Shouldn't we upgrade the 20-20 audible range ?!

[lashto]

Is the juice (of expanding the "standard" beyond 20-20k) worth the squeeze? I think not; I think there are enough "10 dB" problems (perceptually if not literally) remaining in between a good live music experience and a good playback experience that the costs of solving what is basically a "1 dB" problem would be an inefficient use of resources, regardless of how impressive it looks on paper.

If the issue of cost-effective use of resources didn't exist, would it still be a good idea? My instinct is "yes", but that may be incorrect! Apparently there is a real-world downside: Increased noise. See what @Digital Mastering System has to say on the subject:

you are of course right, it is surely not a "10 dB problem" right now. But I would still like to know that someone, somewhere is working on it.
And thanks for the link.

 

[lashto]

you actually listening to the audiophile autism inside your head.

that is a bit outside of my 20-20 range for insults.

I know that I am challenging a strong goup-consensus with this thread ... and I am aware that quite a bit of 'noise' is to be expected.
But maybe we can keep it a bit more civil. And if you do not like this thread, I am sure there are 1000 others who can use your insights.

 

[SIY]

almost any modern car can do 100mph. Not only not needed for 99% of the people 99% of the time, but also illegal/forbidden almost everywhere. Is that your example of a "rational push for speed" done by car people?

I thought you may reply with something like "it does not happen in audio because the audio people are more rational" .. at least, that would've been a good joke

Always good to complement an inapt analogy with a worse one.

 

[Killingbeans]

Extra cooling costs in the summer and higher risk of skin cancer and cataracts from the direct UV.

(Unless you wear sunscreen and good sunglasses when watching TV).

Yeah, and if we also go all in on dynamic range, you'd risk going blind as well... assuming the radiation doesn't melt your face off first

 

[pablolie]

thanks for those. I actually asked for Music. Say, full orchestra recorded at least 5-50

And did you or anyone test that those HPs actually work to 40kHz?
DACs are ~fine .. or better said, have the smallest issues.

...

You can't take stances on both sides of an argument and first claim something doesn't exist, and upon being proven wrong claim it's not up to further standards you didn't define.

To answer your question, the headphones are from a respected, successful brand that would gain zero from posting misguiding specs. Furthermore, as mentioned, that extension beyond 20hz or 20khz is utterly immaterial to my purchasing decisions, so the burden of proof is on you and not me. I can confidently claim I listen everyday to a system with performance parameters you claimed no one caters to in audio. Do go get the same stuff and check how much it changes your music listening enjoyment.

I know we're giving you a hard time, but that simply highlights the fact ASR implicitly focuses on what humans, even golden eared ones, can hear based on very extensive scientific consensus.

Maybe there's room out there for an "Ultrasonic Experience Review" or "Test Tones for Bats"...

PS... I know my gear extends beyond what I can hear (22hz to 17.5khz) because my cat does react to test tones I can't hear.

 

[Killingbeans]

did you at least open any of the hundreds of infra/ultra-sound studies I linked?

Does a single one of them show an SPL needed for detectability that doesn't skyrocket past 12kHz?

I really, really don't care about studies showing how ultrasonic test tones can be detected at high SPL. We all know that's possible.

Show me a single reliable study that points to ultrasonics being beneficial to the experience of reproduced music, and then we can talk.

'Suprinsigly' similar to audio: infrasounds have all sorts of healthy applications and ultrasounds not so much (mostly the opposite)

Get yourself a rotary sub and go nuts

Maybe a warped vinyl played with no rumble filter will work well as the source.

Moving the goalpost to therapy/medical applications doesn't change the pointlessness of infra/ultrasound in audio reproduction.

 

[ahofer]

almost any modern car can do 100mph. Not only not needed for 99% of the people 99% of the time, but also illegal/forbidden almost everywhere. Is that your example of a "rational push for speed" done by car people?

But they actually do move at higher speed and can tell. Listeners can't discern the ultrasound information in music.

A better analogy might be to ask why speedometers go beyond maximum vehicle speed. But you don't see car makers competing on that.

 

[MRC01]

Apologies if I wasn't clear. I was wondering whether someone with no hearing > 10kHz could reconstruct upper harmonics between 10kHz-20kHz from the fundamental. I am certainly not suggesting that we can reconstruct a 40kHz harmonic.

I don't think this would be possible - it is asymmetric. The process is not reversible because harmonics are always integer multiples of the fundamental, and their amplitudes are highly variable depending on the source. If you hear all the harmonics without the fundamental, the fundamental must always be 1/2 the lowest of the harmonic frequencies. This is true for most natural sounds from a drum to a flute to a chain saw to pretty much anything. But if you hear only the fundamental, the harmonics could be anything or nothing. There is no harmonic that must always necessarily exist, no general pattern for your brain/perception to learn from experience and follow.

