how much Dynamic Range audible in your environment? I was shocked...

[flz]

So I did this online test (linked below - free & no registration required). I did it in my normal listening room where street traffic is audible. It was difficult but still possible for me to hear 48 dB of range but at 54 dB, I was totally guessing. The implications on if I can hear a difference in better measuring equipment in my actual listening room is sobering. A DAC with a SINAD of 120 (or 110 or even 100 or even lower) may be totally wasted on me.

Blind testing a 54 dB Dynamic Range (audiocheck.net)

 

[abdo123]

This is frequency dependent. I’m sure at and above 1Khz you have at least 100 dB of dynamic range or your room really (painfully) sucks.

 

[solderdude]

So I did this online test (linked below - free & no registration required). I did it in my normal listening room where street traffic is audible. It was difficult but still possible for me to hear 48 dB of range but at 54 dB, I was totally guessing. The implications on if I can hear a difference in better measuring equipment in my actual listening room is sobering. A DAC with a SINAD of 120 (or 110 or even 100 or even lower) may be totally wasted on me.

Blind testing a 54 dB Dynamic Range (audiocheck.net)

72dB for me... but using music I also reached the same conclusion about 30 years ago.

 

[beefkabob]

The Ayre Codex sounded horrible to me, and that was at 68db of SINAD. I don't know what technically I was hearing, but it just sounded dull. With a Rogue tube amp, which probably had a SINAD of around 68, I struggled to make out some lyrics of songs I knew well. Was it the distortion? The noise floor? The whatchaamacallit? I dunno. I just know that if the distortion and other noise gets high enough, the music sounds bad to me.

Also, I heard these before I saw or even knew of measurements.

 

[Blumlein 88]

Yeah frequency dependent as mentioned. And I've done various things like bury obnoxious tones at various levels among music. I came to similar conclusions as solderdude something in the mid 70's is about it unless I boost volume to something ear damaging. I posted those tones I think here a few years back and let others try. 70's or so was the most common answer.

I've always been struck by the image of something I read. You are standing a few dozen feet from a 747 ramping engines up to takeoff, and you can hear a leaf fluttering to the ground behind you at the same time. Think about that. That is about 120 db dynamic range. You can hear the engine, and in the right conditions you can hear the leaf. One in the midst of the other is ridiculous.

 

[TheBatsEar]

I also reached the same conclusion about 15 years ago.

Why didn't you tell anyone, could have saved hundreds of man years?

62dB here right now, but it's busy right now, hope i can do better later.

 

[solderdude]

Why didn't you tell anyone

30 years ago there was no internet.

About 30 years ago I wanted to know about dynamic range and built this attenuator which can be set to -120dB, see picture below.


Reason for building it was the talk of the ‘limited’ dynamic range of the, then still rather new, CD technology which was said to be poor.
I wanted to find out about my own audible limits for dB levels for myself.

 

[okaudio]

I'll have to try this. My guess is in the 50-60db range later on at night.

 

[Steve Rogers]

48 on second system with adam monitors. cheap dac and some hearing loss + birds chirping away outside, its a great site BTW

 

[MattHooper]

So I did this online test (linked below - free & no registration required). I did it in my normal listening room where street traffic is audible. It was difficult but still possible for me to hear 48 dB of range but at 54 dB, I was totally guessing. The implications on if I can hear a difference in better measuring equipment in my actual listening room is sobering. A DAC with a SINAD of 120 (or 110 or even 100 or even lower) may be totally wasted on me.

Blind testing a 54 dB Dynamic Range (audiocheck.net)

Yep. This is why I don't obsess about the last bits of dynamic range (including differences between vinyl and theoretical digital dynamic range), or low "noise" floors and all that.

I'm interested in changes I can actaully here in real world listening.

 

[Dj7675]

So I did this online test (linked below - free & no registration required). I did it in my normal listening room where street traffic is audible. It was difficult but still possible for me to hear 48 dB of range but at 54 dB, I was totally guessing. The implications on if I can hear a difference in better measuring equipment in my actual listening room is sobering. A DAC with a SINAD of 120 (or 110 or even 100 or even lower) may be totally wasted on me.

Blind testing a 54 dB Dynamic Range (audiocheck.net)

I find the article by @amirm to be very informative on this..

Dynamic Range: How Quiet is Quiet?

Dynamic Range: How Quiet is Quiet? By Amir Majidimehr [Note: This article was originally published in the Widescreen Review Magazine] Most people think of dynamic range as how loud something is. Mathematically though, dynamic range is a ratio. It is the loudest signal divided by “root mean...

www.audiosciencereview.com

 

[RandomEar]

Yep. This is why I don't obsess about the last bits of dynamic range (including differences between vinyl and theoretical digital dynamic range), or low "noise" floors and all that.

I'm interested in changes I can actaully here in real world listening.

Agree mostly, but "low noise floor" is actually very important to me, as in my near field listening setup that leads to the most relevant audible defect of the system: Tweeter hiss. It's just annoying and fairly easy to eliminate, but you do need low noise/high DR devices in the audio chain to get rid of it.

 

[Walter]

66, but it didn't change with aircon on, which raises my noise floor by 20+ db, so I have doubts about the usefulness of this test.

