cable test equip.
 

I dug this thing out the other day I forgot I had. It came from a cable tv system. Is it for testing levels?? The one knob that is unmarked is attached to an allen Bradley pot that is wired to nothing at all.

Looks like a field strength meter to me. It's important on a cable system to maintain levels from channel to channel at the same level.

Whether or not they actually accomplish that is another question... Getting audio levels consistent is another thing they can never seem to get done either...

Whatever rf you send it say channel 3. You set it to channel 3 and it outputs channel 3. The buttons apparently are attenuators. The gain didn't seem to do much. And neither did the meter. Hunk of junk is what it is! They keep a close watch on levels now days. Not the volume of audio though. They could care less. If they crank the modulators too much you end up crashing the network (internet). And they really didn't seem to care when I pointed out the horrible compression on the digital channels. Actually I pointed out lot's of problems they didn't care to hear. :-) Oh well their loss.

There is a lot of blame to go around but when it comes to audio levels and compression it's not always the cable systems fault some of the blame goes to the channels they don't have a audio standard and they over compress. There are systems that care. How can they fix something that's bad when it's received at the headend.

I agree. I suppose they could tell the network fix it or else. But then again it you want "The popularity" channel you would do anything to have it on your system. Especially when it's packaged with 6 other really popular networks and they have you where they want you.