Data Acquisition Web

Audio measurements, one of the most demanding tasks, require high-quality signal acquisition, complex scaling, extensive analysis, and multiple graphical presentations. Virtual instrumentation opens new possibilities for custom audio measurements applications.

Most measurement systems begin with some form of sensor or transducer that generates electrical signals according to physical phenomena. The process of measuring those electrical signals and inputting them to a computer for processing is known as data acquisition. Dynamic audio signals require high-resolution and high-dynamic-range digitizing devices.

Before it is digitized by the data acquisition hardware, the signal from a sensor nearly always requires some type of conditioning, such as amplification, filtering, sensor excitation, and input configuration.

All sensors have a frequency range over which they are designed to operate. Your sensor should have a frequency range large enough to cover the frequency range of interest. Likewise your digitizing hardware should have a large enough frequency range to cover the signals of interest. Anti aliasing filters cuts the maximum frequency range of the device to a little less than one-half the maximum sampling rate, as prescribed by the Nyquist sampling theorem.