Razer Softwares

[FlyingMongoose]

So Razer is really pushing it's new softwares, Razer Synapse for a consolidation control panel for Razer Devices and it works fantastic on the supported devices, it's nice to be able to switch between Macros and Keymaps from one device to another.

Someone in Mumble last night mentioned Razer's new Surround software, I have installed it, and I also have their Game Booster software.

Game Booster is pretty simple, it pretty much just auto-kills useless processes and clears ram before the games you run launch, helps them run smoother.

I'm about to play a campaign of left 4 dead 2 on some slightly higher volumes to see how the Surround software stacks up. I will say this, the demo audio file they include does do a pretty good job after calibrating my razer kraken.

Also, they have started their own IM/Voice Comm system (i've created the brbuninstalling group on there by the way, it's open, so if you do decide to join it, it's just "brbuninstalling").

Anyway, Synapse gets installed if you get razer surround, it's free (for now), or if you have a razer device that synapse supports.

Links for each software below.

Synapse (2) (Free)
Status: Full Version
http://www.razerzone.com/synapse2

Game Booster (Free)
Status: Beta
http://www.razerzone.com/gamebooster

Razer Comms (Free)
Status: Beta
http://www.razerzone.com/comms
Status: Secondary Beta (not on update servers yet)
https://insider.razerzone.com/index.php?...beta.3309/

Razer Surround (Free for now, planned of $19.99)
Status: Beta
http://www.razerzone.com/surround

If you care, razer products I own (that I currently use):

Razer Orbweaver (non-stealth)
Razer Naga (MMO Mouse)
Razer Deathstalker (Keyboard)
Razer Kraken (Headset)

Of course I have all the softwares listed above installed as well.  

[Elder]

i just came up with a great idea

[FlyingMongoose]

And that idea is...

Anyway, played Left 4 Dead 2, and Planetside 2 with the Razer Surround.

It does a fantastic job at emulating the surround experience. I especially noticed a significant bass quality improvement and a number of the "smaller" sounds, for example "bullet whiz (in planetside 2), it definitely had an audible quality of hearing the bullet fly from behind my left ear to the front of me in the left ear, and vice versa.

I do recommend the Razer Surround software.

[HeK]

If it's anything like their mouse or keyboard software, I won't go anywhere near it.
The Razor mouse software is notorious for highjacking the USB bus and forcing all the bandwidth to the mouse....

[Didzo]

I fucking hated the Razer software back when I had my mouse. It worked half the time but had memory leaks and caused all sorts of weird behavior most of the time.

[FlyingMongoose]

Synapse 2 is much better than the old drivers.

[Gump]

As someone who owns a Razer mouse and knows the pain of their old drivers, I've tested out the Surround software and it's much improved. Synapse eats up about 100MB of RAM, isn't intrusive, and is simple to set up. Aside from a couple sound glitches (which were fixed by a reboot) I haven't had any problems, and I'm liking the features. In addition to making FPS combat sound a bit more dynamic to headphone users, it does a good job of enhancing audio.

The only thing I would take issue with is,
The 'bass boost' is kind of clunky. It seems like there's a threshold at about 40% where it flips from subtle to speaker-static-obliterating. However, this may be an issue specifically with my headphones, as I'm using Sennheiser HD 280's, which are designed for lower listening levels and more classic rock/oldies as opposed to techno, metal, etc, which are generally bass-heavier.

Overall, if you're interested in about as close to 7.1 as you can get on headphones, it's worth a try. No driver headaches here.

[Chief]

Razer software has always caused a problem with my keyboard. Sometimes it some of the keys pressed were just not working, and I had to unplug and plug back in the USB for the keyboard to get it to work properly again. Still doesn't work to this day and sometimes the problem appears again once in a while.

[FlyingMongoose]

Razer software has always caused a problem with my keyboard. Sometimes it some of the keys pressed were just not working, and I had to unplug and plug back in the USB for the keyboard to get it to work properly again. Still doesn't work to this day and sometimes the problem appears again once in a while.

