Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Advice from Axiom Owners Quick Advice needed on SPL meter.

My wife just called on the cell phone, she is out shopping for a late birthday present for me. I told her to get me an SPL Meter from Radio Shack.

They have the 7 range Analog for $39
and a Digital version for $49

Which one should I get?

Any help would be appreciated...

Randy

Most people like the analog version.That's what I have and it does a great job.

I have seen very few people recommend the digital ones. The analog one works very well.

The analog is usually prefrred because the needle is not quite as "jumpy " as the digital.

Get what you like. I have both and use the digital.

Oh yeah, happy late birthday.

Thanks Guys, I just called her back and she didn't have time to get to the Shack tonight, so I still have some time to think about it....

Is it just as easy to read the Analog one, and determine what reading your getting, or would the digital one be more accurate?

As far as the B'day, yeah, I thought about starting a thread like Peter did, but heck why should I broadcast that I am 38 and my 20th reunion is just around the corner, e-gads, it sure does not seem that long...

Thanks for the advice.

I'd get the digital. That's what I have. You can set it for weighted average either slow or fast, so there is no 'jumping' on the slow setting. It also has peak memory and a fee other pretty trick options. Plus, it's digital man. Cool.....

Randy, the analog is "warmer". A belated happy birthday.

They are equally accurate (or inaccurate, depending on how you look at it). The controversy seems to be over a bouncing needle (analog) allegedly being easier to read than a changing digital readout. I don't quite understand this since, when calibrating with Avia or DVE, the readout, either digital or analog, goes to it's reading and stays there. It doesn't bounce. With the digital, occasionally, I get a reading (subwoofer) that moves back and forth between two consecutive numbers (74, then 75, then 74, then 75, etc.) so I just take the higher of the two. If you were using the analog, then it's needle would be vacillating as well.

On the digital meter the scale runs from -10dB to +10dB. In other words, if you have the meter set to 70dB, the meter shows readings from 60dB to 80dB. On the analog the scale only runs from -10dB to +6 dB. This means less switching of the scale on the meter when taking readings.

I mount my meter on a tripod, and in order to get an accurate reading you need to position yourself far enough from the meter that you own body neither absorbs or reflects the signal from the speakers thereby having no effect whatsoever on the reading. I find the nice big digital readout easier to read from a distance than the small scale on the analog. YMMV.

The less expensive analog will do the job just fine. No need to spend more for the digital, unless you want the features it provides. I prefer the digital.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, RANDY!

Daaaamm, had no idea there was so much work involved with using these things. I just point it the general direction and call that good. What, are you a machinist? Or just a perfectionist..:)

I just bought the digital this past week and used it with Avia last night. I didn't notice a whole lot of jumping around. The readout might have changed a couple of dB or so, but not much.

As it turned out, I had the speakers set up "right" to begin with. This was about the only time I was "lucky."

The Rat.

Thanks again everyone! I guess a lot depends on how I use it, I will be curious how well my Denons AutoSetup will accurately take care of delay and levels, I usually turn off the Room EQ stuff. Although it does have a manual setup for adjusting the 8 EQ frequencies. I'm guessing you can use these meters to fine tune the various frequencies also?

I just don't want to spend to much, if all it does is verify you got the dB levels right. I'm just unfamiliar with all the uses of these meters. A lot of you talk about charting out frequencies using a sweeping disk. I did download the sounds Jack told us about a few weeks back for the LFE. Also, I don't even have a setup disk yet. Some day I'll be on the bandwagon with you folks.

>>I don't quite understand this since, when calibrating with Avia or DVE, the readout, either digital or analog, goes to it's reading and stays there

You must not have dogs in the house. Test tones make the dogs bark... dog barking makes the SPL change... changing SPL makes the digital hard to read.

It's even worse when the dogs are not matched and bark at different volumes... I get sort of a "WOOF woof WOOF woof WOOF" superimposed on the test tones. Needless to say, I went analog.

Don't they have digital versions of those too? Constant SPL barking. You might try one of those.

Ok, well I guess the wife was playing a little joke on me, she actually did make it to the Shack the other night and picked up the Analog meter. Now I just have to figure out what to do with it, it is fun seeing how many decibels my kids can scream

Maybe these will help, Randy.

Essential Accessories: The Radio Shack Sound Pressure Level Meter

A Quick Overview of Home Theater Calibration

The Radio Shack SPL meter isn't completely accurate. Should you wish to chart your system's frequency response using tones at specific frequencies, here are the corrections for the meter. Whatever your meter reads, add or subtract the amounts in the chart. When using a 100Hz tone, if your meter reads 75 dB, you're actually hearing 77 dB (75 on the meter +2 dB from the chart = 77)

These corrections do NOT apply when using the pink noise from your receiver or from the Avia or DVE discs when calibrating your system

Radio Shack SPL meter corrections

Thanks Jack, I stayed home today, to play around with it a bit, I'll have to check out these websites.

So far I just had the pink noise on my Denon cycle all the speakers and adjusted the levels to all match 75 dB. Not sure why I picked 75db. One thing I noticed is that I had to turn my Center channel way down from its current position. I had the Center on +7dB's since it seemed that when watching movies, it was sometimes hard to hear certain voice dialogs. Now I'm a little concerned I'll have to crank it up louder, which means all the other speakers will be louder. Oh well, I'm sure I'll figure it all out.

I have the Denon 2805. If I understand all of this, I will only be able to adjust like 8 frequencies manually, since it has a built in parametric equilizer? I am interested in running the autosetup and room eq with the included mic to see how accurate the receiver calibrates it all, but the first time I felt the midrange was to high, so I turned off the room eq part.

Randy

Randy, I run my center about 3 dB hotter than my mains. Keep in mind that your system is YOUR system. Do what sounds good to you.

Amen to that. Calibration gives you a real good start and sometimes points out some problems you missed. My current setup has the speakers and TV angled relative to the wall in order to eliminate reflections off the fireplace. The downside is that one M2 main is close to the wall while the other is right in the middle of the room. Takes a 4dB boost on the M2 in the middle of the room to balance the sound. It sounds way better with the levels right and I NEVER would have discovered that without going through calibration.

Likewise - one of my M3s is in a bit of a corner where the closet "bumps out" and gets reinforcement from the walls there (-3dB on the levels to even it to the left main)... same with the left QS4 - it's got a wall/corner to reflect off of so it's also 4dB hotter than the the one on the right which is 10 feet from it's corner.

That's why those level controls are there... gotta use them... your ears aren't sensitive enough to do it by "ear".. though some people do "tweak" their levels out of even (bumping up the centre and almost everyone runs their sub hot).

Bren R.

Remember that if your center is on a shelf it needs to be at the very edge of the shelf and even protruding a bit for optimal sound. Somebody else had posted earlier that they weren't sure about their VP150 as they always needed to turn it way up to hear dialog, but then discovered that their placement was too far back on a shelf and once pulled forward to the edge of the shelf they were able to hear it just right without making it "hot".

In reply to:

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(bumping up the centre and almost everyone runs their sub hot).

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I recently calibrated my system using the Avia Calibration DVD and was very surprised just how hot I was running the sub. I still tweak it up and down a bit, depending on the DVD or CD being played but nothing as high as I was running it before.

The disc along with a RS digital SPL meter really has the system sounding much better than what the 'auto calibrate' feature on the HK 635 did.