Windows XP k mixer vs. whatever is in Vista Options

[audiophilosophy]

I'm a noob with this technical sort of stuff, but I was wondering if the audio processing stuff included in Vista is better or worse than what we had with XP.

Ok, since I am a noob, this is what I have gathered about XP's audio processing--- the k mixer is bad, and it has a degrading effect on the sound unless you decided to take steps to entirely bypass the k mixer. Correct me if I'm wrong about this.

So I'm wondering, are there any improvements over XP's k mixer with what comes standard with Vista?

[AndyH-ha]

so obviously kmixer changes digital stream in some way

But the change that quashes DTS doesn't have t9o be great enough to be perceived with regular stereo material.

[Dogbert]

so obviously kmixer changes digital stream in some way

But the change that quashes DTS doesn't have t9o be great enough to be perceived with regular stereo material.

Contrary to popular belief, the kmixer of XP and 2k doesn't change a thing when you move the wave volume slider to the max. DTS encoded wave files can be played through WaveOut/DSound and through the kernel mixer without any loss.

And I should know, I've developed a driver for the C-Media 8738/8768 which just can do that stunt.

The mixing engine of Vista works with 32bit float samples, so there's actually some information lost in the conversion. But there is a so called "exclusive mode" which is available through the WASAPI. It should give you bitperfect output, albeit I haven't seen software which actually support it (yet).

[audiophilosophy]

so obviously kmixer changes digital stream in some way

But the change that quashes DTS doesn't have t9o be great enough to be perceived with regular stereo material.

Contrary to popular belief, the kmixer of XP and 2k doesn't change a thing when you move the wave volume slider to the max. DTS encoded wave files can be played through WaveOut/DSound and through the kernel mixer without any loss.

And I should know, I've developed a driver for the C-Media 8738/8768 which just can do that stunt.

The mixing engine of Vista works with 32bit float samples, so there's actually some information lost in the conversion. But there is a so called "exclusive mode" which is available through the WASAPI. It should give you bitperfect output, albeit I haven't seen software which actually support it (yet).

So are you saying that the audio quality that comes standard for XP is superior to what comes standard for Vista?