Took years for it to happen, but my razer lycosa keyboard had this issue and it was basically an end of life issue for the hardware. Same goes for my Microsoft Habu.

But they both ended up having issues that were probably caused by bad USB ports at some point and also having shit spilled on them over years of use....

Ultimately though I still keep getting razer products, as they have always been fantastically reliable and high quality in my experience.

[Didzo]

[quote author=TheDarkChief link=topic=7020.msg268770#msg268770 date=1372401516]
Razer software has always caused a problem with my keyboard. Sometimes it some of the keys pressed were just not working, and I had to unplug and plug back in the USB for the keyboard to get it to work properly again. Still doesn't work to this day and sometimes the problem appears again once in a while.

Took years for it to happen, but my razer lycosa keyboard had this issue and it was basically an end of life issue for the hardware. Same goes for my Microsoft Habu.

But they both ended up having issues that were probably caused by bad USB ports at some point and also having shit spilled on them over years of use....

Ultimately though I still keep getting razer products, as they have always been fantastically reliable and high quality in my experience.
[/quote]

That brings back found memories of my Razer Mamba, with it's breaking usb connector cable, peeling mouse wheel and rubber grip stickers, squeaky mouse wheel, failing left click, periods of being completely unresponsive, jumping cursor, memory leaking software that was required for the mouse to be "useable." It lasted somewhere around 1.5-2 years.

Ah, memories.

[FlyingMongoose]

[quote author=FlyingMongoose link=topic=7020.msg268771#msg268771 date=1372403016]
[quote author=TheDarkChief link=topic=7020.msg268770#msg268770 date=1372401516]
Razer software has always caused a problem with my keyboard. Sometimes it some of the keys pressed were just not working, and I had to unplug and plug back in the USB for the keyboard to get it to work properly again. Still doesn't work to this day and sometimes the problem appears again once in a while.

Took years for it to happen, but my razer lycosa keyboard had this issue and it was basically an end of life issue for the hardware. Same goes for my Microsoft Habu.

But they both ended up having issues that were probably caused by bad USB ports at some point and also having shit spilled on them over years of use....

Ultimately though I still keep getting razer products, as they have always been fantastically reliable and high quality in my experience.
[/quote]

That brings back found memories of my Razer Mamba, with it's breaking usb connector cable, peeling mouse wheel and rubber grip stickers, squeaky mouse wheel, failing left click, periods of being completely unresponsive, jumping cursor, memory leaking software that was required for the mouse to be "useable." It lasted somewhere around 1.5-2 years.

Ah, memories.[/quote]

Not everyone's experience is the same, I never owned a mamba, but it took almost 5-6 years for that lycosa keyboard to fail.

[Gump]

Hoooooly fuck okay I recalibrated and fucked with settings a bit. Stereo enhancement enabled, bass boost set to 40; normalization and voice clarity unchecked. If you're on a Source engine game, or any other game that lets you change how it outputs sound (mono, headphones, etc) set it to 7.1. TF2 is awesome now.

[FlyingMongoose]

Hoooooly fuck okay I recalibrated and fucked with settings a bit. Stereo enhancement enabled, bass boost set to 40; normalization and voice clarity unchecked. If you're on a Source engine game, or any other game that lets you change how it outputs sound (mono, headphones, etc) set it to 7.1. TF2 is awesome now.

Yeah don't forget to set to 7.1 when you can!

[at0m]

Synapse 2 is nice because you can set your settings then offline it and it won't fuck you over if you have something with switchblade (like the Razer Blade). They pushed a driver autoupdate that disabled my touchpad for over a month last year, I was not fucking happy.

[FlyingMongoose]

So Razer posted up a secondary beta for Razer Comms to Razer Insiders the main download is still the officially supported one, this one is a version not on their update servers yet, but has a nice new set of features.

https://insider.razerzone.com/index.php?...beta.3309/

I think the coolest thing they have there is the comms widget which supposedly will allow voice chat to work from browser without any special plug ins or software so long as you have a razer ID and comms ID.