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Updated February 20, 2006

ScienceMan Neat Idea - WavePort Sound Analysis

You don't have to whistle right into the built-in mic like this student is doing, an external computer microphone will work as well.

The software is very easy to use - it consists of two screens, the first being the "SoundAnalyzer" screen. To use it, simply click on the microphone and analysis begins, capturing whatever sound you are making. Clicking on the microphone again freeezes the waveform you have on screen, and it can be saved by clicking the icon in the top right hand corner.

The scales are adjustable simply by clicking and dragging. Super easy! Note that the lower part of the display provides a bar graph of the frequencies present in the sound. This is wonderful for illustrating the harmonics present in someone's voice or in a particular musical instrument.

Students have loads of fun with this SoundAnalyzer, but my preference is for the SoundCreator screen. The SoundCreator lets you generate sounds... it defaults to a single waveform, but you can double click on the screen to configure it to more waveforms. Note below that I have two waveforms - you can adjust the wavelength and amplitude of each simply by clicking and dragging.

Note that the two slightly different frequencies above do a great job of illustrating areas of constructive and destructive interference, as well as the "beats". Remember, this actually generates the sound through the computer speakers, so students get to hear the sounds representative of the wavelengths they have put up on the screen! Very cool stuff, very easy to use... ScienceMan highly recommends it!

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