SPL meter recommendation?

IslandPink · Post by **IslandPink** » Mon Mar 07, 2011 9:07 pm

Chaps
It's going to be useful to have a decent SPL meter while designing my speakers.
Has anybody got any recommendations for something good but not too expensive ( < £100 ) that will work for more than a year ( that puts Maplin out of the picture !! )

Ta in advance

Mark

chris661 · Post by **chris661** » Mon Mar 07, 2011 9:54 pm

There's a lot of stuff on diyAudio about this.

There's a Behringer mic that people tend to like, you can get it calibrated and stuff, and there's a nice mic pre-amp to go with it. Hook it up to your computer to display the noises and you're there.

IslandPink · Post by **IslandPink** » Mon Mar 07, 2011 11:31 pm

Thanks Chris -
I think a hand-held meter is what I'm after .
I'll check out DIY audio as well .

MJ

chris661 · Post by **chris661** » Tue Mar 08, 2011 7:05 am

There's a lot of people using Radio Shack SPL meters - I'm not sure which one exactly (probably digital though).

If you opened a thread under "Equipment and Tools", asking for recommendations, hopefully someone can point you more precisely in the right direction

IslandPink · Post by **IslandPink** » Fri Mar 11, 2011 5:29 pm

Re. radioshack meter :
Ok, at first I wasn't sure , as discussion :
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/multi-wa ... etter.html
says it's not 'calibrated' ie. it doesn't have a flat frequency response other than being correct for 'A' and 'C' weighting .
However, it appears to be quite useful over the band I'm interested in , ie. about 100 to 1000 Hz :
http://mysite.verizon.net/tammie_eric/a ... -2050.html
and could be quite valuable further out if you make compensations for the non-flatness.
So, I think I'll buy one of these. I can cadge better equipment from time to time when I need it .

Mark

planet10 · Post by **planet10** » Fri Mar 11, 2011 6:37 pm

Any cheap metr would need to be individualy calibrated. The RS analog meter is the preferred one. I have one of those.

I would have a look at Studio Six Audio Tools. The basic SPL meter is similar to the RS in finctionality and they have calibrated it against an average of iPhone/Touch mics. You can purchase a plug in for a more sophisicated meter, and later consider purchasing the ancillary hardware rig that turns it into a full-fledged hi-qual measuring rig.

http://www.studiosixdigital.com/

dave

IslandPink · Post by **IslandPink** » Fri Mar 11, 2011 9:51 pm

Thanks Dave...but too late for the Studio Six as I just ordered one of the analogue RS meters earlier .
I will try to reference it against someone ( eg. Nick)'s calibrated microphone etc when i get chance.
If I get keen I'll start swapping caps inside and see if I can extend its useful range as per the guidance elsewhere .

Cheers
Mark

Johnherpes · Post by **Johnherpes** » Wed Jun 29, 2011 11:17 am

I purchased a Radio Shack analog SPL meter on their website this last Saturday and Im just waiting for it to be delivered in the mail. Looking forward to tweaking my setup This should be a good learning experience here, and some wonderful sounding audio to follow

andrew Ivimey · Post by **andrew Ivimey** » Wed Jun 29, 2011 1:25 pm

I have four or five meters. They all read dBSPL, A and C, peak and mean. And they are calibrated annually across 250Hz to 8kHz. The company will guarantee accuracy only within these parameters.

It would, I think, be fair to say that a 'radioshack' (Tandy - are radioshack still alive and well in the jolly old US of A or indeed anywhere else? ) or even Maplin's SP meters have never been calibrated and if they were to be it would be most likely to be at 1kHz only.

Does it matter? Probably not - you will get a ball park figure

But, here's a thing. Because I can, I set up an experiment in an anechoic room where the sound sources (pure tones - warble tones, narrow band noise, white and pink noise were available... in stereo!)

Placing three SPLmeters alngside each other - so the furthest apart the mics were was only a little more than the the width of a ooooooo adult head. The meters gave a 2dB difference peak and mean. There was similar variation across the frequencies The one in the middle was not the most sensitive.

So, hooray for the calibration company but you can see just how sensitive the room acoustics and meter placement can be!

Mike H · Post by **Mike H** » Thu Jun 30, 2011 5:31 pm

Daft question time ~

where are you going to do these speaker SPL measurements?

andrew Ivimey · Post by **andrew Ivimey** » Thu Jun 30, 2011 5:38 pm

to work!

Mike H · Post by **Mike H** » Thu Jun 30, 2011 5:39 pm

Indoors?

andrew Ivimey · Post by **andrew Ivimey** » Thu Jun 30, 2011 6:07 pm

indoors.

Mike H · Post by **Mike H** » Fri Jul 01, 2011 3:21 pm

OK, I only ask 'cause I tried this once as I've got a decibel meter, all I got was the frequencies at which various standing waves in the room peaked. It was totally unhelpful in terms of finding out what the speaker was doing.

I was told by the chap who gave me the meter (yes gave) that if I wanted to try measurung a speaker response with it to take it outside on the patio where there's a complete absence of adjacent walls.

And forewarn the neighbours before you start

andrew Ivimey · Post by **andrew Ivimey** » Fri Jul 01, 2011 3:36 pm

As the room is totally reverberation free, indeed damped to buggery then the only standing waves we get are in patients' ear canals but that is all perfect and correct and necessary for a certain type of hearing aid fit.

If you are outside surely there is always the chance of a minor war breaking out, aliens landing their space craft, 'im next door tuning up a matchless 500 or indeed the happy squeals of delight from children torturing a cat. Hardly good science!

audio-talk

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