Tweaking UWell Caliburn Vape pod inhale sensor.

I am in no way to endorse smoking or vaping.

It is best to go clean, I believe.  Because: Your respiratory system designed for fresh air and works best with fresh air.  :))

Shame on me, I smoke at least a pack a day for more than 30 years :((

Nowdays, vaping is getting popular within youngsters. I guess, this is why my son came up with the idea to forcibly switch my smoking habit to vaping. He might have search and found many articles saying vaping is less dangerous than smoking.

Mind you though, those articles speading around the internet may not scientifically proven. Some articles even say the opposite, severe lung injuries/popcorn lung by vaping. Those popcorns may not be a good company while watching movies....

Then came the present from my dear son. A set of Uwell Caliburn an a bottle of mint salt nicotine liquid.

A quick google about vaping, and seems to me (yeah, to me only, not to you, no endorsement here) those vape fumes are safer than cigarette smoke.

Open up the present, charged it, fill the pod and vape away.......

Surprisingly, I learned from my wifey, up to several days after start vaping, my son always checked ashtray in the porch and always empty. I guess he really wanted me to stop smoking...... drama tears..... thank you, Son!

After about a month as a regular vaper and very little cigarette consumption, that Caliburn starts giving me problems. Sometimes, automatic inhale sensor does not work, fortunately Caliburn equipped with manual firing button.

The problem gets worse. Instead of not firing during inhale, it keeps firing once turned on.  Caliburn teardown time bell rings. Opening up is quite easy and lots of video at youtube for that purpose.

Note the center square in the button, there is a small rubber button damper. I lost the LED light tube 

Watchout for this black "nanotech" rubber

Now dig deeper. After removing inner cover, guess what device is the inhale sensor ?  Good guess, a condenser mic capsule.

At first I thought, the sensor must be somekind of thin reed with electrical contact.  Boy, I was wrong. However, a microphone can output an electrical signal by detecting/ converting air pressure changes energy, right?  Kudos to those genius product design engineers.

Tweak a condenser mic capsule? Not a chance. No other way than cleaning it , since the size of it are only 3 or 4 mm in diameter no way to solder a new one, if somehow I could get a replacement.

Nothing to lose, because with constant firing, it is unusable. Sprayed some contact spray on it, waited a minute and turn the unit on. Ho ho ho..... once tuned on, no constant firing ! Re-tested it by applying a light negative pressure on the sensor AKA suck it lightly :)

Doh time, constant firing after test. Drastic measure needed, peeled off the black fabric cover & spray away. Same as without peeling the fabric cover.

With new pod to order & a waste of good rechargeable battery in my mind , why not take the desperate measure. A drop of superglue? Why superglue? Maybe, superglue is thin enough that could seep into inside cavity and forms an isolation, thus destroying the condenser mic :))  Bad bad logic for fixing up something.

Done with superglue, replace the fabric cover, waited 5 minutes. Turn on. Guess no way to suck it, right?  Firing button pressed, it was firing during the press and lit off a second after button released. After several sucessful presses, pack the whole thing & ready to vape.


NOTE:

Only tried above sucessfully with ONE UNIT.

TWEAK IT AT YOUR OWN RISK OR TWEAK it just for FUN :)

Comb Filtering?

Aahh....curse on you, COVID-19, makes everybody screw their everyday life.

8 to 5 now becomes 9 to 3, some are working from home.  With less people everywhere, less traffic in this notoriously horrible traffic city.

15:45 at home, well lots of time (and energy) for tweak.

After a few weeks with new 8 channels processor, CODIA DSP PROJECT 450.8 II , initial rough RTA-ing (1/3rd octave only) & on the road tweaking, it is time to check how much damage done to initial rough RTA/EQ setting.

And this time, with one week installed new TG9, 3.5" fullrange, in place of Wavecor 3.5"

Overall, not so bad after all, with 1/3 octave RTA.  It is time for more precision, starts with Left side (3way front stage).

Some rugged response in low & midrange frequency, wide hump in high 6-10K.  Surely tweaks here and there will smooth everything out. Piece of cake for 6-10K hump, small EQ-ing for midranges.

Around 300Hz.  Hmmm, interesting.  Looks okay with 1/3, but hey.... switching to 1/6 shows some dip and next to it a hump.

