News & Events
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Seminar at Sound Hub
Today, Steve Temme presented on how to measure voice activated devices such as smart speakers, hearables and automotive audio, as well as how to use SoundCheck for basic audio measurements at Sound Hub Denmark, the world’s leading audio innovation hub and co-working space.In the morning, he presented the basics of SoundCheck, and taught attendees (many of whom had access to the SoundCheck system at Sound Hub) how to build a test sequence in SoundCheck. recommendations for the equipment used. After lunch, he explained in depth how to test voice activated devices such as automotive infotainment systems, hearables, and smart speakers. These devices are complex to test as they have numerous wired and wireless connections and often contain signal processing, both on the record and the playback side. In this session, he outlined the test configurations, tools and techniques that enable accurate measurement of the audio performance of such devices under the many various real-world conditions in which they are used.
New Support Engineer – Devin Vaillancourt
Devin Vaillancourt has joined the technical support team at Listen, where he will be working closely with Steve, Mark L, Cam and Mark D to help our customers with their audio measurements. Devin graduated from UMass Lowell in 2016 with a degree in sound recording technology. Prior to joining Listen, he worked as an audio technician for a production services company where he gained extensive knowledge of using, calibrating and troubleshooting audio interfaces, and other recording hardware and software. In addition to his technical experience, Devin is a keen musician – outside of work, he plays in several bands, records and engineers music, and teaches drums.
New Manufacturing Manager: Ryan Burgess
Ryan Burgess has joined Listen as Manufacturing Manager, responsible for all manufacturing functions including supply chain, assembly, test, Quality Control, and product delivery. Ryan is an experienced manufacturing professional with 20 years’ experience in Engineering, Manufacturing, Supply Chain, and Quality Control Systems. He attended Clark University focusing on Computer Science, minoring in Mechanical Engineering, and also holds several certifications including a Six Sigma Green Belt, certified internal auditor and LEAN Bronze certificate. Prior to joining Listen, Ryan has held management roles in the mass notification industry, aerospace industry, industrial technology, and a global technology solutions company. In his free time Ryan enjoys spending time with his wife and six children, music, sports, and home improvement.
New Sales Director: Joe Kushi
Joe Kushi has joined Listen as Sales Director. Joe is an experienced international sales manager with over 25 years’ experience in both domestic and international sales and sales management. He also holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in business, languages and international business. In prior positions, he has sold a variety of hi-tech products including data acquisition and imaging systems, audio and video QA equipment, telecoms and security infrastructure equipment. He speaks 5 languages (with varying degrees of fluency), has lived in Paris and Brussels, and has opened offices and managed reps around the world. Outside of work, Joe enjoys traveling, listening to music, and playing drums.
New Order Processing Specialist: Rocky Ludger
Rock-Andral Ludger (Rocky) has joined Listen in the role of Order Processing Specialist. In this role, Rocky is responsible for every order from the moment it is placed, through fulfilment, to ensuring safe delivery of the product. He is also the smiling face at our front desk and keeps the office running smoothly. Rocky joins Listen with a degree in business from Kentucky University and several years’ supply chain management experience, both in the Boston area and in his native Haiti where he also used to play soccer professionally. He also speaks multiple languages fluently, including Spanish, French and Creole. Outside of work, Rocky is a keen athlete who enjoys playing and watching many different sports and, like most at Listen, also enjoys music. Rocky also founded and runs a non-profit organization in Haiti, New Vision for Youth, that coaches young professional leaders.
Updated Bluetooth Interface Supports High Definition and Low Latency Bluetooth
The updated BTC-4149 Bluetooth measurement interface now supports the aptX HD and aptX-Low Latency Bluetooth protocols for accurate measurement of high definition and low latency Bluetooth devices, in addition to the standard aptX, CVSD and mSBC codecs previously available. This enables manufacturers of Bluetooth audio devices to accurately test the audio of the latest high performance Bluetooth sink and Bluetooth source devices, making the same measurements as on traditional audio devices. In addition, the device has a new, larger color screen for improved ease of operation.
