Hello!
I intend to get myself a quality VU meter for “desk” usage. Could use some pointers in a good direction. I wrote everything down at once, so excuse the wall-of-text.
I say “get” a meter, since I intend to get others to build and I’ll pay. Thereof my questions below. I have modest experience in DIY electronic component handling, and I’ve chosen to focus on getting good at other things in life. I’m no car mechanic, I just drive – kindof.
The meter will be for desk studio usage (no rackmount), in front of screen and used for mixing/music making only, which is my main income. I’ve looked around for months and I can’t find a single meter sold commercially that will fit my needs.
So far the Sifam AL29 looks like the better price/performance/reliability option. It doesn’t meet the VU specification 100% (IEC 60268-17:1990) but very few meters do today. I haven’t found a reliable way to locate which meters supports the VU spec 100% or not.
Older meters - like Weston, Simpson, Dixson and others - seems to me more risky to get. No support, not much to do if meter performance is degraded by time, not knowledgeable enough to accurately measure performance, nor to adjust it if necessary etc etc). However, comments and suggestions about this are very welcome. I am after an analog style meter, not an LED one.
For these meters, I shall then need a circuitboard. Though I don’t see Sifam making/selling such products intended for their own meters? I suppose such a board is not difficult to build for anyone who knows what he’s doing. But I’m fearful that a poorly built- or inappropriate board will affect the meter performance, and also not provide me with a meter calibration function.
Also I can’t seem to find boards which offer ready-made connections to TRS/XLR, provide backlighting, and it will be a plus if the board is a small as possible (check out enclosure beneath).
What would you do to get the right kind of board?
Finally, the whole thing (meters + board) ought to be enclosed, into some kind of desktop stand.
The meters are intended to fit in under a computer screen, so the elevation of the enclosure will need to be quite low. Perhaps no higher than 2 inches or so.
The back end of the enclosure must not crowd the foot of the screen, so it needs to be very shallow too. Probably no more depth than ~2 inches. To save space (depth wise) I thought I wouldn’t put any connectors on the body of the enclosure. But instead, have two 1½ feet long XLR/TRS cables come out of the back of the enclosure.
I will also need the enclosure to tilt the meter displays, probably around 25-30 degrees, so that the displays face slightly upwards and are very easy for the eye to catch a glimpse of by just looking down for a split second.
This enclosure will need to get built, by a craftsman I guess. Wood or metal won’t matter to me. But if metal, I can only deliver a rough drawing of the idea, but I can’t deliver any accurate blueprint than the dimensions the manufacturer of meters and board shows.
This makes me unsure of what kind of metal craftsman is the right one to call to make this? Would you trust a sheet metal workshop or plater do it? Or just call blacksmiths around and see if they got the right equipment to do it?
Who would be the right one to do this?
Thanks for help/comments
/Tokomo
I intend to get myself a quality VU meter for “desk” usage. Could use some pointers in a good direction. I wrote everything down at once, so excuse the wall-of-text.
I say “get” a meter, since I intend to get others to build and I’ll pay. Thereof my questions below. I have modest experience in DIY electronic component handling, and I’ve chosen to focus on getting good at other things in life. I’m no car mechanic, I just drive – kindof.
The meter will be for desk studio usage (no rackmount), in front of screen and used for mixing/music making only, which is my main income. I’ve looked around for months and I can’t find a single meter sold commercially that will fit my needs.
So far the Sifam AL29 looks like the better price/performance/reliability option. It doesn’t meet the VU specification 100% (IEC 60268-17:1990) but very few meters do today. I haven’t found a reliable way to locate which meters supports the VU spec 100% or not.
Older meters - like Weston, Simpson, Dixson and others - seems to me more risky to get. No support, not much to do if meter performance is degraded by time, not knowledgeable enough to accurately measure performance, nor to adjust it if necessary etc etc). However, comments and suggestions about this are very welcome. I am after an analog style meter, not an LED one.
For these meters, I shall then need a circuitboard. Though I don’t see Sifam making/selling such products intended for their own meters? I suppose such a board is not difficult to build for anyone who knows what he’s doing. But I’m fearful that a poorly built- or inappropriate board will affect the meter performance, and also not provide me with a meter calibration function.
Also I can’t seem to find boards which offer ready-made connections to TRS/XLR, provide backlighting, and it will be a plus if the board is a small as possible (check out enclosure beneath).
What would you do to get the right kind of board?
Finally, the whole thing (meters + board) ought to be enclosed, into some kind of desktop stand.
The meters are intended to fit in under a computer screen, so the elevation of the enclosure will need to be quite low. Perhaps no higher than 2 inches or so.
The back end of the enclosure must not crowd the foot of the screen, so it needs to be very shallow too. Probably no more depth than ~2 inches. To save space (depth wise) I thought I wouldn’t put any connectors on the body of the enclosure. But instead, have two 1½ feet long XLR/TRS cables come out of the back of the enclosure.
I will also need the enclosure to tilt the meter displays, probably around 25-30 degrees, so that the displays face slightly upwards and are very easy for the eye to catch a glimpse of by just looking down for a split second.
This enclosure will need to get built, by a craftsman I guess. Wood or metal won’t matter to me. But if metal, I can only deliver a rough drawing of the idea, but I can’t deliver any accurate blueprint than the dimensions the manufacturer of meters and board shows.
This makes me unsure of what kind of metal craftsman is the right one to call to make this? Would you trust a sheet metal workshop or plater do it? Or just call blacksmiths around and see if they got the right equipment to do it?
Who would be the right one to do this?
Thanks for help/comments
/Tokomo