Switch to 1/12, then it is confirm OMG, is that comb filtering?  Very narrow and low dip, repeating itself with smaller and smaller increment throughout the RTA graph.

Flip the polarity of the TG9.  It is way way better response with flipped polarity in TG 9.  Also, no eardrum high pressure feeling.

Now this should be similar to Right side.  Nope. Response much much better WITHOUT TG9 polarity flip..... uh oh......

L & R both, TG9 pair only, with L flipped, R not flipped.... immediately shows destructive/lower SPL.  Reconfirm by un-flipping L.. yes... confirmed.  Un-flipped polarity on both L & R TG9 shows them in phase.

With my next to nothing tuning skills & experience, surely this will not rectify in a few minutes.  Tuning session will end soon for today.

DSP only have 0 and 180 phase,  don't have idea to correct it in the DSP, without screwing phase relationship among all speakers.

Last try before session end, is to move out XO freq from around 280 to 320. Nope, it is still there.  However, with 320Hz XO, seems less stress for TG9.

Closing time.... stop that pink noise, change for few familiar recording, quick channel gain match up & quick save.

Another further tweak in queue ......another fun in line.

As for you damn SARS-COV-2, Get LOST quick you creep! And why don't you pick something your own size, eh!

All hearts goes out to all medical professional heroes out there.....Take care & stay healthy.

True Wireless Earbuds: Tronsmart Spunky Beat, spunky sound!

Nowadays, headset socket are starting to become extinct with latest release mobile phones.

Why such a mature connection method to electroacoustics device have to perish.

While electroacoustic device in nature is analog device and obviously simplest way to drive by using analog signal.

Wireless trend? Sure, but puuhhhlllleeeaseee, add those 25 cents socket, I am more than happy to pay a dollar for it. You big brands can get 4 times profit from it.

So why??? So they can sell $20 bucks adapter, maybe?. Smart. I wonder is there a DAC inside those adapter?

I cannot beat them, then I have to join them. Period. Too many period in this sentence.

Search began. Cambridge Audio Melomania? Sony WF-1000XM3? Another Audiotechica? My current on the go wired buds is ATH-ANC23, no wonder, eh?

The only problem is: they're not cheap. Also, no way for me to trust my own ears.

Many shops don't have demos. Earwax anyone? Picture this: stranger approach you and ask you to remove those thing sticking in your ear cavity and want to stick them inside his..... Okay that's enough, being too much already.

On the other side, reviews of cheap TWS scatter all over the place. Under $100, under $50 and even under $30. Most are from brands I have never heard of, but some are from quite popular mobile phone accesories.

Local online stores also have tons of testimony for mega el cheapo under $10, most with popular brand names.
Some priced as low as $5 bucks. Think of it, 3 rechargeable battery, 3 charging circuitry, 2 minuscule speakers, 2 radio tranceiver, few mm of wire, few grams of plastic polymer, few LEDs, few metal piece for contact, an usb socket, firmware, paints to mark the brand name. Amazing of what humans can do with $5 bucks! Humans are the most amazing God's creation, if I may say.

Trivia: what is the correct brand name those:

J_ANY_CONSONANT_WILL_DO_L

S_Any _Vowel_NY.

Mr. Amar B...  Hint:Are u sure quiet is comfort? Try a world without music!

Mind yo: right answer, no reward, no free Spunky Beat.

While most of testimonies are okay, deal breakers are on battery life, unstable connection and only 1 bud working after short while. Not counting DOAs.

Finally, I made up my mind with these criteria:
1. Willing to burn $20-$50 (Aliexpress), without trusting my ears. Actual local price about 1.5 times (tax, seller profit & local shipping)
2. AptX is a must. Mainly for music, so I don't really care about latency, but these AptX promises better battery life and sound quality.
3. Preferaby with Qualcomm chip, they invented AptX, aren't they?
4. Bluetooth 5.0, not sure of the benefits, but why opt for lower version?
5. Touch interface.
6. Being no 6 is the also important: I will not stick blinking fireflies on my ears.

Choices are (in random order): QCY T1X, MPow T5, KZ S1 Hybrid, Haylou GT1 Plus, Soundpeats Truedot and Tronsmart Spunky Beat & Tronsmart Onyx Neo.

Later on dropped MPow T5, KZ S1 Hybrid, maybe because of those flying colors reviews, local prices marked up to more than I am willing to pay without auditioning them first.

