Options for Voice Chat

Please note this thread is made for you the USER to post what options you would like for Voice Chat.

I personally don't prefer to voice chat with the population as a whole.
Mabe the ability to chat with Friends only or Group only

Or mabe IM Style Voice Chat

List of aloud listeners

I would like to see:

1. The ability to listen but not speak. For example, though I choose not to use Voice, and my Mac Mini is incapable of using a non-USB microphone, it may be necessary in some rare cases for me to toggle this on so I can hear what others are saying. Like if a Linden uses Voice to speak at a Town Hall meeting... (You know they will, and soon, and probably won't have a live typed transcript that people can keep up with.)
   
2. The ability to list who has spoken recently, with time stamps, and to mute individuals from that list. This is also a handy way for non-speakers to determine at a glance if speakers are nearby, without enabling hearing them.
   
3. The ability to mute just Voice, without also muting text chat from that person. (Current Beta mutes both Voice and Typed Chat if you click on someone and mute them.)
   
4. The ability to do a "mute all Voice heard", so that anyone who speaks near me automaticly gets added to my voice-only mute list.
   
5. The ability to toggle visibility of the indicator tags and menu bar indicator for voice enabled on or off, even if you are not able to be voice enabled yourself. In other words, to be able to look at the tags the parcel and the other Players are wearing. Without being voice enabled, the tags are invisible, as are the parcel indicators.
   
6. The ability to see the parcel settings for voice-enabled or not in 'About Land' for the parcel, even if you are not voice enabled and it is not your land.
   

I spent some time today on the voice beta, as a non-speaking user. I had speakers, but no microphone.

It was impossible for me to tell what parcels were or were not voice activated. The checkbox in "About Land" remained grey, regardless. The icon on the menu bar that others said they could see did not exist for me. (I had others who were voice enabled assure me that I was, or was not, on a voice-enabled parcel, and that they could see it on the enabled ones.)

It was impossible for me to tell if anyone was speaking at all, let alone who might be speaking. If there were any animations analogouus to the "typing" animation that go with speaking, people were either not using them, or it was too subtle for me to notice.

99% of the time, I would just as soon have it the way it was for me then. I was not voice enabled, and did not want to use Voice. And it had zero impact on my experience. I couldn't see or hear any indication of audibly spoken conversations going on near me. That is very good, as far as I am concerned, because it doesn't break my immersion.

You already have that if you turn voice on, but enable push-to-talk.

(Off-topic: I really doubt they'd use the land based voice for Town Halls, it's too open to griefing. I think they'll use the moderated group-voice system instead and claim that they need to so everyone not at the town hall can listen along)

No. Only if you have a fully functional setup with a potentially live microphone can you hear. If it fails to recognize your headset or if you do not have a microphone, you can not hear, at all, no matter what settings you choose. I tried. And I heard others complaining (in typed comments) that they couldn't hear audio chat, because the voice beta wasn't recognizing the headset that they were attempting to use.

Now, if you DO have a fully-functional setup, then yes, you can set it up as push-to talk, refrain from pressing the key that activates the mike, and you may listen to others talking. But they would then see you as someone else who is fully voice-enabled, and they will expect to be able to talk to you. What I was asking for was the ability for someone to be solidly voice DISABLED, yet to be able to choose to hear others speak.

And I'll bet L$50 at least one Linden tries to show off their spiffy new Voice technology in a Town Hall meeting or some other public venue within 60 days after they have Voice Chat live on the full grid. The Lindens think this is just wonderful stuff, and they just can't imagine that some of us will hate the idea of adding Voice to SL.

Um, Ceera? I just tried the Voice Beta. And what a surprise!!! Some folks could listen, but not talk!! They just did this thing called typing. No one seemed to mind.

Also- you'd want to use the "Push-to-Talk" feature, as we all noticed some wicked echoes if you left it on.

I'm using standard 3.5mm headphone/microphone jacks. Not USB. And it worked! Ok, well it did once I remembered to 'un-mute' the mic on the volume controls, after I plugged in the Mic.

NOTE: Separate jacks for Headphone & Mic, so since I didnt have the Mic hooked up, I was still able to hear, just not speak.

ANother Note: Anyone trying it without headphones? Make sure your speakers are turned down & away from the Mic as it also causes/may cause feedback. Kinda like when the Talk Radio guy says "Turn down your radio" to the caller.

How to tell someone's talking? Um, dim white dot if NOT. Green "sound wave" if talking. Really tough to miss. If I'm right, it all disappears if you dont enable Voice in the Preferences menu.

