Push to Talk on PS4

[Brad Remington]

So Fred i was wondering if you have any ideas to have a "Push to Talk" on PS4? I do alot of multiplayer raids etc, and im sick of telling people my mics "broken" haha i have to much background noise. Trying to find away i can keybind or something i can hold down to briefly speak into my headset. 

SteelSeries H Wireless Gaming Headset

Thanks, any ideas would be amazing!

[Fred Davison - QuadStick]

That is a really versatile headset and I think it could be done.

Looking at their Tips and Tricks Advanced Settings page, we can get the game audio from the optical input, the chat audio from an analog cable, then send the microphone audio out through the USB.  Connect the USB to the PC, connect the optical cable to the PS4, connect the analog input cable to a USB audio adapter.  Here's a diagram:

The PC and Dragon Naturally Speaking would always hear the audio, when awake.  We would set the Microphone properties to "listen", which would send the mic audio out the PC headphone jack to the C-Media device's microphone input.  We'd have to be careful with the volume settings.  Might need to use an attenuator on that line.  Then some utility to mute/un-mute the audio out using a HotKey.  Googling around shows several possibilities.

Here is a typical C-media device:

[Brad Remington]

wow, you're incredible. what would i search for on ebay? the c-media device that is

thanks so much fred

[Fred Davison]

Here are a few on Australia's Ebay:

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Useful-USB-2-0-Audio-3D-Sound-Virtual-7-1-Channel-Card-Adapter-With-Cable-Cord-/121217762450

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/New-Logitech-USB-to-3-5mm-Jack-Stereo-Headset-Audio-Adapter-External-Sound-Card/160932712939

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/USB-2-0-to-3D-Audio-Sound-Card-External-Adapter-Virtual-5-1-CH-Mic-Headphone/301221766744

[Brad Remington]

got this on express post, hop it will suffice, is that all ill need? ty very much again 

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/251216083104?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2648

On Friday, December 12, 2014 10:51:15 PM UTC+11, Brad Remington wrote:

[Fred Davison]

That should do it.  Do you have a couple of 3.5mm stereo cables?

If the volume from the computer into the mic input is too loud, we might need an attenuator or inline volume control.  Most photography stores carry them for recording sound on DSLR cameras, but wait and see if it is needed

[Brad Remington]

umm i think, atleast i hope haha, 3.5mm to 3.5mm? or

On Friday, December 12, 2014 10:51:15 PM UTC+11, Brad Remington wrote:

[Brad Remington]

will these be ok? if so ill grab 2 lots

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/BELKIN-CABLE-AUDIO-AUX-3-5MM-TO-3-5MM-MINI-STEREO-CHROME-HOME-CAR-SPEAKER-/171456670223?pt=AU_Electronics_Portable_Audio_Accessories&hash=item27eb9d2a0f

On Friday, December 12, 2014 10:51:15 PM UTC+11, Brad Remington wrote:

[Brad Remington]

so i just got these, hopefully they'll be fine

On Friday, December 12, 2014 10:51:15 PM UTC+11, Brad Remington wrote:

[Fred Davison]

Those will work. There are several in this list:

http://www.ebay.com.au/sch/i.html?_nkw=3.5mm+audio+cable

but you have to pay attention to the postage and from where they are shipped.

[Brad Remington]

ok so i have everything ready in front of me and the only thing that i cannot figure out on the diagram is that you have "Chat audio USB" going from C-Media to the PS4, does that mean plug my C-Media to the PS4 somehow?

On Friday, December 12, 2014 10:51:15 PM UTC+11, Brad Remington wrote:

[Brad Remington]

nevermind i understand. i got a usb extension to fit it. 

On Friday, December 12, 2014 10:51:15 PM UTC+11, Brad Remington wrote:

[Fred Davison]

Right, PS4's have a really narrow USB slot opening.

[Fred Davison]

Your next step will be to add the Push to talk feature.  So far, the best way I have found is a program  that will toggle the audio output mute on and off, which isn't exactly what you were looking for, but it is close.

This article explains how to create a shortcut with a hot-key that will toggle the mute.  The program they use is called nircmd.exe and you unzip the file, put the files somewhere, and create a shortcut on the deskstop to nircmd.exe. 

Dragon Naturally Speaking uses the hotkey "Ctrl NumericKeypad+" to turn the microphone on and off for itself and you could use the hotkey "Ctrl NumericKeypad-" to run the shortcut to mute the audio output.

[Brad Remington]

ok so i have connected it all and there is an issue on playstations end, basically when i have the c-media disconnected from the playstation the sound to the headphones work perfect, soo as i plug it in c-media takes over on the device options on the ps4 and i get no sound, am i missing something? tanks 

On Friday, December 12, 2014 10:51:15 PM UTC+11, Brad Remington wrote:

[Fred Davison]

You will have to configure the gaming headset box to use the audio coming from the c-media device for chat instead of optical or usb.  Look in their tips and tricks advanced setting page for the details.

On the PS4, both directions for chat should go through the c-media.

For controlling the Push to talk, you can also add some commands to your voice file pythonw.vcl

# for in-game chat, when using the PC's audio out to send the microphone
# audio to a game console, these commands control the state of the audio
# output Mute button state (in conjunction with nircmd)

toggle mute = ShellExecute("nircmd mutesysvolume 2", 6);
mute        = ShellExecute("nircmd mutesysvolume 1", 6);
mute off    = ShellExecute("nircmd mutesysvolume 0", 6);

# pick one or the other of these two lines to release the mute and turn off
# the microphone until either "wake up" or a hot-key is used.

open chat   = ShellExecute("nircmd mutesysvolume 0", 6) GoToSleep();
#open chat   = ShellExecute("nircmd mutesysvolume 0", 6) SetMicrophone(0);

nircmd has to be installed on the path, like in the c:\windows folder so Dragon can find it.

[Brad Remington]

yea i don't use voice controls python/dragon etc, just found them too laggy, so i connected it all as the diagram says but when i try to talk to people they just hear fuzzy feedback, although if i connect the headphones usb straight to the sony they can hear perfectly 

On Friday, December 12, 2014 10:51:15 PM UTC+11, Brad Remington wrote:

[Brad Remington]

also no sound from the optical. plugged into optical in. only when i disconnect the c-media do i get anything to work

On Friday, December 12, 2014 10:51:15 PM UTC+11, Brad Remington wrote:

[Brad Remington]

yea ive tried everything, once c-media is plugged into the playstation the optical line won't send audio to the headphones, th mic may work but i cannot test it because i can't hear playstations audio, i really don't want to give up but ive spent countless hours on it, too much stress lol.

On Friday, December 12, 2014 10:51:15 PM UTC+11, Brad Remington wrote:

[Fred Davison]

The PS4 is probably automatically changing the audio settings as you plug in different devices.  I don't have a PS4 to test this myself but my PS3 put all the audio on my c-media device.

You want the PS4 set to output game audio on the optical and chat audio on the c-media.  Changes these settings AFTER you plug in the c-media.

To use the ChatMix function, you want the Headset controller set to bring in game audio from its optical input and chat audio from its analog input and send microphone audio out via its USB connector.

This is all explained on the Advanced Settings section on the SteelSeries page, down in Web Setup Guide in Tips and Tricks.  If you are having trouble with getting this set up properly, you should contact the manufacturer's tech support for help.

As I mentioned in the first post, you may need to attenuate the audio from the PC audio out that goes to the C-media input to prevent distortion.  It is not possible to know this until the rest of it is set up and working.  You really need to find someone local who understands this stuff to work it out.