[lmilhan]

Edit: Forgot to mention, as for IEMs: unless you have some elaborate 'Dummy head' rig available, you will not be able to take proper measurements with and SPL meter.

 

[lmilhan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by fatcat28037 /img/forum/go_quote.gif If your ears start to bleed you need to decrease the volume.

Excellent advice from the "Steve Jobs school of thinking and marketing".

Let's raise an entire generation of kids that will go completely deaf by their early 30s due to the need of cranking the volume to compensate for the crappy earbuds we package with each and every iPOD!

 

[sidewinder]

I absolutely have no clue at what dB rate I'm listening to my music. I do find a lawnmower or vacumcleaner to be pretty loud at start, and I can definately notice some hearingloss after I'm done with it (without earplugs that is, though I'm wearing since a couple of months). dB charts say these 'machines' operate at 90dB, so I assume I listen at around 80-85dB.

Some charts differ quit a bit from each other, though I find this one to be close to reality:

Painful:

150 dB = rock music peak
140 dB = firearms, air raid siren, jet engine
130 dB = jackhammer
120 dB = jet plane take-off, amplified rock music at 4-6 ft., car stereo,
band practice

Extremely loud:

110 dB = rock music, model airplane
106 dB = timpani and bass drum rolls
100 dB = snowmobile, chain saw, pneumatic drill
90 dB = lawnmower, shop tools, truck traffic, subway

Very loud:

80 dB = alarm clock, busy street
70 dB = busy traffic, vacuum cleaner
60 dB = conversation, dishwasher

Moderate:

50 dB = moderate rainfall
40 dB = quiet room

Faint:

30 dB = whisper, quiet library

But the thing is that 80dB seems to be a busy street, though while I'm listening with a regular headphone like the KSC35, the streetnoise is (much) higher than what my music produces. Therefore it's pretty hard to find out what is to be considered 'loud'. Then again, you're listening to headphones from a few cm, while you're not all the time right next to a truck, but probably at least a few feet.

Another factor may be 'listening fatigue', but does this have anything to do with high pressure levels?

 

[Tantra]

General: If your ears (in conjunction with the brain) can't detect damaging SPL, then a visual meter could be well spent money.

 

[manhattanproj]

Quote:

Originally Posted by lmilhan /img/forum/go_quote.gif Excellent advice from the "Steve Jobs school of thinking and marketing". Let's raise an entire generation of kids that will go completely deaf by their early 30s due to the need of cranking the volume to compensate for the crappy earbuds we package with each and every iPOD!

if they packaged ipod with good buds, we wouldn't be having this board and companies like shure, ety will all go out of business.

 

[fatcat28037]

Quote:

Originally Posted by flargosa /img/forum/go_quote.gif I have read that listening at loud volumes can permanently numb your hearing, I have also read that sound above a certain decibel can damage your hearing, but how can a person tell what is safe and what is not?

If your ears aren't bleeding and the cat is still on your lap.

 

[magzcampos]

http://www.aedio.co.jp/new/html/image/safelevels.jpg
dows anyone understand this?

 

[JSTpt1022]

Its the limit of hours per day that is safe at that volume level. But what is EE and why are their standards alot more stringent than OSHA?

 

[Frostychrist]

My Ipod Rarely goes above half to 3/4 volume. I have it locked so i don't get carried away with my music and turn it up past that. Different headphones will have different volume levels as well. My Bose triports had to be turned up quite a bit to get a good listening volume. My sennhesiers are at my earlier stated settings.
I use IEM so my rule of thumb is this if I have to ask if its to loud it might be too loud. Also, if you hear a buzzing or ringing sound in your ears after you take out your headphones, they are to loud. Like after a concert if you haven't worn earplugs you will have the muffled ringing sound in your ears.

 

[Frostychrist]

This was the same post as my above one. For some reason I made to

 

[wolfboy]

I'm starting to hear ringing in my ears whenever I put the IEMs in.

 

[Frostychrist]

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSTpt1022 /img/forum/go_quote.gif Its the limit of hours per day that is safe at that volume level. But what is EE and why are their standards alot more stringent than OSHA?

I believe they are the European standards. I was reading up on this recently and a lot of experts believe that OHSA's standards are not as effective. In the states you can't be exposed to 90db sound for an 8 hour period and so on as that graph represents. In Europe if your working in an 85db to 90db area for the same amount of time you have to wear hearing protection. Headwize.com has a whole article on this.


I also read that they have SPL probes that they can test In Ear phones. I haven't found any for sell but I am wondering if you were to call an Audiologists if they could test that for you. I listen to my Ipod for 8 hrs a day and worry about my hearing so it I think It would be nice if I could lock my Ipod at a 90-95db setting and adjust it from their as needed.

I read that the Ipod's max volume is at 130db. If you play at half volume that would be 65db. But, As we all know, Different headphones player louder or softer at different volumes. I was thinking that if you could figure out what the highest level Db your headphones and player are playing at you should be able to adjust that with know problem. Anyone have any ideas on how to figure that out I would be curious?

 

[GotNoRice]

To make things more complicated, there are two different types of decibel measurements. The most common, “A-weighted” decibel (dBa) doesn’t measure SPL evenly over the entire frequency range. In fact it rolls off so bad that you’re talking about -20db at 100hz with it going down significantly from there. Then there is the C-weighted measurement, which is a lot more even across the frequency range.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weighting_filter

When I use my speakers I was measuring ~95db on the A-Scale and ~110db on the C-Scale. That makes sense as I do use a bit of EQ boost on the low end. I don’t understand why the differences between A and C and the shortcomings of A aren’t more widely discussed or understood.

 

[Chu]

This is my very simple method:

I have a radio next to my main listening station that I listen to in the morning while taking care of some more mundane computer work.

My main two headphones are open cans, if I know I couldn't make out the radio through the music it is too loud.

 

[fordgtlover]

Check this link

http://www.headwize.com/articles/hearing_art.htm

Instead of a finger click or a radio you could, according the the table on the link page, set you levels by your lawnmower. At that level you could safely listen for up to 8 hours a day without suffering hearing loss.