random wrong ref time on repeated FarField measurements (v5.20)

challenge

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Hello. I have a question.
Now, mind that these specific ones are measurements I did in october 2023. Forgot to ask at the time.
Files says it was REW 5.20, I presume the one that was up to date at the time (V5.20.13?), so don't know if something changed after)
I don't have the setup rigged right now, will have to measure soon and that's why I am asking.

I am using what would be called a full dual channel rig to measure loudspeakers.
So I am feeding back the signal from the amp output (padded by a resistor probe).

The sound card is a focusrite scarlett 2i2 3rd gen and it goes pretty much like this (using the 2i2 internal mic preamp obviously):

fetch


I've got a turntable and I do the sweeps around a speaker (just 180deg when it's simmetrical).
Rew is set to repeated measurements with some seconds of delay between them just to allow me to rotate the turntable.

I pretty much follow the vituixcad paper for all rew settings: https://kimmosaunisto.net/Software/VituixCAD/VituixCAD_Measurement_REW.pdf

Those instructions say that once you do the full set of measurements, you set the IR window in the 0 degree (on axis) measurement and "apply windows to all".

applyreftime.png


So I set the impulse window on the 0 degree measurement and apply windows to all... and it's usually ok.
But on some sets of measurements (same day, same place, same rig etc) I realized that (I measure every 10 degrees) there will be a measurement that will have the impulse placed like at around -11.5ms instead of 0, compared to all the others in the set.
e.g. you can easily spot the 11th measurement (110deg hor) here is the black sheep after applying the IR window to all:

measurset.png

Note that while doing these measurements the microphone doesn't move nor the speaker, the driver is centered on turntable axis, so distance is more or less the same.

Here you can see the first 0deg measurement (on axis) with ref time at 0:
(ignore that's wired inverted)


0deg.png



and here is the 11th one (110deg hor) with the different ref timing. The first impulse here it is at -11,5ms compared to others, so the window is applied at wrong place.

11th.png


So I manually fix that one and then it's good.
Or I redo the measurement individually and it'll usually pick the correct one the second time.
I thought it was aligning on the reflection as the height of the reflected one is greater?
But the issue is that there are other measurements where the reflected impulse is stronger than the direct one and the thing didn't happen...
eg. the one after, the 12th (120deg hor) was correct yet the reflected IR was higher

12th.png


Now sometime I have full sets of repeated measurements without any issue, and sometime I get one or two measurements like this in a set.
It's kind of random.
What is causing this? Is there some setting I am missing? What I am doing wrong?
Is it rew offsetting the thing or it's an hardware/software issue in the drivers/soundcard/OS chain?
(windows 10, focusrite 2i2 usb on asio drivers)
As I said this is a chain of automated "repeated measurements". Nothing is changing between them software wise. I launch the thing and just have to rotate the turntable.

Shouldn't always get the correct timing from the loopback with those settings?
these are the settings that vituixcad recommends and that I used:

farfieldsettings.png


Is there something wrong in my settings for this full dual channel measurement setup?

these are vituixcad suggested settings for the analysis tab, i think I run it exactly as recommended:

analysissettings.png



thank you
 

John Mulcahy

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Apr 3, 2017
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Please attach the mdat file if it isn't too large, or provide a sharing link to access it.
 

John Mulcahy

REW Author
Joined
Apr 3, 2017
Messages
7,351
The timing shift looks to be almost exactly 1024 samples at the measurement rate. If that's the ASIO buffer size I suspect a buffer of samples got lost, try using a larger ASIO buffer if that's an option.
 

challenge

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I have another mdat on another driver, done the same day. The timing shift is exactly the same amount.

yes the buffer is set to 1024, this is the max value for this focusrite 2i2 3rd edition!

Does that means that the CPU was too slow to process the thing in real time and skipped some?
I had an issue at the time that was locking the cpu at something silly like 0.8ghz. Could be that?
 
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challenge

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Ok so that should be it. Thank you very much for the troubleshooting.
 
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