While it would be neat to have a "voice chat log", I dont see that happening. Your voice isn't a separate "stream" once it gets thrown into the servers. Kinda like a conference call, someone said.

NOW- the only thing I did notice that might be a problem? People all talking at once.

My hardware: Mac Mini (original release) = NO sound input circuitry exists = Incapable of plugging in a microphone unless it is a USB Mike or something plugged into a USB audio adapter. Since the computer operating system detects no valid audio input devices, I presume that this lack could be detected by the Voice Beta as well.

For me, in an area where people said they were talking audibly, there were no white dots on speakers, there were no green squiggles. I've seen the green squiggles on a YouTube clip from the closed Beta, and they definitely were not present in the new one, from my perspective.

I did hear some other people (in typed chat) stating that they could hear but couldn't get their mike to work. So probably if you have an audio input defined in your OS or capable in your hardware, but don't have a mike plugged in where the OS is looking for it, you may be able to hear without a Mike? I don't know.

I found that I have a USB audio adapter available to me. I'd never installed it on this Mac, because I never needed it. I'll try this weekend to set that up, with a set of walkman-style ear buds and a seperate mike. If I can get the OS to recognize that USB Audio adapter, I'll download a fresh copy of the Voice Beta client and try again, with an alt that I don't acknowledge as being related to Ceera.

Getting back on the original track of this thread, some other desired features:

1. If your OS detects no audio input devices exist, then your Voice Chat Preferences should default to a "Disabled" state, not "Enabled", as it does now.
   
2. The default operation should be "Push to Talk", with a defined default key for that, and not "Open Mike", as it apparently is now.
   

There's two comments on the blog that voice won't work on their Mac, but they can talk and have others hear them.

It looks like it's just a bug, Ceera. The viewer wouldn't look for a mic, because it's pointless and only likely to fail in weird set-ups; if you have sound, the assumption is that you'll have/want voice.

I agree with gaybot on those 2 things. As i've also been testing it for the last week or so, i've noticed the keys they have assigned for push to talk are either keys that i use for camera rotations or opening up GUI windows. Using shift pisses off my windows CP's accessibility options... God i hate that popup... And the key above the TAB button... If i choose to use that, i have to close my chat bar first. The middle mouse button seams like my only option even though it is a mouse wheel that i use for zooming.

The Chat indicator above our head is sorta lame. I could have easily scripted a particle emitter to do the same thing. Or better yet, just use a sphere. What i had in mind was the chat indicator be part of our name tags. You know how in FFXI you can show icons next to your name and stuff? That was what i was thinking of. I know it isn't impossible, they just don't wana rescript anything...

I'd like to have an indicator in the UI somewhere other than or in addition to the dot over the head. I don't keep my avatar onscreen all the time, especially with voice being based on your camera location instead of your avatar location.

I guess you missed a pretty important bit in her message:

Her computer (an original Mac mini) has no audio input hardware.

Thsi is not a "Mac" problem, this is a "her computer can not physically have a headset plugged in" problem.

Say what???

Even the crappiest of $200 Dell's have USB & 3.5 mm Audio In/Out Jacks? What "Genius" came up with this concept???

Holy Moley!

The concept of the Mac Mini was to provide the capabilities of a Mac at the lowest possible price and smallest possible form-factor. They sell for about half the price of the next comparable Mac up the line. They do have stereo audio out, and they do have a DVD-Read/CR RW drive. It also has USB and Firewire ports, which could be used to connect an external audio input adapter. So if all you are using the Mac for is office applications, playing games, watching videos, listening to music... well, in January of 2005 it was both all the Mac I could afford, and all I really neded.

The Mac Mini is also unfortunately handicapped in terms of video ram. Even the newest versions have a pathetic VRAM of just 64 MB, and the original ones like I have only have 32 MB VRAM. And the video circuit is built-in and non-upgradable. It's not an issue if you're not doing lots of 3D processing, but they suck as a system to access SL with. You can do it, but performance is terrible.

However, I still can't afford to replace the thing, just for the sake of better SL performance. It still does everything else that I use a computer for just fine.

Anyone who uses a USB Headset on a PC which also has a Sound Card will have 2 Audio Devices under Windows Sound and Audio Devices. (ex. SB Audigy Audio and Logitech USB Headset).

