DTS has been a big name in the surround sound world almost as long as Dolby, but they’ve always had more of a focus on modernized technology and bells and whistles compared to their elder counterpart. They were the first company to ship movie soundtracks on separate optical discs for higher quality audio. Where Dolby has essentially only released two headphone surround virtualization systems over the years with Dolby Headphone and Dolby Atmos, DTS has pushed constant updates to their gaming technology, and made aggressive inroads to get their mixing environment into the hands of the people actually making games.
Now, their DTS Sound Unbound app is finally available on both the PC and the Xbox One after a months-long delay bringing it to the console platform. The app allows you to trial and unlock two technologies for gaming: DTS Headphone: X 2.0, and DTS:X decoding. Unlocking both costs $19.99. The former is a 3D surround system that turns your headphones into a simulated studio listening environment, with sound that sweeps all around your position in 3D space. The latter is a software decoder primarily for movie soundtracks, but which will also hopefully be used directly in games in the future.
