Also, please make sure to push the plug in all the way, otherwise it is not making proper contact with the output port connectors.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
Light, Sound and Weather Meters
FAQ – Light Meter eL200K
The ennoLogic light meter is NOT for photography. It does NOT provide a way for you to determine the proper exposure for a photo. Its purpose is to show you light intensity in lux or foot candles at any given location.
The light meter turns itself off after 5 minutes of inactivity. You can disable this feature by holding the “Units” button down while turning the unit on. You will see the Power Symbol appear on the LCD, indicating that the auto-power-off feature is disabled.
The “DC” and “AC” Output ports provide an analog signal that can be used to record the measured light level signal with a data logger (200,000 lux = 3300mV). A short adapter cable that ends in two bare wires is included for that purpose.
This port provides an alternate way to power the instrument. To use it you will need a USB A-Male to Mini-B cable to power the unit from a USB power adapter. The cable and power adapter are not included with the light meter.
FAQ – Decibel Meter eS528L
There is an error in version 1.1 of the user manual. The pinout diagram for the 3.5mm plug is incorrect. Version 1.2 of the manual available for download on our website shows the correct pinout. Sorry for the confusion!
In this case, the software is not able to communicate with the sound level meter through the USB port. First, we have to make sure the software has detected the sound level meter and added it to its list of known devices. Launch the software first, without the meter connected to the USB port. After the software is running, connect the meter. A few seconds later, the software should pop up with a message saying that it detected a new device, click “OK”, give it a name, and click “Add”:
If you don’t see it pop up with this message, disconnect and reconnect the device from the USB port again, or disconnect, close and restart the software and then plug in the device again. It should detect that a device was plugged in and then let you add it.
Now the device shows up in the window on the left, under “Data Logger”. Before you click the “Device Settings” button, you must click on the device name to highlight it. This is a step that is not intuitive, especially when the list of devices contains only one device, your sound level meter. After you click on the device name to highlight it (see screenshot below), start the setup as you did before by clicking the setup icon (the blue and white gear wheel):
If you still get the Setting Failed message, try a different USB port. On some computers, only the USB port that you initially plugged the device into works, and it has trouble connecting to it when a different port is used. But usually this should not be an issue. If no USB port works, check if the USB driver was installed correctly (see the next FAQ).
Check if Windows has properly initialized the sound level meter and installed the correct USB driver. In Windows 10, that driver is C:\Windows\System32\drivers\usbser.sys, which is a driver that comes with Windows 10 (not with the sound level meter software). If the sound meter is properly recognized, you should see it show up as a serial port in Device manager:
(If you are unfamiliar with “Device Manager”, here is how you access it in Windows 10: Click the Windows Start button, then click on “Settings” and start typing “Device Manager” in the search box. Windows will suggest “Device Manager” above the search box, click on it to launch the app.):
If you see an exclamation mark next to the device entry under “Ports”, then the driver has not been installed correctly. Try installing it manually by right-clicking on the device name inside Device Manager and selecting “Update driver” in the popup menu. Then browse and select C:\Windows\System32\drivers\usbser.sys as the driver for this device.
If your computer is not running Windows 10: If you are running an older version of Windows, download the following driver and install it separately: https://ennologic.com/downloads/USBBridgeSetup_CA.zip. Unzip the downloaded file, then double click on USBBridgeSetup_CA.exe to run the installer. When asked to select the product type, choose “USB to UART Bridge” and click “Next”. Choose an installation directory (the default provided is usually fine), click “Next” and then “Install”. Click “Finish” to exit the setup. Plug in the sound level meter and check if the USB initialization succeeds. If Windows encounters a problem installing the “Holtek USB to UART Bridge” driver and says “A problem was encountered while attempting to add the driver to the store.”, you need to disable Driver Signature Verification Enforcement on your computer since this driver is not digitally signed. To do that, please follow the instructions in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71YAIw7_-kg. After you disabled driver signature enforcement, plug in the sound level meter again and this time the driver installation should succeed. Please note that these step should only be necessary in Windows versions other than Windows 10.
This may be the result of an issue we had with software version 2020.11.10.0942. Please uninstall this version, reboot your computer, and install version 20200.8.18.1031 which is available on our website (see screenshot below).
Data stored in the meter will be cleared when you set up the meter for a new recording session.
No, the data is stored in non-volatile memory, which means it will not lose its data when the 9V battery runs out or (if powered through its USB port) USB power is removed.
Make sure the noise level meter is powered on when you are downloading its data. If it’s connected but turned off, you may see the download process getting stuck at 0%.
1. Make sure the data logger name is highlighted in the device list on the left before pressing the Download button.
2. Make sure the data logger is turned on.
3. Make sure you use the USB cable that came with the product. There are many Micro USB cables used by other products that can only be used for charging and not for data communications.
4. Try using the same USB port that you used when setting up the data logger for the first time.
5. If you installed the software on your C: drive, make sure the version is the latest version of the main release (currently Version 2020.08.18.1031)
6. Launch Device Manager on your computer (Open Settings and search for Device Manager) and verify under “Ports (COM & LPT)” that the sound level meter is showing up as a “USB Serial Device (COMxx)”. If you’re using Windows 10, try updating the driver. If you’re using older versions of Windows, re-install the ““USB to UART Bridge” driver as explained in the software manual.
7. Uninstall the software, reboot your computer and reinstall it.
FAQ – Anemometer eA980R
Yes, the anemometer can be calibrated for all parameters. The instructions for that are included in the user manual. Some parameters, like barometric pressure, are pretty easy to calibrate, you just use a reliable online weather service that reports atmospheric pressure for your location. Temperature calibration will require you to have an accurate thermometer. Calibrating wind speed is more complicated, most of us don’t have access to a wind tunnel. Unless you have the equipment needed to calibrate wind speed, we recommend not changing the factory calibration for wind speed on your anemometer.
The eA980R anemometer does not measure absolute altitude, like a GPS device, but measures pressure altitude instead. Pressure altitude is used in aviation planning. It is a relative altitude measurement based on barometric pressure. Pressure altitude is defined as ‘the altitude above or below a theoretical 29.92 inHg standard datum plane.’ For every 1000 feet you go up in altitude there is a decrease of about 1 inHg. The barometer’s reading at a certain altitude compared to the 29.92 inHg standard pressure can be used to calculate pressure altitude: Pressure Altitude = (29.92 – Current Pressure) x 1,000 + Field Elevation, where field elevation is the elevation of the airport location.
The temperature sensor is located behind the little hole on the left, just below the impeller. You can decrease the response time by increasing the air flow through this hole, for instance by holding the anemometer into the wind or air flow, or by moving the anemometer back and forth. When air is continuously moving through the anemometer, the response time is about 30 seconds. Without air flow, the response is much slower (several minutes) because the temperature sensor is located inside the unit.
With the anemometer turned on, press and hold the “Set” button for about 2 seconds, until the backlight comes on.
The only batteries that will work for your anemometer are LIR2032 lithium batteries. Do NOT use CR2032 batteries (which are not lithium!) in the eA980R or it will NOT work. The LIR2032 provides a higher voltage than the CR2032. You can recharge LIR2032 batteries with a suitable charger that you can buy online.
