I was trying to isolate and troubleshoot a chirping/ringing artifact I was hearing in bass-heavy audio (turns out it was from a probably-faulty DAC), and in the process I used a tone generator to generate low frequency sine waves all the way down to 1Hz. Obviously at the lowest end the tone was inaudible, but if I turned up the headphone amp loud enough I could hear electrical chatter which varied as I changed the frequency. Every time I moved things into the audible realm I was lowering the amp volume so as not to damage the headphones or blow out my ears. In hindsight, I'm wondering if there could have been any consequences to my curiosity. So my question is:
Can very low frequency sine waves damage equipment other than speakers if played at high volumes? When I google this, all anyone is ever talking about is speakers. I already understand that speaker coils can be damaged by sustained, high volume sine waves, but I'm asking about everything upstream of the speakers, such as headphone amps.
Can very low frequency sine waves damage equipment other than speakers if played at high volumes? When I google this, all anyone is ever talking about is speakers. I already understand that speaker coils can be damaged by sustained, high volume sine waves, but I'm asking about everything upstream of the speakers, such as headphone amps.