New member Northampton, U.K.

Good morning all (evening in U.K.)

Just joined to try to learn a bit about measuring the in-room response of my system. Been using a CD test disc (Sound Check 2 by the recording engineer Alan Parsons) and measuring SPL's at individual frequencies with a Tandy 2055 meter. Works O.K. but wanted to try something more sophistacated like the TrueRTA software (am I allowed to say that here?) with a Behringer ECM8000 microphone and MC100 supply and maybe a Soundblaster Audigy 2 ZS notebook PCMCIA card, all of which I have still to buy.

If anyone is interested, my equipment is purely hi-fi and not theatre (no room and no money + wife does not approve):-

2 x KEF 105/3
REL Stentor sub
Quad 66 pre-amp and 66 FM tuner
Quad 606/11 power amp
Meridian G08 CD player
Technics SL120 turntable + SME 3009 series 11 improved arm
Revox B710 Mk11 cassette deck (sorry, I'm nearly 58 and still into the older stuff)
Stax Omega headphones + SRM-T1S supply

Tastes in music are fairly wide-ranging - Genesis (saw the reunion concert at Twickenham a couple of months ago) Pink Floyd, U2, Beatles, lots of '60's stuff like the Hollies, Searchers, Shadows, etc.

One question if I may regarding using RTA software with a laptop (Acer Ferrari 4000). Am I right that the sound-card sends the signal generated by the software from the output of the card to the system, ie. Quad pre-amp and AT THE SAME TIME, that the output from the system loudspeakers is received by the measuring microphone and fed back into the input of the sound-card and immediately shown as a graph response by the software, hence Real Time Analysis? The bit I'm unsure about is simultaneous input and output. Will the sound-card I mentioned above do this or do I have to buy something more specialised or suitable? I always thought that computer soundcards could only send a signal in one direction at a time.

For anyone who is interested, I am also the photographer for the Vulcan bomber restoration project in the U.K. (first flight hopefully next month) and was the RAF Vulcan Bomber Display Team photographer.

thanks
vulcanzero1

[salvasol]

vulcanzero1 wrote:

...Good morning all (evening in U.K.)Just joined to try to learn a bit about measuring the in-room response of my system. ....thanks vulcanzero1

Sorry, I don't have any suggestion for your question ...

I just want to say ... Welcome to the forum ...

[Anthony]

Welcome to the Shack! Check out the Room EQ Wizard subforum; there's lots of good info on measurement mics, free software (like REW), and troubleshooting.

Even if you don't use the SW for EQ, you can still get some good baseline measurements for each speaker and identify things like standing waves, bass suck-outs, overly bright response. It's limited in its ability to do reverb/decay measurements, but for frequency response sweeps, it can't be beat for the price.

plus the acoustics forum has some great info on absorbers, traps, and diffusers to fix the aforementioned problems.

Welcome aboard.

--anthony

[Sonnie]

Hi Charlie and welcome to the Shack!

TrueRTA is different from Room EQ Wizard. It cost money while REW is free and is not an RTA. We have a few guys who use TrueRTA that can probably help you with it. I'd post your question in the REW Forum, even though it not REW.

[mechman]

Welcome to the Shack Charlie!

mech

[nova]

Hello Charlie, Welcome to the Shack. Sorry can't help with your question, but I'm pretty sure someone here can answer it for you.