Microsoft Soundscape still working... When is the official shutdown?

By The Oliver Kennett, 22 July, 2023

Forum
iOS and iPadOS

Hi,

I know that people are working hard on getting a fully fledged replacement to soundscape out, such as voice vista, but I have noticed, for me in the UK at least, soundscape still seems to be active. Looking at the press release it said it would stop working in June, but here we are at the end of July and it's hanging on.

Anyone have any more information on this? Soundscape is still the better choice but I don't wish to continue to drop markers in it only for it to suddenly stop working but, at the same time, I would rather avoid using voice vista which still lacks some key aspects of the original and seems a less rich experience.

O

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Comments

By Dave Nason

4 months 1 week ago

Member of the AppleVis Editorial Team

Hey. I believe they extended it to the end of August.
Keep an eye on Voice Vista as there has been some significant updates, so hopefully that gap will be closed fully. OpenScape is also looking very good as it’s basically a clone, but I haven’t heard when they plan to launch it in the App Store.
Dave

By The Oliver Kennett

4 months 1 week ago

Thanks Dave. I did just have another snoop at voice vista and it is looking better. I think the issue is the spacial positioning of places seems off. Hopefully this will be addressed. Also, using my AirPods Pro was great in soundscape.

I don't suppose you know if there is any way of importing markers? I can export from both soundscape and voice vista, but there doesn't seem to be any way of importing that I can see... Which seems a bit odd.

thanks

Ollie

By Dave Nason

4 months 1 week ago

Member of the AppleVis Editorial Team

Hmm I’m not sure about importing markers. I have a niggling feeling I read about it somewhere but can’t find anything now, so I may be wrong.
I think the actual map data is the same, at least that’s my experience so far. And Voice Vista does have the 3D sound, but I’m not sure if it currently supports the additional head tracking That Soundscape and OpenScape have. At least I don’t remember it asking me to set it up. Again I stand to be corrected though.

By The Oliver Kennett

4 months 1 week ago

Thank you both for the information. I'll keep on with voice vista then. Think moving over is always going to be a little challenging as we don't know what will or won't be the same and, without digging, we won't know.

thank you.

By Cobbler

4 months 1 week ago

Today's update of Voicevista adds the ability to share and import markers and routes.

The developer is doing great work in adding features and making the app more stable.