The BTC-4149 is designed as a R&D interface, testing both sink and source devices with full control over Bluetooth protocol settings, including explicit control over codec choice and transmitter power, as well as various pairing options.
Also available is a lower cost production tool, the BQC-4149. This tests Bluetooth Sink devices only, and offers only the standard aptX, CVSD and mSBC, along with more limited control of Bluetooth parameters. This model has been updated to use the same chipset as the BTC-4149 to ensure accurate production line replication of R&D tests for those customers who use both interfaces.
Both interfaces integrate seamlessly with SoundCheck, so that all parameters can be set and modified from within a test sequence for fully-automated testing of Bluetooth devices. This accelerates testing, particularly on the production line as it avoids the need to manually adjust Bluetooth settings, reducing the possibility of error. It also enables a device to be tested using multiple Bluetooth protocols and settings by taking sequential measurements using different settings in one continuous test.
SoundCheck 17 New Features Video
In this short video, sales engineer Les Quindipan gives a brief overview and demonstration of the new features and functionality of SoundCheck 17, including the new level and cross-correlation trigger, average curve/waveform post-processing functionality, new color palettes, save to MATLAB option, and more.
Listen Releases SoundCheck 17: New Features for Multichannel and Voice-Controlled Testing
Save to MATLAB
Listen is excited to announce the release of SoundCheck Version 17. This new Windows/Mac release offers many features to simplify multi-channel and voice controlled testing, such as a new level and cross-correlation trigger, average curve/waveform post-processing functionality, the ability to easily read and work with multichannel wavefiles, multiple DC Connect control, and enhanced database options. On the usability side, SoundCheck 17 offers increased flexibility in color palettes, save to MATLAB option, and the ability to recall CSV formatted text files.
Today’s modern audio devices have two important testing requirements: the ability to test a voice activated device with no analog input, and the ability to control and test multiple channels simultaneously, for example, microphone or speaker arrays. SoundCheck 17 contains a host of new features to facilitate this. For voice-activated measurements on devices with no analog input, such as smart speakers, wearables, hearables and smart home devices, the new level & cross-correlation ‘smart trigger’ offers improved performance. By using a chirp-based conditioning tone and searching for the exact log sweep frequency, it is more robust and less susceptible to false triggers than simpler level and frequency triggers.
To save time when testing smart devices where it is necessary to test microphone or speaker arrays, SoundCheck 17 can now directly read multichannel WAV files from the memory list, signal generator and stimulus steps. Also for testing multi-channel arrays, multiple DC Connects can now be controlled, independently configured, and used for data acquisition within SoundCheck. The new Average Curve/WFM post processing function which allows the average curve (or waveform) of a selected group of data in the memory list to be obtained, is particularly useful for power averaging selected curves, averaging curves from different spatial positions (e.g. microphone arrays), and complex averaging of multiple measurements with background noise. Finally, the database module has been enhanced and is now it 4x faster and 3x more space-efficient than previous versions. This is particularly important for testing modern audio products with multiple transducers (microphone arrays, multiple speakers, etc.), as these often generate large volumes of data.
New Level and Cross-Correlation Trigger
Usability enhancements include improved color pallets which offer ultimate flexibility in defining colors for backgrounds, grids, cursors and graph lines. New default color palettes are included, and user-defined palettes can be saved as pre-set files which will be applied to any new display created. Multiple palettes can be saved, for example allowing different color sets for different applications. In addition, SoundCheck can now save any data (including memory list curves and Soundmap (time frequency analysis) data ) to MATLAB for additional processing. Data is saved as a standard MAT file and can be manually or automatically saved in this format.
Additional new features include support for the new APTX HD codec for high resolution Bluetooth testing, a 64 bit Demo / Data Viewer which enables measured data to be recalled and viewed without the need to own a separate license, and the ability to recall CSV files as well as TXT files.
More Information: https://www.listeninc.com/products/soundcheck-software/specs/
