TREBLE

[WGTP]

Over the years at this magnificent forum I have noticed that distortions described at too bright or harsh didn't sound that way to me.  I attributed it to having a midrange heavy amp, or sitting off of the speaker axis or playing at low volumes. 

I use a different amp in the lab/bedroom now and it finally dawned on me that I HAVE HEARING LOSS AND CAN'T HEAR THE HIGHS ANYMORE. 

IIRC from my hearing test several years ago, the largest deficiency was at 3500Hz.  This is where the ear is most sensitive and where the treble peak of 12" speakers occur.  It is also the area where we usually are filtering the highs in our distortions.

This makes it a warmer and less harsh world of distortion.

So I'm working on the breadboard to cut the lows and mids, using bright guitar pickups, etc. to get the highs that others are trying to filter out.

If you come see me live, I may cut your head off.

BEWARE. 

[puretube]

That`s sad to hear, WGTP. (no pun intended!)

Mojo sent!

[deadastronaut]

age and years of  loud gigs i guess....

i found this

[weasle76]

I can sympathise with you WTGP, after trying the vid Rob posted!

I've just turned 35, and couldn't hear anything past 12000Hz. 10000Hz was loudest to me. My wife (30) found 12000Hz to be loudest, but couldn't hear past 14000Hz...

I think a trip to get my ears syringed might be a good plan... Although I might have to try this with my kids when they return home from school! Or would that be torture for a 5 and 8 year old...? Hehe 

[deadastronaut]

i couldn't hear 14000hz onwards...i am 45 

[WhenBoredomPeaks]

i couldn't hear 14000hz onwards...i am 45  

Same but i am 23. /edit: 14k is ok but after that i am not sure if what i am hearing is noise, IMD or the freq/

[rockhorst]

I've been stuck at about 16 kHz since high school (29 now). I've worn ear protection at almost all gigs I did or concerts I went to. Worked out fine. Then, about 1.5 years ago, I walk home at night and some stupid deranged teenage kid decides to empty the entire content of his lungs at less than an inch from my left ear while passing through on a bike. Sure enough, there's a 6 kHz dip in my left ear's audiogram since. My right ear on the other hand, still has a completely flat response with a 3dB threshold.

So yes: ear protection works great, as long as no stupid deranged teenagers catch you off your guard. Should wear them all the time I guess 

[DDD]

I have a friend. He's a young guitar player.
He says that every FX I've created has too much HF, or the sound is "too fat".
Well, now I know he may be right (((

[nick d]

                       Oh errrr......I'm 58 , couldn't hear FA above 10k . Then again , I am a life-long Motorhead fan .

[deadastronaut]

                       Oh errrr......I'm 58 , couldn't hear FA above 10k . Then again , I am a life-long Motorhead fan .

stone deaf forever....

[WGTP]

Thanks for the post.  I'm 56 and and couldn't hear 12kHz and beyond.  My 18 year old son could hear all but the last.  The cat is going off.  Even though we can hear higher, we still have some loss at 3.5kHz where things start rolling off pretty fast with a 12" guitar speaker.  That is why running direct can sound different.  Also, not everyones tweeters are going to go to 20kHz.  

[nexekho]

19 and 17k was the hard limit.  The one before that sounded louder than the one before that?  Odd.

Also: wouldn't the compression of that file and the sampling frequency of the flash player/audio driver/audio hardware/frequency response of my speakers have a lot to do with it?

[Pollinator95]

Couldn´t hear 17.4 kHz, and I´m 15. Should I be worried? 

[rockhorst]

@Pollinator: like I said, when I was about 17, I was at about 16-17 kHz. Wear ear protection and you should be fine for years to come.

[arawn]

I'm 37 and couldn't hear anything past 14k too many concerts and impact tools I guess

[petemoore]

  52yrs.
  12k...yupp, I can definitely hear it, the volume drop is about the same as between 8k/10k.
  14k...yeah, big drop in amplitude though.
  15k...not a thing ! !
   Much better than I thought I had, but nowhere near as good as when my hearing improves ~65%, every so often I sing a high note and am completely startled by HF's...literally makes me jump like I got shocked or was being attacked. It's like superduper earplugs were removed, but very abruptly, sometimes the super-'boost' lasts all night, other times it shuts off again immediately or within seconds of 'popping on''...WOW !
  Anything above 12k that I can hear seems to have an irritating effect, the dog just showed up.

[puretube]

Couldn´t hear 17.4 kHz, and I´m 15. Should I be worried? 

Don`t worry: after 4 decades, you might hook up your 20MHz scope to your PC`s line-out socket
to find out. that beyond 17kHz it puts out -80dB... 

(just been there...)

next you`ll go measuring your PC-speakerz frequency-response...

(on my tomorrow`s To Do-list...)

[nexekho]

Thing is I'm using the stereo input on a surround set of speakers so presumably there's some internal filtering going on to direct the bass/treble to the sub and satellites respectively which might be filtering out the higher frequencies.

[WGTP]

 A little more info.  Consonants tend to have higher frequency content and vowels lower.  That is why you can still hear people talk, but can't understand what they are saying.  It is also harder to pick conversations out of background noise.

Chickens can regenerate the damaged nerve hairs in their ears.  We cannot.  So hopfully in the next decade, with stem cells, etc., we will be able to replace ours.  Why a chicken needs this ability, I don't know.  Too much clucking around I guess. 

[jafo]

Neat -- my daughter ran into the computer room screaming "Not cool!"

Anyhoo, I can hear 16kHz (double-checked with Audacity tone generation), and I'm 41. There's a lot to be said for protecting your hearing, I guess.