REW - DEQ 2496 - 64bit Vista - Coming Soon

[Alex2507]

Measure 8 or more sweeps around your general listening area

This is just the kind of thing that will keep Doug from ever running REW.

Right now I'm coming out of the Creative Sound Blaster Live sound card with fiber optic to my rec'r. The sound card is fed with a USB from *this will be on the test* 64 bit Vista and a xenyx 802. I have a calibrated ecm 8000 mic. The calibration file is on a disc which is in my dvd drive.

So far I've only taken a few measurements. The first question I have is about saving the files (?). Maybe some tips on organizing them?

How would I apply the calibration file to rew? I know this answer lays in the mountain of reading at HTS but I finger that @ss ... I mean figured I'd ask. Private joke.

Sometime today maybe I am going to install a Berry DEQ 2496 in the living room H/T. I had been using a really cool EQ which let me hit 25 40 63 and 100 Hertz. Then one output jack failed at the solder joint. Long story short I am installing the Berry maybe today.

I was using an older version of REW for the few measurements I did take. Then after deleting that program I downloaded the latest version and it looks completely different. I assume apple must have something that looks different from this because YAA instructed me to find C Weighting somewhere other than where I did find it.

My initial plan is to make 2 consecutive recordings of each sub. The way it works is I run a mic cable out of the room and then start the test. After verifying that the test results are repeatable, I will run a tone through both subs and then try to figure out how to use the DEQ 2496.

Baby steps, right?

 

[fuzz092888]

This is just the kind of thing that will keep Doug from ever running REW.

Right now I'm coming out of the Creative Sound Blaster Live sound card with fiber optic to my rec'r. The sound card is fed with a USB from *this will be on the test* 64 bit Vista and a xenyx 802. I have a calibrated ecm 8000 mic. The calibration file is on a disc which is in my dvd drive.

It's about time you started this. Why not drag and drop the cal file into your computers HD? Then REW will be able to find it every time without you having to manually add it or have the disc.

So far I've only taken a few measurements. The first question I have is about saving the files (?). Maybe some tips on organizing them?

You can organize them by measuring position and name them according to the speaker or sub measured. I usually organize by speaker/sub (folder name) and then name according to MP and speaker/sub orientation.

How would I apply the calibration file to rew? I know this answer lays in the mountain of reading at HTS but I finger that @ss ... I mean figured I'd ask. Private joke.

The cal file for the sound card or the cal file for the mic? The cal file for the soundcard you have to create and then add. The cal file for the mic is added after you click on preferences. Then you should see a tab at the top that says mic/meter. go to that tab and you should be able to select C weighted meter and then a button that says browse where you can search your files for the cal file.

Sometime today maybe I am going to install a Berry DEQ 2496 in the living room H/T. I had been using a really cool EQ which let me hit 25 40 63 and 100 Hertz. Then one output jack failed at the solder joint. Long story short I am installing the Berry maybe today.

Then you'll be able to use REW to generate the necessary files to upload to the Berry. However, you may need a midi cord? I'm not sure I've never tried to upload to my own Berry.

I was using an older version of REW for the few measurements I did take. Then after deleting that program I downloaded the latest version and it looks completely different. I assume apple must have something that looks different from this because YAA instructed me to find C Weighting somewhere other than where I did find it.

Nope, I'm familiar with REW for both windows and Mac and the tabs should be in similar places. I'll double check tonight though just to make sure I didn't imagine it.

My initial plan is to make 2 consecutive recordings of each sub. The way it works is I run a mic cable out of the room and then start the test. After verifying that the test results are repeatable, I will run a tone through both subs and then try to figure out how to use the DEQ 2496.

Baby steps, right?

Make sure you cal the sound card if you haven't. That might throw off measurements depending on where your soundcard rolls off on the top and bottom ends.

 

[Alex2507]

Whoa ... I can picture Doug backing away from his monitor and unplugging the computer from the wall.


That's a great help. As soon as I swap out the EQ's I'll follow up on your mostly over my head post.

I'll take some pictures.

The DEQ came with it's own Berry ECM8000 mic. It was never calibrated but it's here.

Should I change the output on my sound card to a lone r channel analog signal just for simplicity's sake? There's a write up at HTS for just that very thing. Optical is how I connect my laptop to a rec'r for regular audio so I just used the same connection for a test. It worked. To test it on my H/T it was easy enough to just take that same optical out for the CD input. That produces noise everywhere if I run 7 channel stereo. That has interesting implications. I can now measure everything YPAO measures and see the before and after results and let me be perfectly clear: I only sit in one spot. This is already difficult enough without trying to be good to a hypothetical somebody else.