We've discussed before here at ASR the fact that when detecting sounds near the upper range of one's hearing, the max perceivable frequency is sometimes easier to detect by listening to the crispness of transients, rather than as pure tones. That is, as pure tones, one might be able to hear 15 kHz but not 16 kHz. But when listening to a high quality recording of castanets, jangling keys or similar content, that same person might be able to detect when it is low pass filtered at 16 kHz, slightly above what he can hear as a pure tone. I don't know why this happens. The ear is non-linear, so it could be biological/psychoacoustic based on how we perceive tones versus transients? Maybe something else?

 

[dwstudeman]

There was recently a thread/test about audible DAC/filter differences and 'everyone' expressed serious doubts that the tester was able to hear above 20kHz. So I did a short check to see if that is so rare/incredible. And surprise: it is not!

Ultrasound: Hearing thresholds for pure tones above 16kHz (includes a short metastudy and a test). Quick resume (see Table1):

• Test setup: 32 young ears tested, 19-25 years old. Max allowed/tested level ~100dB SPL.
• 29 of 32 heard 20 kHz .. some at the very low level of 66dB!
• 16 (50%) heard 24 kHz.
• 3 (9%) heard 28 kHz.

Infrasound: Hearing at Low and Infrasonic Frequencies (pretty large metastudy). Quick resume (see Table3): if we keep the same 100dB limit, the infrasound audible threashold is actually ~8Hz.

Quick & clear conclusion: the audible range is actually 8Hz - 28kHz (at the fairly ok level of 100dB).

But ASR measures distortion/etc at 114dB and at that level the infrasound threshold is 4-5Hz. No data for ultrasound but probably fair to assume some extra kHz. And if we do a bit of rounding-up like good engineers do (to make sure that we cover everything), the range becomes 3Hz-30kHz. That sounds like the absolute bare minimum to me!

And maybe we can stop building devices like shrewd salesmen (i.e. barely cover the minimum required). And start building them like good engineers (i.e. clean to double the specs, just to be sure). In that case, we should have audio devices and recordings that are 100% clean between ~1Hz and ~60kHz.

And if someone thinks that 3-30 or 1-60 are "too much" or "unnecessary", here are two examples from other fields/senses:
- vision. For a long time and based on various studies, the 'consensus' was that ~150-200 PPI resolution was "more than enough for everyone". But ~10 years ago, Apple came up with retina-screens at 300 PPI and declared it to be the absolute minimum required. After a bit of 'controversy', nowadays we have smartphones at 500+ PPI.
- touch. In the gaming community the mouse sensitivity/speed is very important and (again) for a long time it was considered that ~2000 DPI is "more than enough for everyone". Another round of 'controversy' and nowadays professional gamer mice are at 10000+ DPI and pretty much any consumer one is at 2000+ too.

So, why are we in the audio world supossed to be happy with that seriously truncated 20-20 audible range?!

You never stated what transducer reproduced the 28 Khz and it's anecdotal since we do not know what the lower harmonic distortion is of that transducer. You are likely hearing lower harmonic distortion from the preamp, amplifier, transducer or all three within the audible range. It takes a lot of good engineering to even make an amp linear to 20Khz since it does not double as an RF amp. This is one of the reasons why obscenely high sampling rates could harm the sound if there was anything other than high frequency noise up there. Musical instruments do not go that high and even if they did, any lower harmonics would have been captured by the microphone under 20Khz if they existed in the first place.

If you were to measure what reached your ears with a calibrated mic and analyzer, you would most certainly measure tones within the audible range. No human in over 100 years of testing has ever had cilia in the ears that can respond over 20khz. It's not sensed either as skin tissue absorption would completely dampen it. If you wish to be sure, cats have much better hearing so go ask a cat.

Bringing eyes into it is another thing entirely.

When I was 18 we hooked a signal generator to a 12" woofer and put 22khz into it, I naively thought I was hearing 22Khz but there is no way that woofer could produce that. I was hearing distortion in the audible range. A calibrated mic and analyzer could prove what is actually reaching the ears.

Just to humor a bit, what is it that you would expect to hear even if you could? Cutting off at 15 Khz because of the 19 Khz pilot signal never hurt FM one iota musically. Overmodulating the broadcast to make it sound louder (distorted) DOES hurt the sound.

