AudioTester is Back!

[mediatechnology]

AudioTester, written by Ulrich W. Mueller, is one of the best low-cost (free/39 EU) audio test suites out there and my "go-to" application.

Unfortunately the site was unavailable for about a year. Now its back online with a new version. http://audiotester.de/

The free version is full-featured but has a 10 minute measurement limitation. Try it.

[lsburden]

This is really cool.

Is there a recommended audio card? What do you use?

This is not a set-up I am familiar with - how do you get signal in and out?

[mediatechnology]

Thank you.

I originally started with an EMU-0404 internal sound card back in 2007.
I still use the EMU-0404 DAC.
For the A/D I mostly use the TI PCM4222 evaluation module which is a bargain: https://proaudiodesignforum.com/forum/p ... ?f=6&t=886

I can drive the EMU-0404 with Windows drivers (this machine is still XP) or ASIO.
I normally use ASIO.

The PCM4222 interfaces via transformer-isolated SPDIF or AES.
I use the SPDIF input on the EMU-0404 to accept the A/D.
The PCM4222 is the system clock for the EMU-0404.
I mostly use 96 kHz sampling and can get the 124 dB DR of the PCM4222.

All of the audio sources (2 A/D 1 D/A) route through and interface to the O/S through the EMU-0404 "PatchMix" virtual console.
It took me an embarrassingly long time to discover and a much shorter time to find the solution to inter-channel latency when handling stereo pairs.
I solved that here: viewtopic.php?t=881&f=15

You should be able to use any internal sound card with pretty good results.
I have a Roland Quad-Capture USB that was recommended by another software vendor and was disappointed.
Host USB-powered makes it noisy and it has a high THD-2 and very narrow THD sweetspot.
I honestly think it has an internal soft-limiter for MI applications and "color."

One of the areas that I've found AudioTester to excel in is low-level noise measurements and swept measurements.

AudioTester and Visual Analyzer are both better at electrical measurement than some of the other packages oriented to acoustics.
YMEC is also pretty good but has license portability limitations.

Visual Analyzer http://www.sillanumsoft.org/
YMEC: http://www.ymec.com/store/en/index.htm

[lsburden]

I ran across this on diyaudio
https://www.diyaudio.com/forums/equipme ... dcard.html
http://www.pmillett.com/ATEST.htm

[lsburden]

Do you know of a USB solution?
Would AudioTester work with a USB interface?

[mediatechnology]

Pete's box is pretty cool.

AudioTester should work with USB devices that are supported by Windows.
I've used mine with the Roland Quad Capture which is USB.

[lsburden]

Do you have an opinion on the QA401?

[mediatechnology]

Does the QA401 support simple sine wave testing yet?

[lsburden]

I don't understand...what do you mean?

It doesn't test sine waves? I've seen FFT responses...

[mediatechnology]

The QA400 couldn't do sine wave sweeps for frequency response testing and IIRC used a multi-tone stimulus.