Re: input/output sound level calibration

Thank you Bob,


My application takes a continuous signal by samples, processes them, then
delivers it back. Quite a small talk apparently. Nevertheless one of the
functions acts as a sound level meter then my question.
I've just had a glance to Dakarta. It seems that both have some identical
components but I'm working with free OSS on a linux box.
However the question here is quite general.
The classical way to calibrate the chain is to use a constant pressure box
(I don't know the name in English) and a microphone "étalon" (B&K), then as
you said, tie the soft to the physic,rendering the result to the screen in
Pascal or dbA or somewhat like, with the appropriate coefficients somewhere
in the soft.
In absence of such apparatus, we could use a simple BF générator
(10Hz-50kHz ; 0-3.5vpp ; 66 euros/~$) or 1kHz-sinus generator (22euros/~$).
Trying to know the output of them as close as possible to the reality and
do the same as before rendering the result in volt. Further, taking the
theoretical sensitivity (e.g; 25 mV/Pa, ask the shopkeeper) do the rest.
Not very precise, is it ?
Nevertheless without the inner knowledge of the sound card we are a bit
working in the mist.
Cheers
Alain


Bob Masta wrote:

On Tue, 07 Mar 2006 14:12:48 +0100, Celer <card.lemoine@xxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

Hello,

I'd like to know some objective thinks about the sound PC cards in
general, mine in particular (PCI64 with ens1370 chip), or a kind of what
could be considered as a standard one. That is the various max (although
acceptable) audio signal levels along the converting chain, but at least
inputs (mic, line) and output of the card(s). Is that any doc on the point
? Also a mean for calibrating the chain (input -> ADC -> driver -> appli
-> driver -> DAC -> output) without sophisticated tools would be welcomed.

Thank you in advance.
Alain


Alas, there are no standards whatsoever, and Windows
has no driver mechanism to allow a card to provide
calibration information. The mixer controls (part of
the driver for the card) only work in "steps", but
the step size is not available and in fact is often not
constant throughout the range of a control.

I have been working on this issue for my upcoming
Daqarta for Windows. The basic idea is that with
a loopback, the software generates a signal and
adjusts the mixer while it monitors the input. This
allows it to determine the relative size of each step
in both the input and output mixer. Then to get an
absolute calibration, you need to provide a signal
with a known amplitude, and the software can then
tie everything together. This is easy if you have
test equipment, but the whole point of Daqarta is
to allow the computer and sound card to act as
a measurement and signal generator, so I'm working
on ways to provide the known input signal using
some inexpensive approach. This is complicated
by the fact that sound cards don't respond to DC,
so that limits the sort of things you can use.

My freeware DaqGen signal generator has a
way to calibrate the relative steps of the output
attenuators without any test equipment.at all.
The idea is to create the same signal on the left
and right channels, then move the left channel
down one mixer step. The right channel is now
louder, so you reduce the digital version of the
wave going to the right channel (while keeping its
mixer unchanged) until it matches the left exactly.
There are some tricks to doing this, but basically you
can get a pretty good match by inverting the polarity
of one channel and combining them together. When
the amplitudes are equal, they cancel completely.
Note however, that this only allows calibration of
relative step size, not absolute output.

Best regards,







Bob Masta
dqatechATdaqartaDOTcom

D A Q A R T A
Data AcQuisition And Real-Time Analysis
www.daqarta.com
Home of DaqGen, the FREEWARE signal generator

Bob Masta wrote:

On Tue, 07 Mar 2006 14:12:48 +0100, Celer <card.lemoine@xxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

Hello,

I'd like to know some objective thinks about the sound PC cards in
general, mine in particular (PCI64 with ens1370 chip), or a kind of what
could be considered as a standard one. That is the various max (although
acceptable) audio signal levels along the converting chain, but at least
inputs (mic, line) and output of the card(s). Is that any doc on the point
? Also a mean for calibrating the chain (input -> ADC -> driver -> appli
-> driver -> DAC -> output) without sophisticated tools would be welcomed.

Thank you in advance.
Alain


Alas, there are no standards whatsoever, and Windows
has no driver mechanism to allow a card to provide
calibration information. The mixer controls (part of
the driver for the card) only work in "steps", but
the step size is not available and in fact is often not
constant throughout the range of a control.

I have been working on this issue for my upcoming
Daqarta for Windows. The basic idea is that with
a loopback, the software generates a signal and
adjusts the mixer while it monitors the input. This
allows it to determine the relative size of each step
in both the input and output mixer. Then to get an
absolute calibration, you need to provide a signal
with a known amplitude, and the software can then
tie everything together. This is easy if you have
test equipment, but the whole point of Daqarta is
to allow the computer and sound card to act as
a measurement and signal generator, so I'm working
on ways to provide the known input signal using
some inexpensive approach. This is complicated
by the fact that sound cards don't respond to DC,
so that limits the sort of things you can use.

My freeware DaqGen signal generator has a
way to calibrate the relative steps of the output
attenuators without any test equipment.at all.
The idea is to create the same signal on the left
and right channels, then move the left channel
down one mixer step. The right channel is now
louder, so you reduce the digital version of the
wave going to the right channel (while keeping its
mixer unchanged) until it matches the left exactly.
There are some tricks to doing this, but basically you
can get a pretty good match by inverting the polarity
of one channel and combining them together. When
the amplitudes are equal, they cancel completely.
Note however, that this only allows calibration of
relative step size, not absolute output.

Best regards,







Bob Masta
dqatechATdaqartaDOTcom

D A Q A R T A
Data AcQuisition And Real-Time Analysis
www.daqarta.com
Home of DaqGen, the FREEWARE signal generator

.

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