welcome to © 2009 rational acoustics llc. all rights reserved. rational acoustics and smaart are...

Welcome to

© 2009 Rational Acoustics LLC. All rights reserved.Rational Acoustics and Smaart are registered trademarks of Rational Acoustics LLC.

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An Introduction to Smaart v7

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Initial View

On first run of Smaartv7,we are presented with this view.

As in previous versions, we begin our session by viewing an RTA measurement. This is Smaart’s way of

telling you, “First step - check your input signals.”

Seeing as this is our first run, we have no IO devices or measurements configured yet . . .

So let’s begin there

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Configuring Smaart v7

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Configuring Inputs

Smaart v7 is able to acquire input signals from any devices that have .wav, CoreAudio, or ASIO drivers recognizable by our computer’s Operating System.

in fact

we can grab multiple signals from multiple sourcessimultaneously

(Note: only one ASIO source can be accessed at a time)

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Configuring Inputs

When Smaart v7 starts,you are presented with this splash screen

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Configuring Inputs

While you are being entertained with this lovely art, Smaart is busy checking to see what Input devices are

available to your OS.

It is here that Smaart builds its list of input devices, and once a device has been discovered, it will continue to show up for configuration in

subsequent runs – even if it is not connected at start up.

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Configuring Inputs

While not absolutely necessary, we shall begin our measurement configuration by setting up our IO

device(s). This includes:

Setting the device’s sample rate,bit depth,

and

assigning the device and its channels “friendly names” - names that will help us as we configure our individual

measurements

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Configuring Inputs

We configure our input device(s) from the “Audio IO” Options Dialogue

We access this via the “Options Menu” or by using the *hot key command [Opt + A]

* “Hot Keys” are Smaart’s built-in, keyboard-based commands

Smaart Menu Bar

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Options: Audio IO

Choose your input device from the “Device”

drop-down list

Here you can assign “friendly names” to your device and its channels

Note: Remember to hit [enter] when entering friendly names or

they won’t be kept.

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Configuring Measurement Groups

Now that we have configured our Input device(s), the next step is configuring our measurements.

Instead of a fixed measurement topology, Smaart v7’s object-oriented code base allows us to configure as many single-channel (Spectrum) and dual-channel

(Response) sessions/objects as we wish.- and -

These measurements can be run either individually or simultaneously, depending upon our requirements.

In order to structure and manage our measurement configuration, we organize our measurements into

Spectrum and Response “Groups”.

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Configuring Measurement Groups

To configure our measurements, we use the “Group Manager” Options Dialog

We access this dialog box via the “Options Menu”, via the Group Manager button

or by using the hot key command [Opt + G]

Smaart Menu Bar

or

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Options: Group Manager

Our first view of the Group Manager dialog.– No measurements configured –

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Options: Group ManagerConfiguring Measurement Groups

The Group “tree view” shows our complete

measurement configuration.

This menu is used to select the Group that is being configured, and to create/copy/delete

groups.

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Choose “New Input” to create a new Spectrum

measurement in this Spectrum Group.

The Group Tab view shows the entire

selected group, with separate detail tabs for each individual engine.

(Note: No measurements have yet been configured for this group, so the group tab is

empty.)


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Choose “New Input” to create a new Spectrum

measurement in this Spectrum Group.

Give your Spectrum measurement a Name

Choose the input device

Choose the Input Channel from that device

(Note: Device and Name use your Friendly Names if you set

them in device config.)


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The new spectrum measurement can now be found in the Group

Tree The Group Tab view now shows the new

measurement.

(Note: The measurement is assigned a color automatically. You can change this assignment by clicking on the color swatch

and selecting another.)

An individual spectrum measurement tab has

been added to the Group.


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The new spectrum measurement can now be found in the Group

Tree The Group Tab view now shows the new

measurement.



An individual spectrum measurement tab has


By repeating these steps, we can create as many measurements as we need in this Group.


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Select a response group in the tree view.

And we can continue to Response Groups to configure dual-channel measurements.


Choose “New Pair” to create a new

dual-channel Response measurement in this

Response Group.

Give your Response measurement a Name

Choose the input device

Choose the Meas. Channel from that device

Choose the Ref. Channel from that device

(Note: Both Meas. and Ref. channels must be from the

same input device.)

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The new response measurement can now be found in the Group

Tree

The Group Tab view now shows the new

measurement.



An individual response measurement tab has



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Initial View

Upon clicking the “OK” button . . .we are now back to our initial, starting view in

Smaart v7 – a single measurement window view of RTA

The big difference is now we have two spectrum/single-channel measurements configured!

Now with measurements configured!

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We have now completed a simple, two channel configuration for Smaart v7. This configuration

- with two spectrum and one response measurement - parallels the standard two

channel configuration of previous versions of Smaart.

