Thread: Can you hear this?

I've opened those mp3 in Cubase and took a look at the waveforms. They should be sinusoidal, but they were not. Which makes the test pretty questionable, because those distorted waveforms are made up of more than one frequency.

Furthermore such a test is very much volume dependent.
You should use equipment that is precise enough to reproduce sound in tight tolerances. A basic computer sound card won't do that. A high end audio interface, such as those used for (semi)professional music recording, will. Then listen to a test tone of 1000hz and adjust volume to "normal". Use good headphones and make sure you listen in a quiet environment.
If you're older than 10 and you can hear the 20000hz tone, something is definitely wrong with your equipment.
If you're older than 30 and you can't hear past the 16000hz tone with this kind of test, than you're a normal human being.

Here's a chart that shows typical male and female hearing loss with relation to age.

Please note that it only shows frequencies below 8000hz. That is because real hearing problems manifest themselves in this range. Not in frequencies above 8K.

At each octave, the frequency doubles. This means 400hz is exactly 1 octave higher than 200hz. It also means that from 10K till 20K fits... 1 octave. An octave that no instrument or voice is capable of reproducing. It only affect the "feel" of a sound. Even if we can't hear those frequencies, we can still perceive them as vibrations and be emotionally affected by them.

If someone experiences trouble to conduct a normal conversation in a group of people in a noisy environment (i.e. at a wedding reception), it's time to see a doctor and take a decent test.

Best regards,
Bart.

Well put Bart!

Those not privy to the desibel (dB) scale - it's a logarithmic scale: 3dB loss means loss of half of the power. 10dB means you are hearing one tenth of the strength. 20dB one hundreth, 30dB on thousandth, 40 one tenthousandth.
Decibel - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Those graphs look brutal - are you sure they're not calculated from wifes asking their husbands to do chores during a footiematch or while he's fiddling with razors?

My 8 year old hears at the 18 range and I dont hear until the 12 range.
This is through the built-in computer speakers though

Little Man claims to hear them all ( but he's a documented lair "no poo").
I conked out at 16 kHz proving my suspicions of hearing loss.

The damn volume knobs not working, I cant hear squat!

Originally Posted by nun2sharp

The damn volume knobs not working, I cant hear squat!

My sense of smell is fairly good!! Is that BS I smell??