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Re: [ST] db's and ears (was "Offroad exhaust" tune?)



We could discuss the virtues of various earplugs, earbud speakers,
in-helmet speakers etc., etc., until the cows come home, but as soon as
2-way communication enters the picture the main problem comes down to
this:

How do you isolate the microphone from engine/wind noise?  Once that
noise gets into the system it is very difficult to exorcise.

Some of the most expensive 2-way communication systems address this
issue with fairly sophisticated electronics and noise-cancelling
microphones.  Throat microphones are a step in the right direction, but
there are problems with acoustic coupling to the throat (and keeping it
in the right position on the throat), keeping it out of the direct wind
blast (yes they are sensitive to that as well), and the fact that these
transducers are not very efficient, nor are they what most would call
'hi-fi' devices.  Expense was also an issue until the fairly recent
arrival of cheaper Asian knock-offs.  I have a pair of throat
microphones and can attest to this.

Interaural mics are an interesting option, but I suspect that the two
biggest problems are going to be cost and fidelity.

Who knows, maybe there are cheap Asian versions of these transducers,
but so far, no one has been able to identify an actual manufacturer.
For obvious reasons, companies such as CavCom, are not likely to divulge
the source for their in-ear transducers.  And as Blake pointed out, the
fidelity of the raw transducer would appear to be in question.  I note
that CavCom seems to have gone to quite a bit of trouble to engineer a
'control unit' that works with the ear set.  They say it's for noise
filtering, side tone and controls ear volume, but I would suggest that
this means that the device is also inefficient (hence the amplifier),
and probably requires frequency compensation to help improve speech
clarity.

I would dearly love to be proven wrong on this, but I'd be willing to
bet that these factors will prevent the interaural mic solution from
being available to more than those of us that have money to burn.
Unfortunately I'm not one of them.

Neil

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Blake Sobiloff" <sobiloff@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <ST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, February 09, 2006 10:54 AM
Subject: Re: [ST] db's and ears (was "Offroad exhaust" tune?)


> On Feb 9, 2006, at 8:24 AM, John Ulizzi wrote:
> > I believe the solution to the problem is two fold: 1) Earbud
> > speakers built into form fitting earplugs that specifically fit
> > YOUR ear. These do exist, there were at least two companies selling
> > them at the show, and   2) a setup with an interaural microphone,
> > which I have not yet found.
>
> There is a headset for general aviation use that work on this
> principle. However, the review I read of them said that performance
> was poor, especially in being able to understand the speech of the
> wearer. (I'd give you the link to the review in Aviation Consumer
> magazine, but the website is down right now and I think you have to
> be a subscriber to read the review anyways.) Unfortunately I can't
> remember the name of the company that produced the headset, but I'll
> post the name if the Aviation Consumer website comes back up.
> --
> Blake Sobiloff <sobiloff@xxxxxxxxx>
> <http://sobiloff.typepad.com/>
> San Jose, CA  (USA)
>
>
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