Anyway, thanks so far. Back later with pic's and better questions.

 

[lsiberian]

Are you only doing the subs or are you planning to use the DEQ to mix it with the fronts as well? Either way I'd not have the receiver in the measurement loop. I prefer to simply hookup my sound card directly to the EQ device(DEQ) and then hook it up to the amps for what I'm EQing.

Even with only one listening spot it's a good idea to still get an area average with multiple sweeps. The more sweeps the better your results.

 

[Alex2507]

Are you only doing the subs or are you planning to use the DEQ to mix it with the fronts as well?

I'm 'doing' the subs with the DEQ2496. I want to be able to measure what my response looks like across a rec'r applied xo point so I need the mains playing as well. I guess I don't really know what 'use the DEQ to mix it with the fronts' means. More on that later.

Either way I'd not have the receiver in the measurement loop. I prefer to simply hookup my sound card directly to the EQ device(DEQ) and then hook it up to the amps for what I'm EQing.

I don't have my DEQ out where I can see the back yet but I want to measure what my mains are doing as well. My rec'r has run it's own YPAO correction from which I took direction on how much to EQ and what not to boost: 8db @ 16KHz. I want to measure what my mains are doing so I have to go into the rec'r for it to apply the xo ... I think. Everything is on those dual bananas so unplugging a main is easy enough if I just want to hear any one thing isolated. Isolating the subs is similarly easy.

[/QUOTE]Even with only one listening spot it's a good idea to still get an area average with multiple sweeps. The more sweeps the better your results.[/QUOTE]

I'm down with multiple sweeps but not multiple positions. If those graphs don't look similar on 2 consecutive sweeps I need to know why. I don't want to move the mic while I get use to using the tool. If I decide to spin a sub 180 degrees there's no way I want to take another series of measurements which all but insure the impossibility of repeatability. If I spin a sub it better show two similar graphs from before and a pair of similar graphs of after. That's 4 graphs of essentially one thing with the constant being mic position. And that's already a bridge too far.

 

[Alex2507]

Picture time.



The one mic position that we are effing with atm.



Slick @ss custom mount job. Yep, I think I'm cool.




So I plugged it in, turned it on and then turned on the light switch that powers the subs. The bass started playing. I have to dig out my various Berrry manuals. This stuff must be bargain basement. Otherwise I wouldn't have so much of it. I have to find out how to do a processor reset. Oh, boy.

It's all wired up. It all works. Now ... I think I'm hitting the pain pills. That's about enough hangin' on for me. Maybe opiates help people understand Behringer manuals. Don't anybody try to sell me anything for a few hours.

 

[speakerman39]

Picture time.



The one mic position that we are effing with atm.



Slick @ss custom mount job. Yep, I think I'm cool.




So I plugged it in, turned it on and then turned on the light switch that powers the subs. The bass started playing. I have to dig out my various Berrry manuals. This stuff must be bargain basement. Otherwise I wouldn't have so much of it. I have to find out how to do a processor reset. Oh, boy.

It's all wired up. It all works. Now ... I think I'm hitting the pain pills. That's about enough hangin' on for me. Maybe opiates help people understand Behringer manuals. Don't anybody try to sell me anything for a few hours.

Alex, you have too many remotes like me.....LOL!!! Just ordered a CSL UMik 1 today and already have a miniDSP. Like you, got to learn REW. Have not even downloaded it just yet. But, will on Sunday. Now I know who I can come to when I hit a snag or two or three or four....see where I am going with this.....LOL?????

Cheers,

Phil

 

[fuzz092888]

I have a sh!t load of paperwork I need to do that was due yesterday so I'll just pop in to ask a question and make a comment right quick. First, what kind of calibration file was included with the mic?

If it's the type of cal file I think it is, and I could be wrong, it's not meant for that orientation. A standard cal file for those types of mics is for the mic parallel to the ground pointing at the source. I'm not sure how much variation there is, but I know that the CSL cal files are specifically made for straight ahead, 45 degrees off axis and a 90 degree cal file for orienting the mic perpendicular to the ground like an Audyssey mic.

I just might be curious enough to check to see how much variation there is between the 0 degree and 90 degree cal files since we have the same ECM mic.

 

[Alex2507]

I'm trying to upload this as an attachment but we'll see ...

 

[Alex2507]

Alex, you have too many remotes like me.....LOL!!! Just ordered a CSL UMik 1 today and already have a miniDSP. Like you, got to learn REW. Have not even downloaded it just yet. But, will on Sunday. Now I know who I can come to when I hit a snag or two or three or four....see where I am going with this.....LOL?????

