The Windup... And The Pitch

[filkertom]

Remember when we were talking about that high-pitched noise I can't hear? Well, some nice guy's got a page with MP3s of test tones at different frequencies, so you can find out where your hearing is on the high end. I've got to try these with headphones, but with my speakers I can just barely hear the 14,000 Khz one, and I mean barely. There's a

Comments

[solarbird]

The higher frequences on the first site are .WAVs, which don't have the rolloff issue.

[solarbird]

I can't hear 15hz at all, at least, not on these speakers.
Up through 19Khz are very clear, after it's really faint. But it seemed to change on different levels so I think I was hearing something other than the sample start/sample stop noises. ^_^ I could hear both the primary tone (really, really faintly) and a lower sample harmonic (it was louder to me than the primary tone) at 21K. At 22K, I don't think I heard or felt much of anything. Results for me were pretty similar across the two pages.

[solarbird]

I mean the character of the noise. I'm not 100% sure I was hearing the primary tone at anything above 19K. I was quite sure about the secondary harmonic on the 21K. I also have no idea whatsoever if my laptop even passes above 19K, so this is not exactly a controlled experiment. ^_^

(Apple G4 powerbook 12".)

[ludzu_alus]

I can barely hear 18hz.

[tropism]

A big problem with these is, as other mentioned, hardware problems. Most computer hardware's meant to reproduce tones between bout 50-15K KHz, you might get 20-20K with better hardware. Anything beyond those ranges is skiffy, and you might be hearing distortions instead of the actual tones.

[the_s_guy]

Hmm. At 33, and with my current speakers (a low-quality Creative 5.1 pack), I can hear those samples up to 17K, and sense something at 18K. There's also a very obvious and easily heard sound down to 20Hz, but I didn't register anything at all using the 15Hz sample. Whether this is a limitation of my computer or my ears, I'm not sure.

These tests will only give the worst-case limits of computer hardware and ears combined. People may well have hearing ranges beyond what their computers can reproduce, and unless there's someone else in the room who can clearly hear samples inaudible to others, the test would really need to be conducted with professional hearing-test equipment to get accurate results.