Online hearing test and a tech question

[imperialbari]

A few TubeNetters have participated in a facebook discussion about high pitch hearing based on an online test available here:

http://theoatmeal.com/quizzes/sound/

Considering my age I didn’t expect to be able to hear a note considered being very high, but I actually heard it clearly without turning up my sound system.

I am curious about the actual frequency of that note, but I am not tech enough to know how to measure it. I am sure somebody has the software to do so and would like them telling me.

Klaus

[Carroll]

The tone most refer to is the "Mosquito Tone" used to drive teenagers away from store fronts while loitering. This tone is not the Mosquito Tone. It's about 14,250Khz, much lower than the Mosquito Tone, which is about 17.5Khz.

Most MP3 encoders have a cutoff at 16Khz, so while the format might technically be capable of going that high, I don't think you can actually generate such a file easily. You need WAV or a lossless codec.

So, if you can't hear the linked tone, if you're under 60, that likely means you have substantial hearing damage. 14Khz really isn't very high.

[scottw]

And what is the concert pitch of 14,250khz?

[imperialbari]

And what is the concert pitch of 14,250khz?

14250Hz divided by 32 is 445.3HZ - which is a slightly sharp tuning A. The original high note is 5 octaves higher than that.

Thanks for the measuring!

Klaus

[pgym]

And what is the concert pitch of 14,250khz?

14250Hz divided by 32 is 445.3HZ - which is slightly sharp tuning A. The original high note is 5 octaves higher than that.

Ah, but 14,250kHz is three orders of magnitude higher than 14250Hz.

For the record, 14250kHz is 20.27 cents flat of A19.

[Dan Schultz]

I can hear that sound just fine. But... my raging tinitus pretty much wipes out everything above 4khz. Can't hear some of the piccolo notes. But... who cares!

[imperialbari]

And what is the concert pitch of 14,250khz?

14250Hz divided by 32 is 445.3HZ - which is slightly sharp tuning A. The original high note is 5 octaves higher than that.

Ah, but 14,250kHz is three orders of magnitude higher than 14250Hz.

For the record, 14250kHz is 20.27 cents flat of A19.

I could enter a formalistic discussion about bad usage of , versus . in an international board representing different national practices. As I have heard the actual note, I wont.

Klaus

[swillafew]

http://hypertextbook.com/facts/2003/ChrisDAmbrose.shtml" target="_blank" target="_blank

Lots of research on the topic at this site. The pitch is near the 6th A above middle C. Hearing tests are not easy to administer, and I wouldn't concern myself with the results of anything given in an uncontrolled environment.

[Teubonium]

Couldn't hear it, but it drove my dogs nuts!!

[toobagrowl]

http://hypertextbook.com/facts/2003/ChrisDAmbrose.shtml

Very interesting link. I downloaded and listened to both the high and low sample tests. I plugged in my best headphones and listened to the samples several times each. According to those 2 samples, I can hear from roughly 11hz to 13500hz.
I am 30 yrs old. At least my low range hearing is good

[toobagrowl]

The tone most refer to is the "Mosquito Tone" used to drive teenagers away from store fronts while loitering. This tone is not the Mosquito Tone. It's about 14,250Khz, much lower than the Mosquito Tone, which is about 17.5Khz.

Most MP3 encoders have a cutoff at 16Khz, so while the format might technically be capable of going that high, I don't think you can actually generate such a file easily. You need WAV or a lossless codec.

So, if you can't hear the linked tone, if you're under 60, that likely means you have substantial hearing damage. 14Khz really isn't very high.

I can hear a "sound" but it's akin to the buzzing of a street lamp. Is that it? Or is there an actual tone? Maybe I just can't hear it

[imperialbari]

http://hypertextbook.com/facts/2003/ChrisDAmbrose.shtml

Lots of research on the topic at this site. The pitch is near the 6th A above middle C. Hearing tests are not easy to administer, and I wouldn't concern myself with the results of anything given in an uncontrolled environment.

Thanks for the link!

I am in total agreement that online tests are useless, if one wants a quantification of ones hearing at various frequency levels. However the ability to hear a given pitch in such test indicates that there is at least some hearing capacity left at that pitch level.

During my college years one of my music teachers arranged a course in lydformning, which may best translate into sound sculpturing. A lot of acoustic phenomenons were demonstrated and debated. My teacher was about the same age back then as I am now, and he couldn’t hear all samples played on the tape recorder, even if it was high tech for its period. However I remember one of his comments: When people are measured to have lost their hearing between 10KHz and 20KHz, they tend to cry that they have lost half their hearing range. NOT SO! They have lost one octave out of several.

Again thanks to Carroll for the measuring of the frequency. It must be about right, as it matches fairly close with my audible results of following swillafew’s link. However I do not agree with your considerations about the significance of the increments mentioned in your posting.