Cheers,

Phil

The more the merrier, Phil. So far Eugene and YAA are here to guide us and of course the mounds of text on the matter over at HTS.

Here's what I have done. I have an uncalibrated ECM8000 mic on the DEQ2496 in the living room H/T. I was trying to reset the memory ... sort of .... and I noticed the Bypass button was lit.

"I prefer to simply hookup my sound card directly to the EQ device(DEQ)"
Eugene, to do this I could actually use fiber optic from the sound card which I'm probably not going to invest time in now. For me to do this with an RCA cable I would simply plug it into either the L or R input on the DEQ, right? I'll be trying this as soon as the hour permits.

REW, the sound card, the mixing board and calibrated mic still have the fiber optic out hooked up to my 2.2 rig: my computer speakers if you will. These speakers don't have easy access to the binding posts so I did as you and the HTS tutorial suggest: Right channel from sound card but to the front panel analog connections on the RX-V2600. I disabled the spdif out on the sound card. Doing a simple R and L speaker test from the computer still produces a little bit of sound on the channel that is not connected. Is that what 'stereo separation' refers to?

So I banged out a couple of sweeps there and checked to see what L&R looked like with the sub polarity reversed vs normal. It's a lot more similar than I would have expected. Maybe I did it wrong. It would be cool if I knew how to post pic's of the graphs. There's a little camera button that says capture on REW.

This is all very cool. Even though I don't know squat, I'm generating graphs of sweeps. It will be cooler as I slowly get around to being better at this.

 

[speakerman39]

The more the merrier, Phil. So far Eugene and YAA are here to guide us and of course the mounds of text on the matter over at HTS.

Here's what I have done. I have an uncalibrated ECM8000 mic on the DEQ2496 in the living room H/T. I was trying to reset the memory ... sort of .... and I noticed the Bypass button was lit.

"I prefer to simply hookup my sound card directly to the EQ device(DEQ)"
Eugene, to do this I could actually use fiber optic from the sound card which I'm probably not going to invest time in now. For me to do this with an RCA cable I would simply plug it into either the L or R input on the DEQ, right? I'll be trying this as soon as the hour permits.

REW, the sound card, the mixing board and calibrated mic still have the fiber optic out hooked up to my 2.2 rig: my computer speakers if you will. These speakers don't have easy access to the binding posts so I did as you and the HTS tutorial suggest: Right channel from sound card but to the front panel analog connections on the RX-V2600. I disabled the spdif out on the sound card. Doing a simple R and L speaker test from the computer still produces a little bit of sound on the channel that is not connected. Is that what 'stereo separation' refers to?

So I banged out a couple of sweeps there and checked to see what L&R looked like with the sub polarity reversed vs normal. It's a lot more similar than I would have expected. Maybe I did it wrong. It would be cool if I knew how to post pic's of the graphs. There's a little camera button that says capture on REW.

This is all very cool. Even though I don't know squat, I'm generating graphs of sweeps. It will be cooler as I slowly get around to being better at this.

Alex, you are much further along than I am. Haven't even downloaded REW just yet. Hope to get that done over the weekend. Have ordered a CSL UMik 1, but they do NOT ship until the week of April 18th. But, it is time for me to take the plunge. Yeah, I know look out.......LOL!!!! Good luck to you my friend!

Cheers,

Phil

 

[Alex2507]

The motherload, as they say ...

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Douglas ... that could be us ... but you have a DEQ. BTW, the only reason I have one is because Jeff the mod let me ride his bike for an afternoon so I gave him $150 for the DEQ and the ECM mic. Seemed like the right thing to do at the time.

So I'm about half way through the tutorial and that is exactly what I needed. It's like I don't have the attention span to get through a 10 minute thing before I want to start pushing buttons. Okay ... now for the rest.

 

[lsiberian]

I just might be curious enough to check to see how much variation there is between the 0 degree and 90 degree cal files since we have the same ECM mic.

You need to aim the mic at the mains if you are doing full range measurements to avoid getting inaccurate readings for more directional sound waves, but for LFE I don't think it's a huge deal. Still I would keep the mice facing forward for consistency.

If you want to mix your subs with your fronts using the DEQ then you'd need an external amp for the fronts. In that situation you'd feed the external amps for both the fronts and subs and use the DEQ to do all the bass and crossover management. Depending on how bass capable your mains are it really can enhance the performance of the overall system to do this because it gives you a more even response typically.

I'm not sure if the DEQ is actually capable of this. It's been a long time since I messed with one.

