3B Scientific Software for Fourier Analysis User Manual

Page 5

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Subject to technical amendments

3.5 Recording and analyzing sound using a

microphone

Toggle the "Wave Source" switch to microphone to
record and analyze waves using the microphone
input of the computer.

Ensure that a microphone is plugged in to the
computer and that it is active. Check with a win-
dows application that it is live.

The "Capture Threshold" knob allows you to set a
trigger so that the recording freezes whenever the
threshold is exceeded. If you want to record and
analyze continuously without stopping, set the
threshold to maximum.

You can also freeze the recording manually by
pressing the "Freeze" button.

Press the "Reset" button in order to record again.

Change the "Recording time" (in milliseconds) by
changing the number in the field shown below.
Longer recording times require longer analysis
time. You should set the recording time to be suffi-
ciently long to include at least 10 complete cycles
of the waveform (ideally over 100!).

Note: The spectrum is calculated with better preci-
sion when the recording time is longer.

3.6 Saving the data

The option of saving data into text files that can be
read with other software is only available when
operating in the microphone mode.

To save the Waveform so that it can be studied in
further detail, enter a filename in the field on the
left and press the "Save Waveform" button.

To save the Spectrum so that it can be studied in
further detail, enter a filename in the field on the
left and press the "Save Spectrum" button.

In both cases the program will create tab-delimited
text files which can then be read with other soft-
ware such as Excel, Origin, etc.

Note: if the filename is not changed, the program
will not over-write the previous data, but will ap-
pend the new waveform or spectrum to the end of
the previous file.