Understanding Voicemeeter Banana

[Gwydion]

Hey, everyone. So I've watched a ton (too many) videos on Voicemeeter Banana. Most all of them tell you how to configure it for your stream. However, some of us (like me) are very new to audio mixing and understanding audio inputs/outputs and why sometimes what you think should be an input is an output! Confusing! So, after an epiphany over the last few days I created a video last night and posted it to youtube to try and better explain Voicemeeter banana and its functionality. My hope is to help you better understand the software so you can configure it for your needs. For example, not everyone streams! Some people just want to get sounds to their players over the internet. I just felt that most of the videos that deal with Voicemeeter banana assume things about what you want. I was trying to make a video more to help you understand what is possible so you can configure it best to match your goals. I hope it is helpful! If anyone watches it and has feedback (good or bad), let me know. Thanks for helping me indulge in my sound obsession....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CNwXseIngA&t=13s

[mlesnews]

Good job! I put this on my to watch list.

-edit: post video viewing

I think you did a decent job with the video, around 20 minutes is a good amount of time. This will help a lot of people!

As someone else mentioned, setup and run Syrinscape on the hw input of choice being the default, and it will stick to that input. Then you can set up your other inputs. Mine is set to vb-audio cable B.
The video helped me set up my OBS feed to vm vaio to vm aux, thus providing a clean feed of just discord instead of all the desktop sounds.
One minor nitpick, as I found that for me at least, your voice sounded a little bit on the low side. Yes, I could simply turn up my desktop sounds but then everything would be louder as well.
Lastly, once you have all of your settings where you like them, save them! Menu > Save Settings.



You probably already did this prior to doing your video, but I'd suggest watching Rob2e's four-part videos on setting up Syrinscape with Discord, etc.
- Twitch Tutorial Streaming Fantasy Grounds 1 of 4 - Syrinscape and Discord: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9U3TRoS3gpM&index=2&list=PLdngHgX1dpPc0aMjhhHf_3q_zqwvUsgyH
- Twitch Tutorial Streaming Fantasy Grounds 2 of 4 - Dulux-Oz Chat Sounds https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_pejfDkn40
- Twitch Tutorial Streaming Fantasy Grounds 3 of 4 - Adding Music Before Your Stream https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTscbsNYHDE
- Twitch Tutorial Streaming Fantasy Grounds 4 of 4 - Adding Background Theme Sounds to Your Games https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xmz_6mO9ksc&t=2s

[Gwydion]

Good job! I put this on my to watch list.

Excellent! Would love any feedback you have on it once you've had a chance to watch it.

[mac40k]

I watched it and thought it was a little too long; that you spent too much time re-iterating points or saying the same thing in a different way. Then I tried to set up it up for FG, VM, and Syrinscape and couldn't get Syrinscape to play. Replayed the video, following the process step by step and still couldn't get things to work. Other sources of sound worked, but not Syrinscape. After digging around in various forum posts, both here and at Syrinscape, I realized my problem was that I needed to restart Syrinscape after changing the Windows default settings. Doh! Of all the things you addressed, I don't recall you addressing this issue let alone re-iterating it. Overall, I thought it was a good video since you decided to make it more generic and not specifically tied to your particular setup, making it more broadly useful.

[Gwydion]

I watched it and thought it was a little too long; that you spent too much time re-iterating points or saying the same thing in a different way. Then I tried to set up it up for FG, VM, and Syrinscape and couldn't get Syrinscape to play. Replayed the video, following the process step by step and still couldn't get things to work. Other sources of sound worked, but not Syrinscape. After digging around in various forum posts, both here and at Syrinscape, I realized my problem was that I needed to restart Syrinscape after changing the Windows default settings. Doh! Of all the things you addressed, I don't recall you addressing this issue let alone re-iterating it. Overall, I thought it was a good video since you decided to make it more generic and not specifically tied to your particular setup, making it more broadly useful.

Well crap. Kinda the opposite of what I was going for. Really appreciate the constructive feedback though. You are right, I didn't address syrinscape and the issue of having to make sure to change the default to whatever playback device you want it to be on before you launch it. I also agree about the length. I've seen several VM videos of 45 min to an hr and really didn't want to replicate that. My real goal was to try and better explain inputs/outputs and helpfully help people understand to be able to configure it themselves. Might rethink my process and try again.

Thanks again for the feedback!

[Talen]

Gwydion, thank you for the video - it was helpful as every few months something gets gummed up and I have to review my sound settings for using Syrinscape and Discord. I've come up against such an issue again - but this is a new one and I was hoping you might be able to help me out. I run one instance of Discord on my laptop for voice, and my main pc runs FG, Syrinscape, Voicemeeter Banana and a second instance of discord to send the sound effects. I then log into the laptops discord server. I am able to stream sounds to the laptop BUT there are no volume indicators showing in voicemeeter even tho sound is coming thru. AND there are no sounds coming out on my desktop speaker - just what is being sent to the laptop's discord server. I'm assuming I somehow bypassed Voicemeeter - but not sure how or how to fix it. Here are the settings I used in the image below. Any words of wisdom?

[Valyar]

Talen, something does not look right in the windows sound settings. The device you need to select as default Playback device must be the VB-Audio VoiceMeeter VAIO. I don't know why the name and and images are different than the defaults.

Selecting the VB-Audio VoiceMeeter VAIO will make the sounds of your operating system to go via the Virtual Input and then you can mix them with the other hardware inputs (headset, virtual cable from syrincape/skype/discord to listen and etc). What you need to ensure is that A1-3 is having the proper output device selected (like your speakers).

Then, on each slip you have to enable the sound to be send along the proper bus (A1-3, B1-2)
A1-3 are hardware outputs - desktop speakers, headsets, monitor speakers
B1-2 are virtual outputs - skype/discord, other software for audio recording

[Gwydion]

Gwydion, thank you for the video - it was helpful as every few months something gets gummed up and I have to review my sound settings for using Syrinscape and Discord. I've come up against such an issue again - but this is a new one and I was hoping you might be able to help me out. I run one instance of Discord on my laptop for voice, and my main pc runs FG, Syrinscape, Voicemeeter Banana and a second instance of discord to send the sound effects. I then log into the laptops discord server. I am able to stream sounds to the laptop BUT there are no volume indicators showing in voicemeeter even tho sound is coming thru. AND there are no sounds coming out on my desktop speaker - just what is being sent to the laptop's discord server. I'm assuming I somehow bypassed Voicemeeter - but not sure how or how to fix it. Here are the settings I used in the image below. Any words of wisdom?

Hey, Talen. Sorry for the delay. It might be easier to text chat about this in real time if/when you have some time. Here is an invite to my discord channel. I think I see the problem (and Valyar had some good tips above) However, can you also send a screenshot of your discord voice settings for the second instance of discord? If you want, you can PM to me in discord if you want to text chat there. Thanks!

https://discord.gg/ynECYg

[Gwydion]

Actually, I think the discord screenshot you sent me is for your sound settings, so I want to see your other discord instance, the one for your voice.

[Talen]

Actually, I think the discord screenshot you sent me is for your sound settings, so I want to see your other discord instance, the one for your voice.

I sent a discord pm to you - thank you. The 2nd discord instance for voice is on a second computer - the settings are below.

Valyar - thank you for the suggestions, but the naming conventions appearing for me are slightly different....

[Talen]

Thank you both for your help....it seems my drivers were all jacked up...I uninstalled all my virtual audio cables and voicemeeter - updated to latest and reinstalled all and THAT did the trick.