Non-Arctis Device

[coreyknapp3]

This app looks like just what I've been searching for. I used Steelseries Sonar on windows with my Beyerdynamics TYGR 300R. This doesn't look like it works at all without an Arctis headset. Is it possible to enable it for use with a "generic headset"?

[loteran]

Glad it caught your eye! Honest answer: ASM is built specifically around SteelSeries Arctis headsets — it's driven by the USB/HID device (battery, ANC, sidetone, OLED, hardware EQ…), and the whole Sonar audio stack (EQ + 7.1 virtual surround) only spins up once an Arctis is detected over USB. Your TYGR 300R is a great analog headphone, but with no USB/HID device there's nothing for ASM to attach to, so it won't work today.

For exactly what you're after on Linux — a parametric EQ plus HeSuVi-style virtual surround on any output — the tool to use is EasyEffects:

• Parametric/graphic EQ (you can even import APO/HeSuVi presets).
• Convolver module: load a HeSuVi hrir.wav and you get the same virtual-surround effect Sonar gives you, on any headphone.
• Per-app routing, autoload per output device, etc.

Install it (Flatpak works everywhere): flatpak install flathub com.github.wwmm.easyeffects, then add an Equalizer + Convolver to your output. That'll get your TYGR 300R very close to your old Sonar setup.

A generic/software-only mode in ASM (Sonar stack without an Arctis) is something I might explore down the line, but it's a real feature rather than a quick config, so no promises on timing. Hope EasyEffects sorts you out in the meantime!

[loteran]

Coming back to this two months later, because the answer changed.

I told you in June that ASM was built around the USB device and that the whole Sonar stack only spins up once an Arctis is detected — so there was nothing for it to attach to with your TYGR 300R. That was true of how the daemon started. It was not true of the app: the four channels, the Sonar EQ, the 7.1 virtual surround, the per-app routing and the clip recorder never touch USB at all. They only ever manipulate PipeWire sink names. What genuinely needs an Arctis is the conversation with the headset — battery, ANC, sidetone, ChatMix, the OLED.

So the refusal was about a lock, not about a limit.

v1.4.0 removes it. Settings → Use ASM without a SteelSeries headset, pick the output your TYGR is plugged into, and the channels are built on it. The Sonar EQ and the virtual surround work exactly as they do with an Arctis — that is the part you were after, coming from Sonar on Windows.

What you will not get is the headset half: battery, ANC, sidetone, the ChatMix dial. Those pages come up empty rather than showing controls that would do nothing.

Someone asked for the same thing again this week from the other end (#189, a Focusrite and an HD560S). Two people wanting it independently is what made me look at the lock properly instead of restating why it was there — so thank you for asking first, even though it took a while to get anywhere.

If you still have the TYGR set up, I would genuinely like to know how it behaves on real hardware: I could only test it here by unplugging my own DAC and routing the channels at a TV over HDMI, which proves the mechanism but is not the same as your setup.