ambient1/Airex Reactor

[Sethika]

I've been wondering this for a while now, but has the Air Exchange Reactor track ever been discovered in a less bitcrushed file or anything? Even an idea of who may have originally composed it? I'm quite fond of the track and the atmospheric nature of it, and would love to hear it in a higher quality.

The best I can find outside of the literal audio jpg that is ambient1 in the leak, is the track being sampled at the end of Dark Interval, from the end of Episode 2.

[cambreaKer]

as far as i know no one found a better quality version of ambient1, so it's a total mystery if it exists at all

[Витой]

First of all, "Airex Reactor" is a fake name given by the guy who made that fake HL2 beta soundtrack.
Secondly ambient1 was just a test music track with no real other purpose, so yes, I doubt that its version with higher bitrate exists.

[Sethika]

First of all, "Airex Reactor" is a fake name given by the guy who made that fake HL2 beta soundtrack.
Secondly ambient1 was just a test music track with no real other purpose, so yes, I doubt that its version with higher bitrate exists.

I'm aware of the Airex Reactor name being fake, I just imagined a few people would be more familiar with it.

The track, like a lot of the Half-Life soundtracks in general, had to be made up of sounds from sample kits and whatnot.

Even if there's not a directly higher quality version of the track, finding what samples it was made from would be equally great. If I could find the sample, I'd look into making a fan restoration of the track.

As far as I know, it may be a part of a Sony sample kit, as Valve was using Sony's Soundforge for a majority of the sounds in the HL2 Beta looking at the properties and whatnot.

[rottenalp]

The ending does sound very familiar. I wonder if it's just a coincidence since it's supposed to give a similar atmosphere, or if they used the same samples?

[Sethika]

The ending does sound very familiar. I wonder if it's just a coincidence since it's supposed to give a similar atmosphere, or if they used the same samples?

I find it likely that it was the same sample, it obviously sounds a tad different in Episode 2, but I think that's obviously because it hasn't been bitcrushed to space and back.

I definitely think it works extremely well atmospherically. It really hits home in Episode 2, and I'd love to get a hold of the sample used and possibly remake ambient1 in a less eargratingly compressed track.

[KacperZ45]

Info from file:
 - Created 2001-04-02
 - Created by Chia Chin Lee
 - Made or modified in Sound Forge 4.5

[SleepySpaceBird]

Hey! I know at least one of the "beta" tracks is "Cold Water" from Resident Evil remake. It's called "Kraken Base" and is a slowed down version of the real thing.

hl2.track3.mp3 - Long Lost Friend from Resident Evil
hl2.track7.mp3 - Some other Resident Evil Remake track but slightly edited
hl2.track20.mp3 - Return to Zork intro iirc
"Half-Life 2 Leak Theme" - Steve Duda - 3xOSC Fun (FruityLoops 3.3, 2001) - NOT "Flesh and Blood", that song stole this original music from over a decade earlier.

Airex Reactor REALLY sounds like something I've heard from an old Resident Evil sort of game, but I just scrubbed through the remake, 2 and 3's OSTs and couldn't find anything that sounded like it was the track. Judging by the inclusion of other video game music in their test files, I doubt Airex Reactor is anything original either. Though, interestingly, the end of "Dark Interval" sounds like a sped up and higher pitched version of "Airex Reactor".

[Dr.Epav]

When you speed up the track you can kinda tell what it is, i swear ive heard it in a haunted house or something similar - its certainly some stock track, just fancily distorted.

[Bruner]

No doubt it's a stock ambiance effect. I don't think Valve would go through the trouble of composing a piece of music if it wouldn't actually be used in-game. I imagine it comes from one of the many sound libraries that Valve frequently used for both Half-Life and Half-Life 2. Most notable ones made by Zero-G and Dick DeBenedicts.
If anyone wants to do an extensive search for the origin of ambient1.wav, I'd suggest going through some of those first.

[Omega93]

I guess I can save up for those stock libraries, Unless someone here already has access to either one of those stock libraries, I’m gonna look where I can buy them.



-ChadScript

[Bruner]

I guess I can save up for those stock libraries, Unless someone here already has access to either one of those stock libraries, I’m gonna look where I can buy them.



-ChadScript

I would probably look for ones between the 80s/90s and 2001, the date the file it's self was made.

[Bruner]

Info from file:
 - Created 2001-04-02
 - Created by Chia Chin Lee
 - Made or modified in Sound Forge 4.5

I've been thinking... Is there a way we can get in contact with Chia Chin Lee via Email or something? If the ambiance heard in ambient1.wav was created from the ground up by him, he could possibly still have an uncompressed version somewhere on an old hard drive or something.
If he wasn't the actual creator of ambient1.wav, maybe he could provide where he originally found the track.
That is if he still has an uncompressed version somewhere or if he remembers where he originally got the track.

I'm not familiar with Sound Forge 4.5 at all, but perhaps the editing program comes with it's own library of stock ambient tracks and sound effects and such. If not, correct me if I'm wrong. That being said, if Sound Forge 4.5 comes with stock tracks, another possibility is getting a copy of Sound Forge 4.5 and potentially ripping the ambiance track.
(If SF 4.5 even comes with stock tracks and if one of those is ambient1.wav. Take this with a grain of salt.)

[AyeTSG]

Info from file:
 - Created 2001-04-02
 - Created by Chia Chin Lee
 - Made or modified in Sound Forge 4.5

I've been thinking... Is there a way we can get in contact with Chia Chin Lee via Email or something? If the ambiance heard in ambient1.wav was created from the ground up by him, he could possibly still have an uncompressed version somewhere on an old hard drive or something.
If he wasn't the actual creator of ambient1.wav, maybe he could provide where he originally found the track.
That is if he still has an uncompressed version somewhere or if he remembers where he originally got the track.

I'm not familiar with Sound Forge 4.5 at all, but perhaps the editing program comes with it's own library of stock ambient tracks and sound effects and such. If not, correct me if I'm wrong. That being said, if Sound Forge 4.5 comes with stock tracks, another possibility is getting a copy of Sound Forge 4.5 and potentially ripping the ambiance track.
(If SF 4.5 even comes with stock tracks and if one of those is ambient1.wav. Take this with a grain of salt.)

I was able to find a copy on archive.org, and it DOES come with sample tracks. However, I looked through them all and found nothing resembling ambient1.wav... so back to the dead end we go.

[Bruner]

Dr.Epav might be right. The audio compression and distortion might be from the original track being slowed down.
Is there any choral music in Sound Forge 4.5?