Fine business TTT'dMac,
That far from Loxton huh? You're really out west in 'Tim Buck'd Two' land. And I thought I was lost......
My wife says I should be a stand up sunday newspaper comic, not a bobbing head.
Back to your' earphones & music.... Mate.
I got music distortion info from an old antique radio internet website, that has every electronic' orented magazine cover to cover published on the site.
I was reading an in depth article about how power transformer & audio output transformers differ in engineering design.
The article continued on a back page of the same issue magazine, so the next virtual page was a new subject on how earphone & speakers work electronically & mechanically together.
This article discribed the relationship between the input power & how it effects distortion in the sound reproduction. This was about circa 1935. Nothing has changed in electronic design since then. It all still works the same physically.
The study went on to say that all electro mechanical devices, be it an earphone, speaker, or microphone, has a "sweet spot", (that is my words), where both the north & south pole push & pull the voice coil through the center of this field evenly, in a linear way.
As soon as the voice coil moves beyond a balance of power of the two magnet poles, say the cone is moving physically from the balance center of pull, away from the center of the magnet bubble, some of the strength to move the coil is lost by a rule of "Inverse² of the distance", leaving only the remaining magnet pole closest to the voice coil, to continue moving the coil onwords in it's mechanical travel.
Beyond this peak shared strength in the magnet bubble, distortion between the input signal & the mechanical output of the driver starts & increases rapidly above that point, the lauder, the more distortion.
When you look at speaker specs, they are always rated in dB's SPL. Generally it is in the area of 90 to 92 dB's of sound pressure where the maximum linear low distortion occures in all speakers, earphones, & microphones, & is related to the volt power input from the amp to the driver earphone/speaker system, as well as the volt output of a microphone, all referenced to: 0 dBv = 90 dB SPL.
It is all based on an AC rms volt meter measurement of +4 dB volts or 1.228 v rm² = the peak dynamic volume level possible with little or no distorted output of the driver, or the peak linear dynamic range of the driver. Beyond that point, you are just listening to laud distortorted music. The word Laud & Loud are not the same word & have very different meanings.
0 dBv or 0.775 v rm², generally produces the 90 dB's of sound pressure level just right for listening to the singers, weather it is a loud speaker or earphones, & is the volume level the singer is suppose to be heard at, (generally speaking) if that singer were performing live in front of you.
It doesn't sound like much power? Does it? Well it isn't.!
I use two bridgable NAD 2200 power envelop amps each bridged @ 1600 watt per channel, driven by a NAD 1155 preamp. Total throughput THD = 0.02% @ 3200 watt dynamic power output! to drive my 3d sound wall with.
I play my speakers, (8 cabinets total, matrixed into a form of a 3D sound wall), all 20 drivers in them, with the voice of the singer set at 0 dB volts. They are so clear, you have to hear it to believe it. I am suggesting only 4 watts average total power!
All 8 speaker systems driven by 3200 dynamic watts @ only a tiny 1.6 watt average power @ 0 dBv.... Sounds like overkill, but it's really true, low distortion.
I calculated the power input to all of the speaker cabnets & dB sound pressure levels.
It comes out to be somewhere around 4.02 watt total rm² power @ +4 dBv, & it sounds so good at that level, I don't want to turn it up beyond these levels ever again.
About laud music.... I have listen to so many songs over the years, some of them thousands of times, but when I listen to them now at the 0 dB level set.... It is like I have never heard the song before, it sounds so different, & clear. The instruments are not all smashed together in one big noisy sound field. Every instrument is seperate & soo clear.
I went so far as to use SkyPaw sound pressure meter appz on my I-phone, to measure the SPL, & in every song I play, when the singer's voice is adjusted to 0 dB peaks.
Note:SkyPaw is free at the appz store.
Well, (too much beer), I will say that again, using the I-phone skypaw appz, the background music never goes over the vom measurement of +4 dBv on volume peaks, which = 96 dB SPL coming from my speaker system, WHEN, I have the peaks in volume of the Voice adjusted to a maximum of 0 dBv (0,775v), which = 90 dB SPL coming from my speakers.
The music dynamic volume range averages about 6 dB SPL louder than the singer in almost every big band recording, while other recording methods with the singer at close center stage front, the background music never exceeds +2 dB = 92 dB SPL coming from my speakers. I don't know exactly why, but it is somehow related to the dynamic range set by the recording studio.
You have got a choice pair of earphones now. One of the better units available on the market today.
I'm asking you to save the ware & tare to the new phones, (& your' ears), from the very start, & give this a try.
I'm not joking. This info is for real & on the level. Tell everybody you know about it, when you find out just how good it really is.
Get out that old dusty vom & start adjusting the vocal volume to the peak meter level of 0 dB, & you will have such a look of suprise on your' face, you will never go back to laud music again.
Cheers,
{(I'll have another Bloody Beer, if you will, Mate) Translation: Let me know soon, what you think, when you try out this trick, on your' new headphones.}
PS: Don't think 90 to 96 dB SPL isn't loud. It is definately as loud as you would want a good sounding band to be. It sounds loud to me & I am deaf, & over the hill, not to mention, I'm in my 70's.