We shall use this basic configuration for the next few sections of this introduction

presentation.

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The Group Manager dialog is a powerful interface for configuring and controlling our measurement system, and we will revisit it multiple times and explore it more deeply

throughout this presentation.

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Basic Measurement Concepts

NOTE:If you are not familiar with the basic

measurement concepts of single-channel (spectrum) and dual-channel (transfer function

and impulse response) measurements as realized in previous Smaart software versions,

we highly recommend you read the Smaart Application Note:

“Getting Started with SmaartLive”

The fundamentals of our measurement have not changed – Smaart v7 has just expanded

and refined how we make them.

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A Quick Tour of the Interface

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Plot Area

This is where the action is – this is where our active and stored measurement data is displayed.

Like in version 6, you can choose what type of measurement is shown in this

data window via the drop-down selector in the top-left corner of this

window.

And as in version 6, clicking on either axis of the data window will zoom the window to the

default ranges.

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Plot Area – Click & Drag

Now you can actively click on, grab and move RTA and Transfer Function traces using your mouse

in the v7 plot area!

On screen control handles!

Various threshold controls (Spectrograph, Coherence Blanking) show up in, and can be

modified from, the data plot area – on the fly!

New in v7!

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Cursor Readout

As in past versions, here you find information about your cursor position.

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Data Storage

Smaart v7 includes two sets of easily accessible registers for the quick storage and retrieval our RTA

and Transfer Function (.ref ) data.

Capture using the standard [spacebar] hot key command or via the capture button.

Load any Smaart data (v1 through v7!) that has been stored in our standard .ref file format.

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SPL Readout Area

Choose our input signal from any channel of any available input device.

Set to full-scale readout or calibrate for SPL and Leq measurement

Choose SPL settings for weighting and integration

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Measurement View Control

Like earlier versions of Smaart, measurement view buttons are used to determine what type of

measurement data is displayed and how many widows are visible.

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The “Spect” button takes us to a default Spectrum view

with one plot window

showing RTA data

This is also Smaart’s start-up view

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The Two-window View button takes us from a one-window to a two-window view.

Pressing this while in “Spect” displays

RTA

over

SpectroGraph

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The “Transfer” button takes us to a default Transfer Function view, with two plot windows:

The Top Window displays TF Phase

The Bottom Window displays TF Magnitude

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The “LiveIR” button opens the Live IR window when viewing a response measurement

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The “Impulse” button takes us to Impulse Response Mode

And the “Real Time” buttonIn IR mode takes us back to Real Time Mode

This switch can also be triggered via the “Mode” Menu.

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Signal Generator

This strip controls Smaart’s signal generator.

Pressing the button turns the generator on/off.

Clicking on the level field brings up the generator control dialog

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Measurement Controls

This area is where we select and control our measurements.

The controls presented here vary depending upon whether we are addressing Spectrum (single-channel)

or Transfer Function (dual-channel) measurements

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Measurement ControlsThe top labels also act as buttons to access the

relevant Options dialogs

Global measurement controls

Measurement Group Select

Group Level Commands

Individual Measurements:

Hide/ShowRun

Sig LevelDelay

Delay FindTrack on/off

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Spectrum Measurements

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Clicking the “Run” button on our first measurement starts it running.

Our meter shows input signal level

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RTA display settings can be adjusted in the

Spectrums Options dialog

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We can use the Global Spectrum controls to vary Scale and Averaging

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Full adjustment of all Global Spectrum measurement parameters can be accessed in the Group Manager

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Clicking the “Run” button on our second measurement starts it running as well.

The lighter background color indicates that this is the “active” measurement - it is displayed in front of any other measurement

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Clicking on the first measurement makes it the “active” measurement and brings it

to the front.

The lighter background color indicates that this is the “active” measurement - it is displayed in front of any other measurement

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Clicking on its colored square hides a measurement trace and an “X” is shown.

Even though a measurement’s trace is hidden, it is still running – as evidenced by its input meter.

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To capture data from the active measurement, click on a data Register slot

then capture using either the “Capture” buttonor the [space bar] hot key.

You can re-name your data by

highlighting its name and typing a

new one.

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Pressing the two-window button now brings up a view with RTA in

the top window and Spectrograph in the lower window.

RTA data trace now hidden

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Clicking the One-Window view button and choosing “Spectrograph” in the

drop-down view selector gives us a full window view of the Spectrograph

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The Spectrograph view vertically displays a series of spectrum measurements or “slices”.

Smaart v7 stores a slice history so we can scroll back through data which has passed off the screen. We can also control the number of

vertical “pixels per slice” to adjust the measurement scroll speed.

We adjust both of these settings in the Spectrum Options dialog.

