My name is Alfredo Accattatis; I love electronics and
software, and I have been working for years in commercial companies as
software/firmware engineer and software designer. I've been writing programs for
embedded systems (with DSP and MICROCONTROLLERS), for PC, for Avionic Computers
and even for Mainframes, using C, C++, Pascal, Ada, REXX and assembly. I
starting write VA
during my free time just for fun and using (also) my DSP experience. The program
was and is completely FREE.
I've been collaborating with the University of Rome "Tor
Vergata" from 2006 in the "Signal and image Measurements and Processing"
group, as
Ph.D. student; for furthers information see:
A special thanks to the Professor Roberto Lojacono and
Marcello Salmeri (see simplify web site above) for appreciating my
qualities and let me collaborate with them!
Then, I began also to collaborate with the
professor Giovanni Saggio, which is the founder of the IGS-group and
thanks to him I've been able to further improve VA at a very very incredible level
(introducing the ZRLC meter, for example); he adopt VA
as basic instrument for the measurements on his electronic glove and more. for furthers
information:
Many people do not have the money to buy an expensive
Oscilloscope or a Spectrum Analyzer. Or simply they do not want to invest money
for something they will use rarely. Nevertheless many people love to build and
test audio amplifiers or other kinds of simple circuits (oscillators, filters,
etc); or simply they need monitoring some particular signal (an output of a
sensor), and are only interested in the range of audio frequencies . A lot of
musicians, for example, need a spectrum analyzer with an octave band analysis
tool embedded.
So, a good soundcard could be all the hardware they need.
Together with their PC, that is, a lot of hardware already available at no cost.
A recent soundcard with a sampling frequency of 96 or even 192 Khz will allows
to manage signals with frequencies up to 96Khz ( well beyond the audio
frequencies) transforming VA in a powerful set of instruments for general
electronics and other applications. VA is useful anywhere you need a true
oscilloscope, spectrum analyzer, frequency meter, voltmeter, function generator
and even a distorsiometer (THD, THD+n). For example when tuning a class B
power amplifier: you need a spectrum analyzer (or a THD meter) to minimize the
crossover distortion. Now introduced a powerful ZRLC meter.
The idea of using the soundcard of a PC is not a new one (there are many of
programs like VA) but I tried to write a program specifically made for the
analysis of audio circuits for the electronics hobbyist. I think VA is probably
less "extravagant" than other (i.e. less windows and frills) but full of
substance and even a lot of original ideas.
VA is a software "under construction", and in continuous
evolution. Thanks to the feedback of a lot of people all over the world, and ...
why not...my pure passion!
The future
A lot of considerations made during all
the years I spent to improve and fix VA, take me to the crucial decision of
NOT create a commercial version of VA. Or, in other words, to continue improving
VA only for free. A lot of new functions and bug has been fixed starting with the
10.0 version of VA, that likely could have been the first commercial release. So,
please continue using VA and thank you for encouraging me with your feedback and
- sometime - your donations.
Latest VA reviews, articles:
Send an e-mail to
alfredo[at]accattatis.org for questions and/or suggestions about the web
site. The webmaster is Alfredo Accattatis.
Last modified:
28-mar-2014