superpositioned.com is a new site that I found through one of my readers Tom the Wombat. I am very impressed with his work as a DIY site, and I find myself reading it almost every day. I really encourage you to go check out his stuff. Anyway, a function generator is a must for any project. Tom has written an article on using a sound card as a function generator. He has a Linux machine and used the program SigGen as a function generator.
He said that it would generate Sine waves, Square waves, sawtooth waves, as well as triangle, and pulse waves. He found that it was not a perfect solution because it only had a maximum frequency of around 24 kHz. His sound blaster live was only able to deliver 4 volts, and it was only generating 0.16mA, with 0.6mW maximum power output. This is not a really big deal because an external amplifier can be used. I do worry about the possibility of ruining your sound card, but doubt that it is much of an issue. If anyone knows of any dangers with this then let me know.
He also found a program for windows based machines called Digital Signal Generator.
Go check out Superpositioned’s article here
Go help him out by digging his story.
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