 

[tvih]

I listen at such relatively low volumes that huge dynamic range etc. is indeed mainly wasted even if there isn't any ambient noise, which there of course is - according to REW + Umik-1, about 36 dB(A) or 42 dB(C) right now. My listening listening level is generally max 85 dB at the peaks (often much less), and thus usually somewhere around 60 dB(C) or less average. Suffice to say at that normal listening volume I can't hear the noise even in the 42 dB dynamic range test. 36 dB I can hear just barely, knowing what to listen for - though should be a bit easier if I turn off my computer as it has started to make more fan noise than it used to for some reason. It used to be effectively completely silent at idle, but now it's easily audible even from the opposite side of the room, and my listening position is only half the room length away. Need to get it to be silent again.

 

[Blumlein 88]

I listen at such relatively low volumes that huge dynamic range etc. is indeed mainly wasted even if there isn't any ambient noise, which there of course is - according to REW + Umik-1, about 36 dB(A) or 42 dB(C) right now. My listening listening level is generally max 85 dB at the peaks (often much less), and thus usually somewhere around 60 dB(C) or less average. Suffice to say at that normal listening volume I can't hear the noise even in the 42 dB dynamic range test. 36 dB I can hear just barely, knowing what to listen for - though should be a bit easier if I turn off my computer as it has started to make more fan noise than it used to for some reason. It used to be effectively completely silent at idle, but now it's easily audible even from the opposite side of the room, and my listening position is only half the room length away. Need to get it to be silent again.

Replace the fans with some of the Noctua brand fans. They are the quietest I'm aware of and not too expensive. Be Quiet Silent Wing fans are considered almost as good, but I've not heard any of them.

 

[MattJ]

Optimally, ie; no dishwasher/clothes dryer/refrigerator/HVAC/neighbor's lawn mower etc running, I get about 73dB range. With any of the previous, it's more like 45-50dB. Although a lot of the music I listen to may only have a 10-20dB range, so.......

 

[AnalogSteph]

though should be a bit easier if I turn off my computer as it has started to make more fan noise than it used to for some reason. It used to be effectively completely silent at idle, but now it's easily audible even from the opposite side of the room, and my listening position is only half the room length away. Need to get it to be silent again.

The most likely culprits:
1. Dust buildup. Smoking environments are particularly nasty. Pay particular attention to the areas between fans and heatsinks as well as dust filters.
2. Bad fan bearings. Sleeve bearing fans just do not hold up when operated in a horizontal position.
3. Thermal paste that has dried out and gone hard as a rock.
4. Rogue software that is putting load on the system.

Some of the most useful Windows tools for diagnosing such issues are HWMonitor and the trusty Task Manager (once you have exited the factory default Dumb User Mode).

 

[Sgt. Ear Ache]

So I did this online test (linked below - free & no registration required). I did it in my normal listening room where street traffic is audible. It was difficult but still possible for me to hear 48 dB of range but at 54 dB, I was totally guessing. The implications on if I can hear a difference in better measuring equipment in my actual listening room is sobering. A DAC with a SINAD of 120 (or 110 or even 100 or even lower) may be totally wasted on me.

Blind testing a 54 dB Dynamic Range (audiocheck.net)

Dacs with SINAD of 120 or 110 are "totally wasted" on any human being. The audibility thresholds for this stuff are reasonably well-understood. If your system is giving you 80 or 90dbs of clean range you are good to go. Dacs (and amps really) are essentially solved problems. Once you have basically perfect performance in an audible sense at even the very low end of the price range you have to look for some other way to distinguish one item from another. If I'm looking for a DAC, and I have five to choose from in my price range and they all have the features I need and they all seem to be pretty well put together and they all meet my desires as far as design style...well then if one of them happens to have 120db sinad while the others are all 110db I might as well go for the 120db one. I won't hear any difference but whatever right?

 

[mdsimon2]

Dacs with SINAD of 120 or 110 are "totally wasted" on any human being. The audibility thresholds for this stuff are reasonably well-understood. If your system is giving you 80 or 90dbs of clean range you are good to go. Dacs (and amps really) are essentially solved problems. Once you have basically perfect performance in an audible sense at even the very low end of the price range you have to look for some other way to distinguish one item from another. If I'm looking for a DAC, and I have five to choose from in my price range and they all have the features I need and they all seem to be pretty well put together and they all meet my desires as far as design style...well then if one of them happens to have 120db sinad while the others are all 110db I might as well go for the 120db one. I won't hear any difference but whatever right?

As mentioned previously by @RandomEar DACs with decent dynamic range (I'll define that as > 110 dB at 2 V output) are very important if you care about tweeter hiss and use digital volume control. It's not very difficult to hear tweeter hiss with a ~100 dB dynamic range at 2 V output even when using relatively low noise Hypex amplifiers if you have a decently sensitive (~90 dB @ 2.83 V) unpadded tweeter.

As you mention this level of performance is easy to come by these days and I agree that features / design are far more important than SINAD bragging rights, just pointing out that there are quite audible reasons for choosing a DAC with decent dynamic range.

Michael

 

[Sgt. Ear Ache]

As mentioned previously by @RandomEar DACs with decent dynamic range (I'll define that as > 110 dB at 2 V output) are very important if you care about tweeter hiss and use digital volume control. It's not very difficult to hear tweeter hiss with a ~100 dB dynamic range at 2 V output even when using relatively low noise Hypex amplifiers if you have a decently sensitive (~90 dB @ 2.83 V) unpadded tweeter.

As you mention this level of performance is easy to come by these days and I agree that features / design are far more important than SINAD bragging rights, just pointing out that there are quite audible reasons for choosing a DAC with decent dynamic range.

Michael

you're saying you can hear tweeter hiss while music is playing when you have anything under 110db sinad? (for myself, as a general rule I would work to eliminate any tweeter hiss anyway)