[Goit]

The headphones are all advertised to reach very low frequencies, can they really do that? I see 15hz, 13hz etc...

 

[toxic888]

You wouldn't hear those frequencies anyway? What are you asking anyway, what headphones? :/

 

[Goit]

Well, the organ can go down to 15hz or something like that.

I'm talking about the sennheiser HD555.

 

[ericj]

You've heard of the rubber yardstick, right?

Published frequency response specs are like a yardstick that says "For Entertainment Purposes Only" on it.

They're lying. With math. By not showing their work.

 

[EtherealApril]

The frequency response specs for headphones don't actually tell anything about how a headphone may sound, just the frequency extremes that the phone can supposedly reach. They're also not very useful for comparing phones because manufacturers test under different conditions and with different tolerences.

If you want to hear how low a phone can reach before you buy it, I suggest that you compile some test tones or tracks with low frequencies on a CD and listen to it through the phones. Trust your ears, not the manufacturers' specs.

 

[krmathis]

Yeah, if the specifications say so then they most probably can reproduce the frequency. You wont be able to hear it though...
Example the Stax SR-007, which have a frequency response down to 6Hz.

 

[Goit]

I'm getting different responses here.

 

[LnxPrgr3]

Many a $5 pack of headphones claims 20Hz to 20kHz response. I'm not really sure what qualifies as a "response" in this case...

...and that's exactly the problem. There is no generally followed standard for what counts as a response for the purposes of that spec. It's completely arbitrary.

It's a pretty safe bet, though, that even if headphones can produce a 15Hz sound, it'll be a lot quieter than they could manage at 200Hz, even ignoring whether a human listener would hear the 15Hz at all.

 

[paaj]

if they say 20-20000hz (like ibud

) they forget to say at what levels the extremes come through... yes they move, but so little you won't hear anything. given values are only a little usefull when they give the deviations (eq +- 3db means something like the given extremes are at most 3db lower than average).
they'd probably get away with stating 0-100000hz (at +-100db levels...)

 

[LnxPrgr3]

Quote:

Originally Posted by paaj /img/forum/go_quote.gif if they say 20-20000hz (like ibud ) they forget to say at what levels the extremes come through... yes they move, but so little you won't hear anything.

I dunno... 25dB or so down from flat isn't too far off to count, is it?

Does Apple actually claim 20-20000 on these? I can't find specs listed anywhere to confirm.

 

[paaj]

I don't know really, I think people can hear about 40db difference in dynamics if they try hard, but it does mean it'll be considerably lower than the rest of the music so you won't hear much of it. compare it to HD600:

one kind of standard i think (with speakers mostly) is measuring the +-3db points. still does not say much about the sound though.

 

[Goit]

So how does the HD 555 look? Is it audible at like 20 hz?

 

[Goit]

Range (music) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Actually, if human hearing stops at 20hz, and the organ and contrabass clairnet can go lower, how can we hear it?

 

[Fitz]

It's picked up over the entire body via bone conduction. That's why even normal bass is very different on speakers versus headphones.

 

[Rednamalas1]

^ sounds kinky.