Headphones and Hearing Loss

[iceblitzed]

Hello Tom's Hardware Forum

I am not very familiar with the headphone world. I recently read articles that keeping the sound of your speakers/headphones etc below 85 decibels will not cause hearing loss (or very little). I was wondering if there is some program or something to determine the decibel rating that is coming out of headphones?

 

[SchizTech]

There are sound level meters, or perhaps not quite as accurate, cellphone apps. You'd hold the meter (or phone mic) up to the headphones to do a measurement. Not many people probably go to the length of purchasing a meter for this purpose but don't listen at a higher than comfort level.

A thread at another forum: http://www.head-fi.org/t/607728/testing-headphones-decibel-level

For a rough idea, here's a chart that lines up 85dB with "city traffic (from inside a car)" with 80 dB as "telephone dial tone" and 90 dB "train whistle from 500 ft or truck traffic"

http://www.gcaudio.com/resources/howtos/loudness.html

 

[iceblitzed]

ok thanks uh one more thing how can I determine the number of volts that can go through my jack on my laptop

 

[SchizTech]

I wouldn't know where to look up that sort of specification (it's not the sort of thing ordinarily published). Why do you feel you need to know this?