How to Set Up Vent
By Acknar

Getting vent going the first time might be a bit confusing if you've never worked with somthing like that before, so I thought I'd post a quick run-down of what you need to do. It's pretty simple, really. I highly recommend downloading and using vent even if you don't have a mic (and heck, they're under $10 at wallmart!). What can you do with vent if you don't have a mic? Well, for starters you'll be able to hear other players when they try to tell you a patrol is coming or they've got aggo and want it off, or NO! NO! DON'T TOUCH THAT THING! or whaterver. You can alway respond in party chat, so even for the microphone impared it will make group coordination easier... a lot easier!

First, download it. You can get the install package here.

Ventrilo Download Page

Scroll down on that page and select the latest NON BETA client for your OS. For windows at the time of this posting that would be version 2.3.0

Click the "Download" button and you'll probably get a dialog box asking you if you want open it or save it. I chose to save it to my desktop and I wound up with a file called ventrilo-2.3.0-Windows-i386.exe

Now run that file. I just took all the default options to install the client and that worked fine for me. When it's done you should have a brand new ventrilo icon on your desktop. Click on that and open it up!

The first thing to do is create a user name. To the right of the User Name box there's a "->". Click that, then on the Setup User dialog box that pops up click the "New" button. Enter the name you want to use. I recommend your main character's name - it will help other people recognize you when you connect later. After you've entered your name if you want you can also enter something in the "Phonetic" box. This would be part of what the Sthephen Hawking computer voice says whenever you connet. I've got "Acknars minyon" so that it anounces "Acnar's minion has connected" to all the other user's when I join a channel. It's OK to leave this blank, but a lot of people like to mess around with it just to be silly. Click the "Play" button if you want to mess around and see what your phoneitc will sound like. If you leave it blank it will just say "<your character name> has connected".

You don't need anything in the "Description" or "Working Dir" boxes, so we're done with this dialog and you can click "Ok".

The next step is the most important. Click the "->" to the right of the Server box. This bring up the Connection Editor and you will need to pick "New" again (it's the only thing you can pick anyway). Type in a name. I use "Psycho Squirrel Patrol", but really it can be anything you like. Next type in the IP address. For the uninitiated, an IP address is what your computer uses to find other computers, and it's always a set of four numbers from 0-255 separated by "." like this 128.255.0.99 (<- Thats' NOT our address!). Hint: The server address, port number and password are all located in the guild info. (type "o" in-game and click the button that says "Guild Information")

Ventrilo defaults to using a port number of 3784. If you looked at our guild info you'll know it's guessing wrong here, so replace it with the right number.

Next, type in the password (also found in guild info!). Ventrilo will remember it so you won't have to type it in each time.

You don't need a Default Channel and the other options are fine the way they are, so just click "Ok" and were done with the Connection Editor.

Now you're back to the main Ventrilo interface and you're in the home stretch. You don't need to do anything at all with the Bindings, so you can proceed to the "Connect" button!

If all goes well, your computer will play a sound and you'll see your user name under the name for the connection and below that some "rooms". If anyone else is on, they will also show up either in the main area (the lobby) or in one of the rooms. You can move around to the rooms by clicking on them if you like. There will be little speaker icons to the left of each user's name and they will turn from red to green any time that user speaks on vent.

There is one more thing to do, and that's to set things up to suit yourself and make sure you can hear people and they can hear you. Click on the Setup button and that takes you to the Setup dilog box with a bunch of tabs across the top. You will probably only ever need to mess with the first tab, which is where it starts you anyway. I really prefer a push to talk key so that my mic isn't always on and driving other people nuts with background noise and feedback from their own voice coming over my speakers. Click the "Use Push-To-Talk Hotkey" checkbox, and then click in the Hotkey box further down below. That will get you a "MOUSE1" in the hotkey box; not what you want but now you can press the key you DO want. I use the right side control key, so mine says RCONTROL. You can play around with this to see what works best, but for god's sake don't pick a key you use for playing WoW...

For most people you're just about done and all you may need to do is mess with the Inbound and Outbound amplifiers. They are a couple of sliders over on the right side in the lower half of the dialog box. They range from -10 to +10 and default to 0. If you can't hear people talking when they talk, then increase the inbound. If what you hear sounds like ass and is all staticy, decrease the inbound. If when you talk people tell you they can't hear you, increase the outbound. Get it? See I told you it was simple! The only hitch is that while you're on the Setup dialog you cant actually do any talking or listening until you finish up by pressing "Ok"

Did you press "Ok"? Good! now press your hot key and watch the little speaker icon to the left of your user name turn from green to red. Say something, dummy! Like, ask for a sound check or say "Can you hear me Ok?", or "Acknar made me do it" or whatever, but atleast say Hi!

Unless you've got sound driver issues that I'm not qualified to help you with, you're all done!

Congratulations!

Ack