Soundpeats Truedot are not yet available locally, since they're just launched.

Reading review after review & direct comparison mostly from www.scarbir.com, seems Spunky Beat is the one. Other than the sound quality review that seems to suit me, charging case also a significant factor.

Spunky Beat charging case have 4-LED battery indicator, easier to know how much case power left. Two way charging,  using built in/permanent charging cable  and USB-C socket.  Onyx Neo is newer, but its case doesn't come with these features.

The built in lanyard also a nice touch while trying to reach for it inside jeans pocket stuffed with mobile phones, cigarette, lighter, house keys, car keys, napkins, parking tickets, lint, pokemon, etc. Pokemon live inside our pockets, right?

Btw, great review & comparison from www.scarbir.com, I strongly recommended to visit the site for anyone looking for affordable TWS/headphones.  Thanks a million, Bart Breij AKA Scarbir!

The day has arrive. New Spunky Beat in sealed package. A buds pair, charging case, 3 pairs of silicone tips, manual book, warranty card and an USB-C charging cable.

With some leftover juice in both case & buds, it is mandatory to immediately pair them and test.
Easy & fast pairing with several android phones, an android tablet also an iphone. Not a single issue during pairing with those devices. Yet to test with PC, macbook and Fiio PMP.

A lady live inside those buds always speaks up in every operation mode. I was wondering to have a little chit chat with her, but she seems to ignore me, and so far I observed, she only says "Power On/Off", "Pairing", "Connected/Disconnected" and  "Battery Low".
Yeah, so much of an idea to know her in more intimate relationship.......

Also with touch volume control (3 taps), it will beep, once reaching maximum and minimum level. No feedback for step up or down level. Intuitively for me, to raise should be on the right, lower on the left, but it's the other way around. Same with ext/previous track. For un-spunky guy, I beg to differ, Tronsmart.

Other touch commands are power cycle, android voice command,  phonecall controls.

Note that volume control is NOT available with the first hardware version.  Mine is later version. You can check www.tronsmart.com for more.

Mommy size tips installed was not a comfortable fit. Tried daddy and little girl size. Too bad neither of those mushroom family member fit comfortably in my ears.

Come looking for some stashed extra tips from other earbuds. First one to test was the free foam tips from ATH-ANC23 package, also a meh with these buds. After a few sets, found a comfortable one and good sounding, another a freebies from ATH, silicone, cylindrical shape.

Below are subjective opinions, with cylindrical current tips installed and for $25 bucks.

Coming from a very laidback ANC23, Spunky Beat sounds brighter. Just a tad bright but not excessive to my standard. Treble is quite smooth.

Vocals a bit to the thin side, despite the "Spunky" name. However, it is still quite far from "I hate them" boundaries. Adequate soundstage width and details.

Even though bass is adequate, need a bit more for my liking. Maybe insufficient for avid bassheads. Bassheads should look for "Spunky BeatS" variant, yes, with extra "S".  Unobtanium On-line Store sellls them for less, but out of stock since 1980.

Surprisingly, bass definition is very good. No boominess & tails. Every low frequency instrument are very well defined.

All of above quality will vanish once the volume cranked too high. Loss of details, "limping" treble, if you can figure out what it means. Still enough SPL before reaching that level, though.

Battery life is good. Only once I hear the lady telling me of low battery.  Good job, Qualcomm.

The lady has blue and red pet fireflies living with her inside these buds. Constant red during charging in the case. Blue blink/constant during pairing and other operation mode.  Once bluetooth connected, those fireflies goes to nap. They wake up in sweat, blinking if bluetooth disconnected.  Nice attitude, fireflies!

I am happy with most aspects (sound characteristic, charging case, earbud size/comfort, battery life, bluetooth connection, buds indicator light behaviour). Oh well, they could do better in the touch control territory. They may change this on Onyx Neo.

This become my daily buds strictly because of wireless convenience  and ANC23 will still be my flying bud because its active noise cancellation feature & airplane plug adapter. Well worthed for $25 bucks!

The only tweak possible with my android device, is adapt voice. That's all there is to it.

So little tweak, still lots of fun with Tronsmart Spunky Beat. Cheers !!!

JBL MS-8 Car Audio DSP Encounter

My first car audio DSP processor is JBL MS-8.

It was a huge rave in diymobileaudio.com, with quite many threads and the MS-8 official thread page count by the time of this writing........627 pages. 

