Spatial speakers

Next to the graphics part, there are also some speakers on the device. Microsoft calls them spatial sound speakers, meaning that they are capable of placing sounds in a three dimensional world. The speakers are quite obvious when you look at the device; they are the two red bars in the middle of the headband that will be just above your ears when you wear it. The effect is remarkably good--even with the use of just two tiny speakers, the sound quality is great, and you really feel the sound coming from a place in the room around you. Of course, this can be something we can use in our software. When we place items in our scene that we want the user to look at, we can have it make some noise and people will instinctively turn in the direction the sound is coming from, and this works even if we place the sounds behind the users. In practice, this works really well, and we will use this later on. The reason they decided to place the speakers in this location is that by putting them in front of your ears instead of on top of them, you will not be able to hear the actual real world around you anymore. This way, the virtual sounds blend in nicely with the real-world sounds.