[teambayern]

I've read a lot of articles about the dangers of extended headphone use, including temporary and permanent hearing loss and the dreaded tinnitus.  It seems measuring SPL is the best way to ensure you're listening at safe volumes, but the problem is that each output, source, and headphone would alter that level such that uniform guidelines for listening habits aren't generalizable.  
 
But I had an idea, and I wanted to get some opinions.  It seems to me the three variables are output, source, and headphones.  Well most of the world and a good chunk of headfi owns an ipod at this point.  True, there are different levels of output for different ipods, but I wouldn't think the variation would be significantly different.  So why not create a chart where users with SPL meters can post the readings they get while listening to song on their ipods, unamped?  Then we take the readings and come up with some average SPLs, and find out how loud we can go while preserving our hearing.  This could be something that w all contribute to together, establishing a few base rules for the testing to ensure consistent results.
 
EXAMPLE
 
Grado 60======Strawberry Fields, Beatles======50% iPod classic volume = 85 db
 
M50==========Dani California, RHCP========= 25% Ipod nano volume = 70 db
 
 
 
This would be useful for two reasons:
 
1) We could start to identify broad guidelines for iPod use once we have enough data. (ie under 50% of iPod = safe for at least 8 hours a day)
 
2) We could create baselines that everyone could use and compare for other source, outputs, ect.  So say you have an ipod and some Grados, but you mainly use a hifi system and some AKGs for your listening.  Well, pop on your iPod and grados for a minute, listen to Strawberry Fields, and compare that volume to that of your hifi system to determine safe listening limits.  Imprecise?  yup.  But still useful as a broad guideline? you betcha.
 
 
So what do you all think?  Would this be helpful? Does it exist somewhere?  Thoughts appreciated.

 

[Abovetheair]

I don't know about this idea, I wouldn't want to spend my time searching how loud I should listen to a song. Here's the issue, peoples hearing goes down because they are trying to omit outside noises thus turning up the volume. I notice it all the time in public that I am able to hear some ibuds blaring playing a song that is easily understood. That is what causes damage, end of story. Also everyone's listening area is different meaning that they might be set at a lower or higher volume.

 

[teambayern]

Thanks for the response, but let me clarify a bit.  The idea wouldn't be to search how loud you should listen to any particular song.  The idea would be to aggregate the specific measurements and then generalize safe listening practices from that.  And I totally agree that the reason most people might go too loud is outside noise.  What I'm saying is why not get a list together so you know when and to what degree your sacrificing your hearing, as opposed to just getting loud.
 
For example, say we get a good body of measurements for your M50s and you get on a subway station.  You might know, for example, that you can safely crank it up 50% to drown out the noise, but at 75% you're over X db and might risk hearing damage of some sort after Y amount of time.  You might say it's a short trip and I love this song, or you might say my ears ringing isn't worth this journey album.  The idea is to inform decisions, not make them for you.

 

[Ham Sandwich]

Doing something like that would be a lot of busy work.  And you'd have to keep it up to date.  You'd have to have separate tables for each iPod hardware revision and each firmware revision.  And European models may have different volume steps or maximum volume than American models.  There's a lot of numbers busy work in keeping data like that consistent.  And you'd have to do all that for each headphone tested.
 
And you'd probably want to use standardized test files rather than actual music.  Say maybe white noise or pink noise at a level equivalent to a modern mastered "loudnessed" album, and also white noise or pink noise at a level equivalent to a good mastering (not loudnessed).

 

[teambayern]

Your suggestions would certainly improve the integrity of the chart I'm suggesting, but I don't think accuracy anywhere near that degree would be necessary for purposes I'm suggesting.  The firmware updates and model revisions might have an impact, but certainly they wouldn't offer such substantial changes that a benchmark based on the ipods generally wouldn't be helpful.  I can't imagine a firmware update, in particular, altering the db output more than 5 db, but if you have other info let me know.  I also don't understand your suggestion regarding white noise.  Since I'm just trying to gather data points regarding how many db are hit at certain volume levels, I don't think something this clinical would be necessary, and I agree it would be a lot of work.  It would also serve to eliminate a helpful reference, since no one listens to white noise.  If I know a value for a certain song, at least I can listen to that and get an idea of how loud that is vs. the volume of other songs.  In other words, if I know dark side of the moon is approx. 75 db at 50% volume on grado 60, then I have ballpark even if I use grado 80 with a different ipod.  That's all I'm looking for.  What i'm proposing is to simply aggregate what's already out there, not do a Headroom grade analysis.  Just saying, let's pull all our different SPL threads and posts together in one place, draw some broadstrokes guidelines that would benefit everyone.
 
 
If this kind of rough and dirty guideline isn't something headfi would be interested in, that's fine.  Thanks for the replies, keep them coming.

 

[Ham Sandwich]

I suggested using pink noise or similar because measuring actual music is difficult to do consistently.  The music may have soft sections and loud sections (especially for music like Pink Floyd).  How do you get multiple people to measure a Pink Floyd song the same way?  And what about different masterings of the same album?
 
And how to measure IEMs?  I have an SPL meter and can measure full size headphones reasonably well.  But measuring IEMs and ear buds is quite different.
 
I do like the idea though.  Would be helpful as a general guideline with obvious caveats that different iPods and different headphones will give different numbers.