hearing test

[clauclauclaudia]

Yo, you college types (but everyone can play!)

Turn your volume *low* so you don't kill me for killing your eardrums, then take vvalkyri's poll.

I'd also be curious to know how well you can hear each of the three reference tones in atrustheotaku's comment here.

Despite the news coverage graphic showing the ring tone as being around 17 KHz, it appears to actually be 15,011 Hz. Which is why I ask about the three reference tones. I can hear the 15, but not the others, but I'd love to try the others on equipment where somebody has been able to hear them so I know whether it's my ears or my headphones (hey, my earbuds wouldn't even reproduce the lowest tone properly).

Yes, I hear the tone of a silent TV too.

Note that, as atrustheotaku comments, it's not an all or nothing "I can/can't hear this tone". Rather it's a decibel falloff, where the average person in their 30s can hear the 16KHz tone only when it's 22 decibels louder than the point at which the average person in their 20s can hear it. So. Take the poll. :)

Comments

[hammercock.livejournal.com]

I had already taken the poll, but hadn't listened to the other reference tones. This was my response after doing so:

I could definitely hear and be irritated by the 15 at the lowest speaker volume (1 out of 10). I could hear and was irritated by the 16 at 2/10 volume, though I might not have been able to pinpoint the source if I hadn't already known; at 3/10 volume I could tell and was much more irritated by it.

As for the 17, it's not so much that I could hear it, but that I felt sort of subliminally aware of and sickened by it. I only turned it as high as 6/10 volume, because after that the speaker buzz kicks in and overrides it.

Conclusion: My high-frequency hearing seems pretty intact, and these tones range from intensely irritating to outright headache-inducing and even somewhat queasifying. It's been a few minutes since I listened to them and I still feel a bit head-sick. On the flip side, I have a devil of a time trying to decipher human speech in a crowd or amongst other background noise. I'm 35, for the record.