 

[Timcognito]

Above 20 KHz is pure frivolity. It is nice to see DSP and PEQ going into devices, something that makes a profound difference. Also stacking magnets forcing and securing N to N and S to S chains in speakers leading to greater linearity and less over shoot. Not sure if many caught that in Andrew Jones latest video on the new MF speaker. Real tech leading to audible sound improvement is what we need and want.

 

[dwstudeman]

that is a bit outside of my 20-20 range for insults.

I know that I am challenging a strong goup-consensus with this thread ... and I am aware that quite a bit of 'noise' is to be expected.
But maybe we can keep it a bit more civil. And if you do not like this thread, I am sure there are 1000 others who can use your insights.

Once again, if you did not measure what the ears are hearing with a calibrated mic and analyzer you have no way of knowing how much lower harmonics are in the audible range unless some of the young were the result of a cat/human genetic splicing operation.

 

[pablolie]

Once again, if you did not measure what the ears are hearing with a calibrated mic and analyzer you have no way of knowing how much lower harmonics are in the audible range unless some of the young were the result of a cat/human genetic splicing operation.

Indeed once you get into bio enhancements it is a different discussion. Theoretical mostly, although I recall reading about experiments that allowed deaf people to hear stuff. With visuals, we know about stuff like night goggles and such... but their principle is different inasmuch that they translate what we can't see into something within the range of our vision. In audio that would mean somehow presenting the 40kHz tone -for example- as a clearly hearable 10kHz or so. So different stuff.

 

[Killingbeans]

Also stacking magnets forcing and securing N to N and S to S chains in speakers leading to greater linearity and less over shoot.

Like a Halbach array?

 

[Timcognito]

Indeed once you get into bio enhancements it is a different discussion. Theoretical mostly, although I recall reading about experiments that allowed deaf people to hear stuff. With visuals, we know about stuff like night goggles and such... but their principle is different inasmuch that they translate what we can't see into something within the range of our vision. In audio that would mean somehow presenting the 40kHz tone -for example- as a clearly hearable 10kHz or so. So different stuff.

No hijack just a quick tangent. Watched this the other night and was glued to the "Set". My wife was less impressed, FWIW. Very well done. We often forget that the deaf are missing more than speech. Give it a little time as there is a story that emerges.

The Tuba Thieves | Documentary | Independent Lens

The experimental documentary The Tuba Thieves is about deaf storytelling and the very nature of sound and listening.

www.pbs.org

 

[Timcognito]

Like a Halbach array?

Similar but no tangential force. I got patent on a medical product used in a heart procedure that used the Halbach Array, so when Jones said that he was forcing them together my ears perked up. Never knew it was called the Halbach array.

 

[pablolie]

No hijack just a quick tangent. Watched this the other night and was glued to the "Set". My wife was less impressed, FWIW. Very well done. We often forget that the deaf are missing more than speech. Give it a little time as there is a story that emerges.

The Tuba Thieves | Documentary | Independent Lens

The experimental documentary The Tuba Thieves is about deaf storytelling and the very nature of sound and listening.

www.pbs.org

thank you - immediate priority in my watchlist.

 

[danadam]

Ultrasonic attenuation vs distance:

from:

Looking for music with meaningful ultrasonic content

For me, all music contains ultrasonics. For the rest of you, well... "Harmonics of muted trumpet extend to 80 kHz; violin and oboe, to above 40 kHz; and a cymbal crash was still strong at 100 kHz. In these particular examples, the proportion of energy above 20 kHz is, for the muted trumpet, 2...

www.audiosciencereview.com

All those people who can't get first row tickets to live events, why do they even bother /s

 

[MRC01]

Ultrasonic attenuation vs distance: ...

Yep, and many acoustic musicians know their own instruments sound different to themselves while they're playing, than it does to another musician sitting just a few feet away. And different further to the first row of the audience. The close sound is brighter with more "zing". When selecting an instrument, don't always pick the one that sounds best to you while you are playing it, but bring a friend whose opinion you trust to listen from at least 10 feet away.

 

[pablolie]

...

All those people who can't get first row tickets to live events, why do they even bother /s

I have always beemnthe first to say that I have no idea why so many seem to hold the live performance thing banner as the platinum truth of fidelity.

I like live concerts DESPITE the fact the acoustics are often abysmal. Sometimes because of seating, more often because of overdriven acoustics that the venue is too small for or such... doesn't matter where you sit in the latter case. But I go because of the experience.

 

[Ktacos]

When selecting an instrument, don't always pick the one that sounds best to you while you are playing it, but bring a friend whose opinion you trust to listen from at least 10 feet away.

yes, pick it based on how others hear, not how you hear it.

Seems like a terrible idea lol.