The thread itself started Jan'07 and still active till now (March'20, 12k+ posts to date)... less and less post, of course.

Well... with a new car in '13, I enthusiastically bought MS-8......... MS-8 DIYMA thread did hell of a job of getting me to part with my money for MS-8 :).

Auto tune, 8 channels (thinking to expand to 3 way), powered output (for rears/center simplicity), Radio Frequency (no need to point the remote) remote control, etc..... Then, MS-8  it is!

After long and exhausting web search, numerous calls to numerous car audio shops.... for the ultimate reason of getting the lowest price in the whole wide world if possible.

Finally bought from an independent guy (forgot his name). Initially also bought along a Morel Tempo sets for my wife's car. Unfortunately, the one he brought to me seems a bit mess. Some glue splatter in the cone, and I thought he brought me a fake one.  I emailed Morel to check the SN, and it was legit. Contacted him again to buy it...already sold and he ran out of stock, but I still seal the deal on MS-8 with him.

Deal was done by numerous SMS chats.  YES, short messaging services. This is before Whatsapps/BBM/ etc time.  Only chat application i recall was Yahoo! Messenger which was ceased service a couple of months ago.

JBL MS-8..... hmmmm...... revolutionary OEM integration processor with AUTOTUNE! Yuuuummmmmmy!!!

Autotune.... why?  I recall my first time attending IASCA contest in my country, around early ninetees.  That was the first IASCA contest in this country.  A honorary judge was a foreigner named Craig .......

With IASCA, RTA measurement is mandatory and I also a believer of good sound always shows in measurement.

In my assumption, with autotune, I could skip of needing to have an access to a RTA.

So, with all equipment installed, then let's pull the autotune trigger.... should be a piece of cake, right?

Half way true.

Basically, the MS-8 autosetup/calibration routine (output setup) are defining operation mode (2 ways, 3 ways, subs, rear, front, center channels combination) to suit the design goal.

2 way front + sub, tweeter high pass at 2.5KHz, midbass bandpass 65Hz to2.5KHz, sub @ 65Hz, all with Linkwitz Riley 4th order .... what's so difficult about that? :) Can always tweak them in very near future  :))

Later on I learned from DIYMA (the great Mr. Wehmeyer),  in general, it is better to cut subs at 80Hz for MS-8 (because of the way MS-8 autotuning algorithm?)
Also it is recommended to factory reset after several calibration. Perhaps to clear the memory/processor, since indeed this is a computing device.

There is also an Input Setup routine that MS-8 use to de-eq, de-time align & setting headunit before clipping volume of an OEM system with multiple outputs.

Once I realized the purpose of input setup routine (I'm using aftermarket headunit, with only R & L outputs), I always skipped this routine.

Next, assign corresponding channel to suit installed drivers & setting the crossover orders & cut off frequency.

After that, the real autotune routine starts, by first setting the main volume control -20 to -40 depending if the installation using external or internal amp.  Next step are some test tones (MLS?) for time alignment & AutoEQ.  These are repeated for several seating position.

During AutoEQ measurement, seems MS-8 is smart enough to do spatial averaging of each measurement. By wearing Binaural Mic in the form of cheap economy class airplane free headsets... it measures 6 position in each measurement.

The person wearing the mic need to look forward and turn to left and right rearview mirrors......... kind of neat, isn't it?

Afraid to get lost in the middle of the path? Not sure to look left or look right? Just take a glace to the display, it will point you to the right direction. Right on, MS-8!

Btw, in a few instance i tried  to cheat the MS-8.... only straight front position during the measurement :)

What's next? Anything else? That's it? You sure?  No.... last step is unplugging the Binaural mic from the MS-8.

If left plugged, according to some, may cause some feedback problem that could destroy unprotected tweets/aeroplane noise of death. It is recommended to install series capacitor (large value, around 60uF if my memory serve me right, so it acts as an all pass filter and won't interfere with tweeter cut off frequency) to protect those teenie weenie voice coils, in case shit happens, say amp turn pop, wrong channel assignment, etc.

Lucky me, in many years of my MS-8 sevice, never one this problem occured.

And that it. Now, let's hear the magic of your revolutionary OEM Integration Processor JBL MS-8, after setting the main volume to about -6 to -9.

Another assumption is... the autotune uses JBL target curve... so the FR must be good, sound must be good, the "Correct Sound", at least according to Harmann.