The frequency ratio between the mosquito tone (17.5KHz) and the test tone in my link (14.25KHz) is 1.228 which in musical contexts is an interval about midway between a major third and a minor third.

The frequency ratio between the MP3 cut-off (16KHz) and the test tone in my link (14.25KHz) is 1.123 which in musical contexts is an interval slightly larger than a whole step.

Klaus

[Rick Denney]

A standard test of old age hearing used to be the flyback frequency of typical televisions. In the U.S., the NTSC standard set the flyback frequency to 15.734 KHz. This was the frequency at which the electron beam in the television jumped back across the screen to begin the next scan.

When I was in my 20's, I could hear whether any television in the house was switched on. Now, I can't.

Rick "who doesn't know the old PAL-standard frequencies--something like 15.6 KHz" Denney

[MaryAnn]

Doesn't this flyback apply only to CRT televisions? It would seem that if one has an LCD or plasma TV, that something might be different. I don't know anything about the technology so I may be all wet.

MA

[pgym]

14250Hz divided by 32 is 445.3HZ - which is slightly sharp tuning A. The original high note is 5 octaves higher than that.

Ah, but 14,250kHz is three orders of magnitude higher than 14250Hz.

For the record, 14250kHz is 20.27 cents flat of A19.

I could enter a formalistic discussion about bad usage of , versus . in an international board representing different national practices. As I have heard the actual note, I wont.

Klaus

Or maybe you could visit a proctologist to have the pickle removed from your butt and recognize it was a joke.

[imperialbari]

Or maybe you could visit a proctologist to have the pickle removed from your butt and recognize it was a joke.

I love your eternal charm, so I kindly will ask:

How do want that pickle served?

K

[Rick Denney]

Doesn't this flyback apply only to CRT televisions?

Yes. The horizontal frequency is 525 lines X 60 Hz / 2 (because of interlacing). PAL/SECAM in Europe is 625 lines X 50 Hz / 2, or 15.625 KHz. Some flat-panel displays also produce high-frequency whine, but for completely different reasons.

Knowing Klaus, I would not be at all surprised if his television was an old CRT unit, assuming he owns a television, about which I would not be prepared to bet.

Rick "who still has a couple of CRT televisions in use" Denney

[imperialbari]

I live in a small 5 room row-house. The hall is way too small for a TV. The bathroom in between gets too humid for a TV. So I only have 3 TV sets. A flatscreen in the living room and CRT’s in kitchen and bedroom. The two latter ones will have to be phased out over the next two years as we go digital only by some date in 2012.

None of the TV sets I owned myself, 10 samples over 37 years, have emitted high frequency noises. However there were several reasons why it was a pain to visit my mother in law. She smoked. And her TV had a high frequency noise, which really was annoying to me: loud and piercing. But she couldn’t hear it and my then wife vetoed telling her. The sound solution had been to shoot both, but I took the less radical route and consulted a TV tech.

He told it was a quite common fault caused by some sort of defective shielding, which I couldn’t correct myself.

For many years I hadn’t been exposed to such high frequencies, and I thought I had lost the ability to hear them. So when TubeNetter CrappyEuph (I didn’t invent her screen name) in another context came up with my first link, I was quite happy to learn, that I had an octave or so more than expected in my high range hearing.

Klaus

[sloan]

bogus test - probably designed to make you feel happy and explore the rest of the website.
I heard the tone - and if *I* can hear it...

[sloan]

Doesn't this flyback apply only to CRT televisions?

Yes. The horizontal frequency is 525 lines X 60 Hz / 2 (because of interlacing). PAL/SECAM in Europe is 625 lines X 50 Hz / 2, or 15.625 KHz. Some flat-panel displays also produce high-frequency whine, but for completely different reasons.

Knowing Klaus, I would not be at all surprised if his television was an old CRT unit, assuming he owns a television, about which I would not be prepared to bet.

Rick "who still has a couple of CRT televisions in use" Denney

Check your spec sheets. It's 525 lines x 30 Hz. Interlacing simply does 262.5 lines for Field A, followed by 262.5 lines for Field B - where each Field is 1/60th of a second. Each Frame (Field A + Field B) adds up to 525 lines, and takes 1/30th of a second.

Be glad that the CRT is dead. It had a long and illustrious career (and was the centerpiece of my life for 40 years - but, it's dead. DO NOT PURCHASE another CRT. Ever. Full Stop.

Every year I spend about 3 hours of class time explaining the intricacies of the RGB color CRT. It's all the students can do to keep from giggling. Rube Goldberg would have been proud.

Buy me a few beers and I'll tell you how I once wrote software that caused a CRT to catch fire. Twice.

Putting on my shadow mask and ducking for cover...