oscilloscope where and how much?

[mjmarovi 8]

Ok, so I've done a lot in car audio, and have used a dmm to set gains before, but it was a cheap one from radio shack and i don't feel it was really worth crap even using. Never blown any speakers, but also know I've never had a perfectly correctly set gain on an amp. I just do it by "feel", "sound" and performance. natural abilities you may say, complete crap you may even say! lol but hey it's worked so far but i'm tired of trusting myself.

What oscilloscope has anyone used? know of? how much? where? and what will do the trick/be best for setting gains?

Thanks in advance i'm very interested!

[johnecon2001 82]

hand held o-scope

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cf...tnumber=320-290

moving to general car audio

[shizzzon 461]

thats the same one i use so i know it'll work for ya

[mjmarovi 8]

awesome, the price isn't a huge factor, and i like the idea of handheld, but anything less expensive you'd recommend? and also how exactly would you us this to set gain? I feel really dumb asking i'm sure i could figure out, just not something i've done or spent the extra money on to do.

[bose301s 1]

Basically set the HU at the max volume and bass settings you would use it at, play a ~50hz sine wave and hook up the o-scope to the output. Adjust the gain so it looks like a pure sine wave:

If you get a readout like this you are clipping, turn the gain down until it looks normal.

Edited February 19, 2008 by bose301s

[shizzzon 461]

i remember the clipped graph, haha, o do i remember.

When i first got mine, i hooked it up to this 2 channel amp powering my rear speakers. I had already went through 3 pairs of 6x9s in 1 year. I hooked that thing up playing test tones through it and every single frequency except for the lowest ones right around the x-over point was clipping.

So i fixed all that, never had a damaged speaker since and it even sounded better... strange?

[bose301s 1]

i remember the clipped graph, haha, o do i remember.

When i first got mine, i hooked it up to this 2 channel amp powering my rear speakers. I had already went through 3 pairs of 6x9s in 1 year. I hooked that thing up playing test tones through it and every single frequency except for the lowest ones right around the x-over point was clipping.

So i fixed all that, never had a damaged speaker since and it even sounded better... strange?

Lol, not at all strange, totally as expected.

[mjmarovi 8]

ok pretty simple, will def. get an o-scope in near future thanks for all info guys!