[hur1214]

When people hear loud music from their ear-bud or headphone.

It may cause of conductive and sensorineural hearing loss or tinnitus(a ringing in the ears).

All doctors says, "hearing music with ear-bud or headphone more than 10 min, it can damage your ears a lot."



ps: it does not matter your headphone is open or not


Take care!

 

[dan1son]

When people hear anything loud for extended periods of time it will cause hearing loss. It makes no difference if it's from earbuds, IEMs, headphones, speakers, or an impact hammer.

The amount of time is relative to the decibel level. This is nothing new... we are all well aware of it, which is why most people here use high end headphones... because they still sound great at low volume.

 

[Lazarus Short]

This is why I listen to headphones much less than I used to. It is just too easy to up the volume into the red zone. I don't care to trade in my Stax for hearing aids.

 

[Dane]

What people need to understand is that damage is caused by sound pressure alone. It doesn't matter whether it sound good or bad. The problem with high-end equipment is that it sounds good even at very high sound pressures. Take care.

 

[tintin47]

Quote:

Originally Posted by hur1214 /img/forum/go_quote.gif When people hear loud music from their ear-bud or headphone. It may cause of conductive and sensorineural hearing loss or tinnitus(a ringing in the ears). All doctors says, "hearing music with ear-bud or headphone more than 10 min, it can damage your ears a lot." ps: it does not matter your headphone is open or not Take care!

Headphones, or any other sound for that matter, can damage your hearing only if you listen at high volume levels. The higher you go volumewise, the less time it takes to damage your hearing. If you keep your phones under 85 dB or so (probably 80 to be safe), you are in almost no danger at all.

 

[oqvist]

Quote:

Originally Posted by dan1son /img/forum/go_quote.gif When people hear anything loud for extended periods of time it will cause hearing loss. It makes no difference if it's from earbuds, IEMs, headphones, speakers, or an impact hammer. The amount of time is relative to the decibel level. This is nothing new... we are all well aware of it, which is why most people here use high end headphones... because they still sound great at low volume.

I don´t think that is the reason... They can play high with no distortion... It´s actually better to run low quality headphones that distort if you crank them up if you want to save your ears. With hifi headphones it´s most often not apparent at all if you play to loud.

 

[yukihiro]

So... you think that just because this is a headphone forum that all of us love to crank up the volume? If anything, this forum has helped me to appreciate my hearing. There's plenty of information on protecting your hearing on this forum.

 

[billybob_jcv]

Quote:

Originally Posted by yukihiro /img/forum/go_quote.gif So... you think that just because this is a headphone forum that all of us love to crank up the volume? If anything, this forum has helped me to appreciate my hearing. There's plenty of information on protecting your hearing on this forum.

+1

This has been discussed many, many times at head-fi.

 

[andyk]

What?

 

[Uncle Erik]

A sign of maturity is realizing that the volume knob also turns to the left.

 

[dj_mocok]

I heard drinking alcohol can make you drunk too

 

[dan1son]

Quote:

Originally Posted by oqvist /img/forum/go_quote.gif I don´t think that is the reason... They can play high with no distortion... It´s actually better to run low quality headphones that distort if you crank them up if you want to save your ears. With hifi headphones it´s most often not apparent at all if you play to loud.

No... that's definitely not the case. The amount of distortion makes no difference to hearing loss whatsoever. It's the relative sound pressure level (measured in decibels), relative to the threshold of human hearing (Absolute threshold of hearing - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia).

Either way if you crank crappy headphones to a level of distortion, it's just as harmful a good headphones cranked to the same SPL.

While I agree that distortion can cause SOME people to turn it down I'd argue that's not the normal case. Most average people don't even care or know what distortion is and think louder is better whether it sounds clean or not. We're an exception to that case.

If you end up turning it up simply because it sounds great, that's a problem you need to work on. You're going to hurt yourself

. I find myself keeping it lower for the same reason. I listen to open headphones most of the time because I can very easily judge how loud they are by listening to normal conversations while they play. With my IEMs it's a bit harder, but I'd bet those are even lower since there is no background noise.

 

[Get_Zwole]

^^ i agree with good isolating iem's like my w3's i can listen very comfortably with great sound with my volume only 1/4 of the way up on my iphone 3gS. I would guestimate the level to be around 72 to 75 db's. Ive used my db meter to measure with cardboard and a hole in it and sealing it to the top of the meter. While not incredibly accurate im sure its not wayy off and it read 72 db's at my normal volume so i figure 75 is about norm for me. Most people i talk to listen around 50 to 60 % on the iphone 3gs, i know recording makes a difference but i think im in the clear.

 

[Abu Som3a]

Low quality phones force you into listening at lower volumes to avoid distortion. High quality phones can tolerate excessively high volumes and still produce crisp sounds. So on the long term, you are more liable to hearing loss from Hi-fi headphones if you aren't taking care.

 

[billybob_jcv]

Only if you insist on listening at the higher volumes. Guess what - the high quality headphones sound better than cr@ppy headphones at lower volumes too...