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Transfer Function Measurements

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The “Transfer” button takes us to a default Transfer Function view, with two plot windows:

Top: TF Phase Bottom: TF Magnitude

With noise going through our speaker system,clicking the “Run” button on our measurement

starts it running.

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First steps in our Transfer Function (Frequency Response)

measurement process issetting our input levels

andsetting our measurement delay

We have used the signal generator as

our pink noise source

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To measure the delay, we can use Smaart’s “Delay Finder” function

Click “Insert” to accept the

measurement

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Increase Averaging to stabilize our measurementand

Adjust Mag and Phase Trace Smoothing to improve readability

Note: The Coherence trace will not be available until

we engage averaging.

The Coherence blanking threshold

control

*Remember, we can adjust trace offset by

“clicking” directly on a trace and “dragging” it

up and down.

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Engaging Live IR shows us a linear view of the Impulse response of the active TF measurement

Note: Window is centered on the current measurement

delay time.

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Smaart v7’s delay Track uses the Live IR function to automatically and continuously measure and

adjust the measurement delay

Yellow Dot indicates tracking is engaged

Click on the “Track” Button or Yellow Dot to engage Tracking

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Full control of all Global Transfer Function measurement parameters can be accessed in

the Group Manager

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TF displayand Live IR

measurement settings can be adjusted in the

TF Options dialog

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Impulse Response Mode

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The primary purpose for this mode is to perform and analyze Impulse Response Measurements

in bothTime Domain and Frequency Domain

In this mode, we can also analyze previous IR measurements that have been stored

in standard .wav audio file format

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To make a IR measurement we:

select a configured Response Measurement

set our measurement FFT size / TC

adjust our signal levels

hit Start

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Our IR shows the entire measurement in Linear view in our Top window.

This window serves as navigation and zoom control.

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The Lower Window(s) are our zoom windows where we can view all or part of our measurement is a

number of different ways.

We can control the number of zoom windows with our standard single/dual window buttons

and determine what our measurement view for each is via our

drop-down view selector menus

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This window is displaying a Log view of our Impulse

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This window is displaying a Linear (zoomed) view of our Impulse

This window shows the bottom window zoom range

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For a more interesting IR, we shall a previously stored IR

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Here we have an IR from a much larger environment

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We can filter the IR with eitherOctave or 1/3 Octave filters

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Now we choose the Two-Window view

This window we choose a Frequency Domain viewSmoothed to 1/24th Octave

This window we choose a Log IR view

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This window we choose a Spectrograph view

The dynamic range controls for the Spectrograph view appear on the Log IR

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IR displayand

Spectrograph measurement settings can be adjusted in the

IR Options dialog

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Going Multi-Measurement

Going Multi-Measurement

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Amp SpeakersX-Over(Spkr. Proc)

SystemControl

DSP

EQDelayLevel

PolarityRouting

Computer Audio I/O

Source

Mic 1

Mic 2

Mic 3

Smaart Signal Gen Out

We can expand our measurement system beyond 2 Channels

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Why Measurement Groups?

The short answer is, it depends upon our measurement needs and the complexity of our measurement system.

In the case of Spectrum Measurements, we could build a Group for each input device that we use. This will allow us to

quickly check signal presence for our devices.

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Here we see the spectra of the five input channels that we are using from our device

“PreSonus FireStudio”Measurement Group Select

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In the case of Response Measurements, we could build Groups for each sub-system we plan to measure. This allows

us to better organize our measurement process as well as the resulting data we capture.

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Our Group Names indicate the subsystem we shall be measuring

Our first three response measurements in this Group are measurements of the Main Left speaker system

from three separate Mic positions: Balcony, FOH and Roaming

Each measurement uses Console L Out as its Ref

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The fourth Response measurement in our Mains Left Group is a

measurement of our Left System EQ. Here we use EQ Out L as our Meas and

Console L Out as our Ref

Since this “Left EQ” measurement is a purely electronic measurement, we may want to

adjust some of our measurement parameters for this response separate from the Global

settings. To do this, we access its individual

measurement Tab.

Here we choose to fix the averaging for this measurement to

“16” by un-checking the “Use Global” box. We also fix the

Mag and Phase Smoothing to “None”

If want, we can also have the trace for this measurement graph inverted

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The fifth Response measurement in our Mains Left Group is a live average

of our first three response measurements which we have named

“ML Average”

We highlight our AVG response and then choose the measurements from this group that we wish to include in this live average

To create this response measurement we use the “New Average” button.

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Multi-Channel Measurement

Here we have our five Simultaneous Response

Measurements

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Multi-Channel Mania

And here, we swap the Phase display for RTA

welcome to © 2009 rational acoustics llc. all rights reserved. rational acoustics and smaart are...

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