Omnia Audio Omnia.9/XE - Manual (Page 91)

Speaker Calibration
As mentioned earlier, taking the time to calibrate at least one set of speakers to act as your reference
monitors is time well spent. In order to perform a speaker calibration, you need four tools:
• A calibrated microphone to capture the audio.
• A pink noise generator to provide audio for measurement (pink noise having an equal amount of
“noise power” in each octave).
• A real-time audio analyzer (RTA) to visually display what the microphone is hearing.
• Some means by which to correct for speaker and/or room inaccuracies (such as a parametric
equalizer).
Omnia.9/XE provides three out of the four tools – the pink noise generator, the RTA, and the EQ. All you
need to add is the calibrated mic.
Choosing a Calibrated Mic
It is important to understand that you must use a calibrated microphone designed for sound measurement
purposes to perform a proper calibration. Studio or recording mics – even the high-end, high-dollar ones –
are of no value when calibrating a system.
You can spend thousands of dollars on a scientific-grade, high-precision calibrated microphone, but the
good news is – you don’t have to. Even the least expensive models will provide good quality results and
are worthy of consideration.
While we are not in the business of selling microphones, nor do we have any interest in promoting any
brand or model over another, we can tell you that Behringer ECM8000 and DBX RTA-M work quite well
and can be purchased at local music stores and from various on-line vendors for around $100. If you
prefer to connect your mic via USB or Firewire, several manufacturers (M-Audio, E-Mu, and Blue come to
mind) offer XLR to USB and XLR to Firewire converters starting at under $50).
Setting Up the Mic
Place the microphone as close as possible to the position you will occupy when monitoring so that it
hears what you will hear. In cases where you are calibrating two of the same speakers, and both are
placed in similar locations in the room, you can calibrate both the left and right channels simultaneously. If
you find yourself in a situation where the speakers will be affected differently by their individual placement
in the room – one is suspending from the ceiling in a corner and the other is sitting on a shelf, for example
– or one is significantly closer to your monitoring position than the other – we recommend performing an
individual calibration for each speaker.
Setting Up the Client Software for Calibration
For the example below, let’s assume that you are calibrating your studio monitors, which are being fed
audio from the Speaker Output portion of Omnia.9/XE’s Monitor Outputs. We will also assume that you
are in a situation where you can use the same calibration settings for both speakers. By default, the
parametric EQ section is set up in the “common” mode, which means changes made to the left channel
will be mirrored in the right channel.
Connect the Client PC and the Calibrated Mic
The first step to calibration is making sure you have a remote connection to your Omnia.9/XE.
Using the NfRemote Client Software
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