Pink noise a room/club

[Primo Don]

Can anyone direct me in how to use pink noise to balance a room without buying a RTA?

Thanks! Adam

 

[jgourd]

Can anyone direct me in how to use pink noise to balance a room without buying a RTA?

Thanks! Adam

Without an RTA? I suppose you could listen to a lot of noise for a very long time on good monitors so you know what it is supposed to sound like. I doubt that it would work though and you might be driven mad in the processs.

A cheap RTA can be had for under $100. I have a Behringer RTA/EQ that works great. Granted it is a Behringer and therefore subject to much scoffing and humiliation but it still works great.

The real problem is that a room doesn't have the same response when empty as it does when it is full of people.

You can use noise and an SPL meter to balance the individual cabs in your PA stack however.

 

[mshilarious]

I guess a poor man's RTA would be one of those audio test CDs that steps through the frequencies combined with the meter on your board . . . after a few times with that, I think I'd save up for the RTA.

 

[riantide]

This is embarassing, but what is pink noise and what's an RTA? It sounds like they can employed in tuning a room, which is something I need a lot of help with!! Thanks, excuse my ignorance.

 

[mshilarious]

Pink noise is random noise that falls off 3dB/octave, which gives the perception of equal loudness across all frequencies, even though actual volume drops (energy remains constant). White noise has equal volume across all frequencies, but is perceived as bright.

RTA is a real-time analyzer. It gives a visual display of the frequency of a signal. Used with a reference mic (totally flat omni at all audible frequencies), it will show you the response of your monitors, or your room (after accounting for the response of the speaker), other mics, audio equipment, etc.

 

[riantide]

I think I get it. Thanks.

 

[Primo Don]

jgourd...

Are you using the Behringer DSP8024? This looks like a cool little unit. I understand about the ridicule about Behringer but, as you know, you can't beat its quality-to-price ratio. I have a LOT of Behringer equipment actually...mains, subs, x-over, subharmonic processor, (mini) mixer...

Anyway, I realize that the room behaves differently when it's full of people... If this is the unit you use, how long does the machine take to adjust? Can it be re-done between sets? I obvously haven't read the manual yet.

Thanks very much for the info! Adam

 

[boingoman]

RTA is real-time. You watch the response change as it happens, pretty much. You can save an RTA picture of a room, recall it later, and compare it to the present RTA curve.