the passenger section the noise level is behound acceptable for people
     
  23. facundo.dim

    facundo.dim Active Member

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    My friend, you just changed my life with this EqualizerAPO. It's amazing, I could manage to reduce all the high pitch sounds, I can hear the track sounds now!

    The tutorial on the web is a bit difficult to follow if you are not familiar with the properties of the sound (like frequencies and equalization). I will be sharing my own config files and explain, so the people can adjust as they like. You just have to modify a .txt file, really easy to do. It's a game changer for me, I can even drive the BR 187 enjoying the sound, lol.
     
  24. bluetiger#2496

    bluetiger#2496 Member

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    I'm glad it helped. If you need any other help or explanation, just let me know. There's also a graphical interface to edit the sound eq somewhat hidden in the poorly named Configuration Editor
     
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