Allow us to assign different sound devices to each task within the SL Sound Settings:

(optimal configuration example)

1. Mic Input -> [Headset]
   
2. World Sound Output -> [Sound Card]
   
3. Voice Output -> [Headset]
   

The goal will be to route all game sounds through the sound card (speakers) while allowing only voice to be heard in the headset. This is essential in noisy areas like clubs for instance where people would otherwise have to choose between music or voice chat.

This also serves to keep random incoming profanity private in situations where young children may be in earshot.

I may be alone on this, but I definately don't want to listen to game sound and streaming music mixed with conversation on a tinny voice headset, and I don't want a roomful of spam coming through a hi-fi sound system.

Other apps like Skype have achieved this but so far games have not caught on (like Battlefield 2142 or Test Drive Unlimited, both of which built-in voice chat is useless in a noisy environment). Seperating the sound devices adds to the quality of both.

I strongly agree that this needs to be done for all of the reasoning above, or what is the point in having the power of voice... Why not just use TeamSpeak or Vent otherwise. I really dislike having to upset and change my system sound properties just for one application (SL).

Yea, I can't knock the Mac Mini too much. I was considering one for when I get around to sticking an MP3 Player in my car. It'd be perfect for that!! Small size, reliable, dont need alot of power to play music.

I also thought this would be a great thing to implement into the voice features. Being that we can select several friends from our friends list and create a private 'select' friends IM, it would be nice to have a feature to allow voice in there, or group IM's, and Simple person to person IM's. I would recommend that while you are inside a Friends conf, group IM, etc that it take your voice away from in world, and place it only inside the IM.
I was impressed with the Voice Beta Grid. The multi-directional feature is really nice, allowing you to know from what side someone has walked up and is speaking. I always have my mini map open, but being that it is voice, I think it would be nice to get a green chat message saying "So & So Avatar is within listening distance", I know when I get talking I start to not pay as much attention to things around me.
I do not have a USB headset, and I didnt have a problem with using voice, the only thing I did notice is I had my sound almost at max volume, and it was still not as loud as I would have liked it. One other thing, I have a switch on my headset that turns my mic off so to mute any incoming sound from my end, when I am afk, talking to my family, answering the phone, etc. and when I used my mute mic switch, people around me said they heard a weird dull noise coming from me, and I noticed some green waves above my head, where there should have been nothing. I was not using push-to-talk when I tried this, but then did switch to push-to-talk and muted and did not get any green waves. I do not like to use push-to-talk when I am talking to just a few people, but when others come into the conversation I will switch to push-to-talk just out of common courtesy.
I also agree the white dot is hard to see, but I always have my name tags set to "show temporarily" so I dont know if I would want the tag itself to light up, but making the dot a diff color, or maybe not so transparent would be nice.
I have to say over all I was really impressed, I thought that the voice would make things laggy, or cause it to crash a lot, I didnt have a prob with lag or crashing. A friend of mine did however, crash on the voice grid before even fully loading, he had the min requirements for running SL, and had been running fine on it. Are there new min requirements for the voice grid that we are not aware of?

About the dot - how 'bout it's the same color as the color for "my effects"?

I love the sound - can't wait for it to get on the main grid

You might want to consider the AppleTV instead. it's basically a stripped down Mac Mini for half the price and with a user interface designed for small screens.

If I can't turn off completely Voice chat I'll be away so fast the door won't make contact with my behind.

I use SL late at night, and also when my daughters in the room, there's no way I'm going to subject her to people saying F U A hole when they get a tissy on or grunting and groaning of some perv jerking off while some womans doing the ironing saying give it to me hard baby, from the safety of a different time zone.

We know this is going to end up the primary use of voice chat, despite the usefull aplications it should be used for.

The defenders of voice will say keep out those sort of zones, yes its possible, but I'm just not taking the risk of some diatribe happening over my speakers or condeming myself to a life in the PG zones.

I'm one of a few people that feel this way, I wonder if this will increase or decreae the population..time will tell.

I'm with you. If it can be disabled, I'm fine with it. if not...hold the door open for me.

It CAN be disabled. OR use a headset. I keep one earpiece off so I can hear the tv, while I'm watching it, talking to others. Heh- I multi-task waaay too much.

Go download the Voice Beta & try it!

Cant complain about it if you havent tried it yet.

And for the most part, its not the end of the frickin' world. Voice will be like everything else- a novelty at first. Then it'll subside. Few will use it. Just another feature thats there if needed.

Besides, you dont need "voice" to spam people with sound- 10 second sound clips do just as well.