wfview 1.5 Remote Operation - Mic Audio levels excessively high and very distorted

1

Remote Operation - External Mic Left side jack on HP Laptop audio levels excessively high and very distorted. The microphone is analog and plug into my laptop and works great with RS-BA1. I have tried all settings and nothing helps, both laptop and wfview. I noticed that Qt audio does not work for TX or RX, but Port audio does on my HP laptop. However, when I use my USB microphone, it works perfect! What am I overlooking? Kevin, WA6JKN

2

Hi Kevin,

Can you turn on the secondary meter “TXAudio” and let me know what you see for levels?

Thanks,

—E
de W6EL

3

__E,

My observation is as follows with Secondary TX Audio turned on:

  1. No difference in sound, still excessive and over driving the audio using a analog microphone plugged into the jack located on the side of my HP laptop.
  2. The TX Audio is showing room noise of <-24dbfs while in RX. When modulated with the LAN audio gain turned off, the TX Audio moves quickly to the right to 0 dbfs. Seems too Hot?
  3. When TX and the LAN turned all the way down, the TX Audio is reporting the same as in step 2. No audio heard on the external RX.
  4. When TX and the LAN barely turned on, the TX Audio secondary meter is reporting the same, but the external RX sounds like I am over driving the mic audio. When I whisper, the external RX audio sounds great!
  5. The whisper test observation and TX Audio indications led me to investigate the microphone audio settings again for the External Mic at the left side “Properties” and to my surprise, noticed that the “Microphone Boost” was set to 30db. Turned it to ZERO and now everything sounds great on TX when I talk into the analog microphone and the TX Audio secondary meter now indicates around -12dbfs on voice peaks!
  6. Thank you for leading me down the path of Success!
4

The TxAudio meter shows raw data from the transmit audio device selected. It will not change based on any slider in wfview nor based on TX/RX mode. It just shows you what is coming in to wfview, and I think we are seeing a good purpose in that with your issue.

It sounds like something in your OS needs to be adjusted. Most operating systems have a sound control panel where you can adjust the soundcard analog gain stage. This is definitely the case for Linux and macOS. Since your mic is hovering at -24dBfs, it definitely seems to me like the gain is set way too high.

Try poking around in your operating system to see if you can find anything that will lower it. Even my thinkpad’s built-in mic jack has a noise floor of about -55dB (which isn’t great, but it works fine for ham radio).

FYI the “TxRxAudio” secondary meter will show you the receive audio level (pre-volume adjustment) during receive, and will switch to the raw TX device audio during transmit. But for what you’re doing, keep it on TxAudio until you see that idle level drop down significantly.

–E
de W6EL

5

Thank you, this issue is closed!

6

Wonderful! Glad it’s working.

—E
de W6EL