The first song from my new car with new JBL MS-8 and new audio gears.... well, some are from previous installation.... sounded just like an ALARM CLOCK RADIO ....... Don't ask what it is..., again, sounded exactly like an ALARM CLOCK RADiO.

HOWEVER.......I observed that.... the CENTER IMAGE.....it was like something I never heard in a car before.........very slightly to the left side of the dash but it was TACK SHARP! Maybe I'm exagerating, thus, safely said the center image may be only 1 or 1 1/2 notch below the one you find in a good pair of headphones.  Afterall, this is an automobile environment :)

This might be the result of precise time alignment and L/R frequency response uniformness (FR for short).

Maybe MS-8 has a finer time alignment resolution, since I could never experienced center image like this in previous device with time alignment capability (alpine CDA-9833 and Clarion DXZ-776).

Later, I found  a way to correct this during the time alignment routine, that is not to look straight to the front, but just a slight tilt a bit to the center rearview mirror.

This method gave a tack sharp center image in the center of the dash, well least this method works in my car, my system & my ear :)  I may have difference hearing in my left and right ear  :) :) :)

I believe this was the point I boarded on to the car audio long haul long hour journey.  All starts with alarm clock radio sound.

Again... back to 400+ of diyma pages to look for some install tips & trick.  Some of them, re-check all driver polarity & set to normal, adjusting all amplifier gain to 2 volts, skips the input setup, flipping sub polarity during setup, change input from default to aux and lots lots of different tips and trick from DIYMA.

Mentioned above, I tried only straight front position only, thinking maybe the measurement variation could be too great and screw the algorithm.

Weeks of tweaking and running numerous calibration, I can only manage to get a good center image but unlistenable tonal balance.

Fortunately there is also manual graphic EQ, tone control & sub volume setting, with these, I was able tune the system to a decent sound quality.

Coming months, & moving forward to get the autotune right, I bought a Behringer ECM8000 condenser measurement microphone, a mixer to connect it with my laptop souncard and try to setup a PC RTA platform.

Not satisfied, then I invested on a handheld RTA (Phonic PAA3). I assume (again) maybe with RTA i could find what was wrong (FR standpoint, maybe some extreme peak/cancellation that prevents autotune to complete it's job).

Well, I spotted around 2.5Khz cancellation with my speaker set or installs (vifa P17WJ & small vifa xt25)... Great! I just found a solid reason to shop more :)))
So....the replacement is.......drumroll...........Audison AV K6 sets. 
Why Audison? Maybe i share the reason in future posts ;)
Ha ha.... better sounding sets, at least to my ears.

However, still, no luck with autotune here. Another autotune dead end :((

However with several RTA systems, different softwares & speaker sets to play with, I guess, I was developing experience to tune with RTA, say matching L/R FR, applying target curves, smooth out some FR irregularities, tweak crossover points/slope, etc.

Back to autotune.........So much for MS-8 AUTOTUNE, huh?

YES, it is for ME/MY system/MY installation. And until I replace MS-8 with another processor (5-6 years in service), I never once could get a good sound without heavy tuning with those manual settings available.

But hey....... there are so many praises for MS-8 in many forums, so many success stories with MS-8. So how come I just can't achieve the same as others?

I never found the exact problem & answer within my system.  Should MS-8 have the capability to give some feedback of why the autotune cannot come to completion, that would be marvellous.

So then, is MS-8 a bad DSP?

DEFINITELY ABSOLUTELY NO.

MS-8 is a GREAT product. Great implementation of a great concept. Could be improved? Hell sure...too bad it was discontinued.

While it did not work as expected in my system, is a different story.

To me, MS-8 is another form of computational product.  Say, analogy to a 8 digit calculator, you just simply cannot solve 9 or 10 digit of math problem with it.  All computational product have a limit in their computing power. It WILL do the job perfectly as long as the problem DOES NOT exceeds its capability.

Maybe my system & my next to nothing installation skills just somehow creates an 20 digit problem that is beyond the capability of MS-8.
And still, I managed to get a decent sounding system with MS-8, with (maybe) half complete autotune.

Some feature of MS-8 I haven't tried yet, one of them is center channel with L7.
After 5-6 years... it seems no more to tweaķ and I put MS-8 on retirement plan.

Simple reason. No tweak no fun. Cheers!!!