[Bob in St. Louis]

A buddy of mine (a "music-o-phile"), sent me a link to a YouTube video about testing ears for their 'old age' capabilities.

On my $30 PC speakers I can hear everything below 17k on this video, and nothing above it.
I put full blame on what would appear to be a deficienciy on my part, to the quality of the equipment I'm listening on. Of course.

I had full intentions of playing this video ('test') on my main system which is equipped with tube amplification, much higher quality speakers, etc..etc..., to see what my ears are REALLY capable of.

But then my 14 year old son walked by, so I sat him in my chair to see how he fared on the (very) meager system my computer audio system is comprised of.

Check this out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxcbppCX6Rk

Got your answer?

Good.

I hope you don't feel old.

Bob

p.s. My son heard all of it. 

[Captainhemo]

Geeze,  I couldn't even hear the 15khz

My 9 old niece could only  hear  below the 17 khz  so I am hoping  / wishing there could be a problem iwth the onboard sound  chip on my M/B   
Going to have to try this on  another PC

-jay

[G Georgopoulos]

The test at youtube may not work well if you have pc speakers with limited frequency response...

[WireNut]

Funny story I forgot until now. About 20 years ago my wife (X-wife now) sent me to the ear doctor for testing. Doc ran all the test and said your ears are fine, there must be something else wrong to cause you to loose your hearing   

20 mores years later my ears have never been better 

[Vulcan00]

My daughter is a Dr. of audiology. She told me that  I would be amazed how much improvement to my hearing would result if I would have my old ear canals cleaned. 

Harrison


PS   and I don't mean with a Q-Tip, she is referring to a professional cleaning at the Dr. office

[Captainhemo]

My daughter is a Dr. of audiology. She told me that  I would be amazed how much improvement to my hearing would result if I would have my old ear canals cleaned. 

Harrison


PS   and I don't mean with a Q-Tip, she is referring to a professional cleaning at the Dr. office

There was actually  a thread   in the "cheap & cheerful" circle   relating to this  a while back,  kind of a  DIY   solution.
Either way, cleaning out  the old canals would seem to make sense

edit - actually it was over  in  " the starting block" 
http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=116877.0
-jay

[JerryM]

Being pretty pleased with my hearing, this video was both disappointing and alarming.

Playing it the fourth time, I realized that at 0.09, in the lower right hand corner, it says "Watch at 1080p and wear headphones for accurate results." Simply switching the video to 1080p allowed me to easily hear the 19 KHz tone without issue, but not the 20 KHz tone.

Trying to find my old iPhone headphones now. 

[WGH]

Either the RAAL tweeters only go up to 12 KHz or my ears are old, I would guess the latter since I'm turning 65 in 24 days.
If anyone composed music for kids just using 12 KHz - 20 KHz we would never know what they are listening to.

Based on this cool interactive frequency chart not too many acoustic instruments go above 12 KHz.
http://www.independentrecording.net/irn/resources/freqchart/main_display.htm

[*Scotty*]

Here is a simple quick and dirty test for your ears using a CRT based TV. The horizontal scan rate for NTSC on a CRT is 15.734kHz., my old 32 JVC TV produced this frequency at 95dB at 0.5meter. It used set my teeth on edge when I was younger, then somewhere in my 50's I stopped noticing it. If you can still hear this noise when you walk into a room that has a CRT type TV operating you aren't doing too bad.
My upper limit nowadays appears to be about 14kHz.
Scotty

[Bob in St. Louis]

Good point Scotty.
Yes, I hated that noise too.
In some cases, I recall walking up to a house on a nice summer day when the windows were open, and I could hear the TV all the way from the front yard.

Question is, where do you find a CRT now-a-days? 

[*Scotty*]

I have a giant 25-incher in my bedroom. Hard to believe that a TV of that size back in the 80s was considered BIG and they were expensive as well.
Scotty

[WGH]

I thought something was wrong so not completely trusting a youtube video, I downloaded a set of test tones to play directly through the stereo:

http://mdf1.tripod.com/test-tones.html

Each tone is very short so I set foobar on repeat. The results are I can clearly hear up to 17 KHz with 18 KHz and above missing.

Something between the computer -> HDMI -> Panasonic TV -> Toslink optical cable -> Outlaw Processor -> AVA pre-amp is stripping out tones above 12 KHz. The computer is used to play low-res videos so the high frequency loss was not noticeable.

Wayne

[Bob in St. Louis]

Thanks Wayne.
I was wondering about the equipment (my cheap PC) being able to reproduce the sounds, but my (young) son was able to hear much higher than I.

Now....it's possible he was faking it, in (yet) another attempt to make me feel older and more feeble that he is. 

But like the chart you showed, there's not very much up there that concerns me too much.

Bob

[Ericus Rex]

Our own Stereocilia is a Dr. of Audiology and he told me once that it is perfectly normal for a man of my age (40) to  not hear much above 12K.  Don't feel too bad gents.  My wife still hears higher freq's than me but I clearly hear lower than she does.

[jules]

... and at the other end of the scale my laptop can't manage 100Hz and doesn't do a great job of even 200Hz. I hadn't realized that they were so weak where it really matters. [No, it's not my ears, headphones do it fine  ]

Jules

[Guy 13]

Hi all Audio Circle members, especially the ones around 65 years old.
I rather not test my ears,
because after 18 years of Vietnamese noise almost 24 hours a day,
I think I am probably limited at 14KHz at the most.
A long time ago I did test my GR Research V1 speakers at the low end
and below 30 Hz it was very difficult to hear it.

Guy 13

[JLM]

My ears turn 57 next month but I couldn't hear 15k or above (just 'clicks') even via my main rig.     Must have been growing up around all that loud farm equipment.  Just move me into the audiophile retirement home.   

Thanks for the chart Wayne, looks like even at 12k I'm still hearing all the major instruments, just not the harmonics (yellow bars) of some of them.  Surprising to me that violin harmonics are present up to 20k. 

I don't suppose this explains why I can't hear my wife.   

[coke]

 

[Bob in St. Louis]

That's an awesome cartoon. 

[mav52]

Great cartoon....

61 here  what did you say