Way to adjust sound settings without going through menu bar?

I'm flying FSX Steam Edition and loving it!

During flights I find myself frequently adjusting the four sound settings (Engines, Cockpit, Environment, Voice), especially when switching to a different aircraft. Unfortunately, each adjustment requires that I unhide the menu bar, then mouse navigate to Options/Settings/Sound. Is there an easier way?

For example, is there any way the individual sound adjustments can be bound to the keyboard, saving me the mousing around?

Or is there a 3rd-party addon that would make individual sound adjustments more accessible? (If they exist have yet to find them).

Thanks.

If you are adjusting the sound during the flight, there is basically only the option to route the voice channel to a different sound device, and then using an external mixer to adjust its volume separately.

With tools like SimStarter you can define sound settings per startup profile, so you could implement different sound settings for different types of aircraft. But this is only of use when you (re)start the simulator.

Other than that, you could try to settle for a single global sound setting and adjust the sound configuration files of the individual aircraft to your taste - it is possible to set the sound volumes individually on a very detailed level.

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc526952.aspx

Thank you evm. Those are great tips! Currently I've resorted to making screenshots of my sound settings for each aircraft for reference, which is better than nothing. I'll check out SimStarter and the link you provided.

Some sort of external mixer is appealing too as I often like to stream music to my headphones while flying and flipping back and forth between FSX and the streamer is annoying. I do have a second PC available for streaming, so with the right mixer I could put that to work.

Thanks again.

Hey evm, thank you especially for the tip about SimStarter! It resolves my sound concerns and does a whole lot more. Fantastic product!

The only thing SimStarter doesn't do is allow me to assign custom joystick settings to individual aircraft (which would save me from going to the menu and changing the direction of the throttle axis whenever I change from fixed wing to rotary aircraft).

Hey evm, thank you especially for the tip about SimStarter! It resolves my sound concerns and does a whole lot more. Fantastic product!

 

The only thing SimStarter doesn't do is allow me to assign custom joystick settings to individual aircraft (which would save me from going to the menu and changing the direction of the throttle axis whenever I change from fixed wing to rotary aircraft).

FSUIPC can do that, and much, much more

Thank you mallcott! Once upon a time when I was an FS9 maniac I used FSUIPC to interface with external products and networked PCs. I'll have to check it out and see what it does today.

Thanks again. :)

Thank you mallcott! Once upon a time when I was an FS9 maniac I used FSUIPC to interface with external products and networked PCs. I'll have to check it out and see what it does today.

 

Thanks again. :)

YVW

+1 for FSUIPC. The best part is, that FSUIPC profiles work by aircraft title, so even if you switch to a different aircraft in the same simulator session you will have the appropriate controls ready.