 

[Alex2507]

I'm not sure if the DEQ is actually capable of this.

Everything was going good til we got to that. My mains are externally amp'ed.

Following that tutorial got me a way too loud test tone ripping through my left sub. That guy in the video talked about -12 on the first number and like +4 for the second setting. I'm continually surprised that nothing has cooked so far. This is brutal. I ran for the light switch and killed the subs. Sheesh ... maybe Doug is right. It's just too much. We'll never get there. May as well give up now. We could learn to live without electricity ... out in the woods.

 

[lsiberian]

Everything was going good til we got to that. My mains are externally amp'ed.

Following that tutorial got me a way too loud test tone ripping through my left sub. That guy in the video talked about -12 on the first number and like +4 for the second setting. I'm continually surprised that nothing has cooked so far. This is brutal. I ran for the light switch and killed the subs. Sheesh ... maybe Doug is right. It's just too much. We'll never get there. May as well give up now. We could learn to live without electricity ... out in the woods.

I looked at your device and you'd need an active crossover to integrate the mains. Your subs only get around 10 db more extension than your mains so it might be worth it to you.

 

[fuzz092888]

You need to aim the mic at the mains if you are doing full range measurements to avoid getting inaccurate readings for more directional sound waves, but for LFE I don't think it's a huge deal. Still I would keep the mice facing forward for consistency.

Usually I do my EQ measurements up to 200-250Hz, so I need to have the mic aimed at the sub. If you're only doing below 80 or 100 you're probably right.

 

[fuzz092888]

I looked at your device and you'd need an active crossover to integrate the mains. Your subs only get around 10 db more extension than your mains so it might be worth it to you.

Hmm, that's making things a lot more complicated wouldn't it? Wouldn't the only way to integrate the mains be to set the mains to large in the receiver, then go preout L/R -> Active crossover? However, if he did that, wouldn't that then cause him to lose LFE to the subs? So he'd really need a 4 in 4 out minimum right? Or am I speed reading this too much and have missed some vital information, like this isn't even for the living room?

@Alex2507 This is for the living room right?

 

[Alex2507]

I looked at your device and you'd need an active crossover to integrate the mains. Your subs only get around 10 db more extension than your mains so it might be worth it to you.

I'm not getting an active crossover and I don't know what 10 db more extension means. I'm not that well versed but I thought extension was a Hz thing. I don't know.

That video got me through running auto eq and saving an adjusted setting with both subs firing. I did it like a million times finally settling for his -12 number. I don't know how to set it to dual mono yet. I ran 31.5 Hz to 160 Hz. After I dropped 25 hz by 5db and 20 Hz by 8 db. I saved it in the first empty slot and tried to call it mono but it came out monoo. The DEQ tries to eq out the 50 Hz bloom of the subs. I figured 160 Hz was high enough as LFE only goes to 120 Hz..

Without that video I'd be totally screwed. There's no way for me to have figured out all those steps with just the paper manual and messing around with the front controls. Never mind the million other things a DEQ can do. For one thing the RTA behaved as expected at first. Then it took me forever to find out that the A and B buttons on Pg. 2 of the RTA screen control the rate and peak. The video didn't mention that either. There are other videos too.

At first the cuts made the subs virtually silent. I maxed out the volume controls on the back f the sub amps. I level matched the eq'ed subs to everything else and then added an extra 3 db to account for my low spl. Anyway, we're up and running. I suppose I can now check out some other stuff DEQ specific ... like the dual mono thing. Any thoughts on how that works?

Just casual listening with music sounds good. Running YAA's bass demos shows plenty of low end. I might amend the 15 db cut at 50 hz or so. The RTA shows a suspicious dip right there. Douglas ... this is doable.

 

[lsiberian]

Usually I do my EQ measurements up to 200-250Hz, so I need to have the mic aimed at the sub. If you're only doing below 80 or 100 you're probably right.

I'm not saying it's ideal, but I doubt it would have a significant impact on the results of the measurements overall especially.

Integrating the mains with your subwoofer can be very beneficial, and his receiver should be able to mix the LFE into the L-R Signals.

Receiver - DEQ
DEQ - Crossover(CX2310)
Crossover to Sub and Mains.

The biggest pain point is by far doing all the measurement work. I can't blame him if he doesn't want to fool with it. At some point good enough is good enough and I get tired of tinkering too. I just want to offer the option for something perhaps later he can fool with if he so chooses.

 

[lsiberian]

I'm not getting an active crossover and I don't know what 10 db more extension means. I'm not that well versed but I thought extension was a Hz thing. I don't know.

I meant hz.