Thoughts on life, love and faith by Plasticmind.

26 April 20071. beth Martin:

The 15 was really loud, but I couldn't hear the 16 at all. weird. Liam said he could hear it when I asked, but he's only two, so he may not even have understood the question. I guess My ears aren't as young as I am.

26 April 20073. Matt:

I just turned 20, but can hear all of them. But I'm one of those guys who can hear when the TV is on in the other room because of the high electrical whine of the tubes. Though I bet in a year I won't be able to hear them.

26 April 20074. ren:

I posted my results on Karen's site, but I'll do it again. This is without the benefit of headphones (since I'm at work) so I get the excuse of noise pollution, right?

I can hear 15kHz just fine. I can hear 16kHz but only barely and with the volume up pretty high. It's more like I can feel that there is a sound than I can actually recognize the sound. I'm sure I wouldn't really notice it if I didn't know it were playing. I would probably just think my ears were being weird. Definitely can't hear the 17kHz at all. I guess we both have old ear, Bethy.

26 April 20076. Karen:

I'm too scared to use earbuds to try it, because I get a headache just from long-term use anyway. But I could hear the first 4 clearly through my crappy macbook speakers. (and they really are terrible speakers) The next 2 were more pain than sound. The one on the tv commercial, though is loud and piercing to me. I wonder what KHz it is.

I think my hearing is still good because I was always forbidden to listen to loud or rock-and-roll type music. (aka "devil music")

26 April 20077. crystal:

I am 27 (Tim's almost a year younger) and we could hear the 18 really well (ouch!). I guess that's good since I spend all day with those teenagers trying to hide their cell phone sounds. Sound emitters are actually a part of Tim's new business, so he just pulled out a device with different sound frequencies. He could hear a little more than I could (about 22-23).

26 April 20078. Jill:

I could hear all of them but 18--that one I only heard the pop at the beginning, and my ears were kind of buzzing, but I couldn't say that I actually heard anything.

And I'm 29, rapidly heading to 30--just wanted to point that out. : )

27 April 20079. angela:

So is there a limit as to how high you can turn up the volume on your computer? Can hear the beginning and ending "clicks" for 17, but nothing for 18.

30 in October, but let's not talk about that one. ;)

27 April 200710. Sara:

That really is amazing! I think I'll link to this from my blog, if you don't mind. Easier that than retyping the whole thing! :-)

I could hear the 17 when I was looking at the computer (I wasn't using headphones)- but nothing if I turned my head to the side. I think the 18 one is just a trick- there's nothing really playing, is there??? ;-)

Man, going deaf already and I'm just a wee 24!

27 April 200711. amber:

heard the 18...
i'm 22.358904109589 years old today

28 April 200712. mandi:

heard 'em all. my question is the same as angela's, though. am i cheating if my speaker was turned all the way up? i'm 27 in august.

28 April 200713. Dan:

Jesse...
I'm Sara's dad, and 52. I can hear all of them - ha ha!

Dan

4 October 200714. Rebecca:

That's really weird. I always think of myself as having bad hearing (though admittedly that's because I don't pay much attention to anything) because people always sound like they're mumbling and I play music really loudly etc, but I found 18KHz to be quite loud, though not as uncomfortably piercing as the lower frequencies, and that was without headphones with my volume on 35%. My computer is quite slow so they had to take a few minutes to load before I could hear them, so I was doing other things, and each sound caught my attention really easily so I wouldn't describe them as faint at all. (This is coming from someone who never hears her mobile phone even when it's up really loud!) So yeah, I'm amazed that some people honestly can't hear anything when the 18 plays and some of you describe pain rather than sound toward the larger numbers - I found it the opposite - I thought 12 was horrible to listen to but 18 was quite reasonable - annoying but not painful!! In case you're interested, I'm 20 years and 5 months old.

23 October 200715. Ian:

I'm 34, and I can still hear the 18KHz just fine. Of course, as Matt mentioned, I can also hear power hums from TV's and other devices, which my 33 year old wife cannot. I haven't lost high freq hearing yet, but I have picked up tinnitus from several teen years of loud head-banging metal.

23 October 200716. Ian:

Just found another website (click my name to find it) that goes up to 20KHz. I can hear the 18KHz clear as day, the 19 is very faint, and I can just barely make out the 20KHz. I had to crank the volume *way* up to hear the 20KHz, and most of the way up to hear the 19KHz.

28 October 200717. Bradley:

Im 14 and could hear them all.but my aunt and grandma could hear them all to and my aunts 29 and grandmas older.But does it matter if the speakers all the way up because they were?

5 February 200818. Ethan:

I'm 16 almost 17 and I can hear all of them just fine...the lower frequency hurts my ears really bad and makes it really uncomfortable...hopefully I can keep my good hearing ^_^

13 February 200819. piker:

What?

15 February 200820. Alex Houston:

WooooooooooooooW i heard all of em but i only heard a faint 18 khz lol btw im 13 lol going on 14 in April so ya lol 11 is soooooo annoying xD but noone else in my family heard it lol thats fudged up xD

22 February 200821. Chris:

Hmm, they get progressively harder to hear, up to 16, which is very faint, but then suddenly on my PC 17 and 18 are easy to hear again. What's going on? Perhaps a problem with the computer not being able to play these high freqs?

24 February 200822. Jack:

u guys r making me feel bad... im 16 and on full volume i can hardly hear 18 id bet i couldnt hear 19...

5 March 200823. Ray:

I'm 39. For 10 years I was a piano tuner - I have trained hearing!

Like a few others, I can hear the whine of TV's and other electronic equipment and some florescent lamps too. I hear all the frequencies except 16kHz. There's something there, I just can't hear it!!! (My 12 year old son is amazed that he can hear 16kHz and I can't...) On another site I found 15.8 kHz and hear that just fine.

As far as some people reporting pain with some of the frequencies, I have found that different people hear certain frequencies differently - age is not necessarily a factor. Two people the same age can both hear the same frequency but one of them winces and the other looks at the first one wondering what's wrong. It's not something wrong with anyone's hearing, it's just differences in our ears.

The fact is that typically, younger people can hear a wider range of frequencies than older folks - especially the higher frequencies. And that's what the "Mosquito tone" is taking advantage of.

31 March 200824. Chance:

lol im 17 and i had the volume down to almost nothing and i could still hear the 18.

31 March 200825. Chance:

lol im 17 and i had the volume down to almost nothing and i could still hear the 18.

10 September 200826. Casper:

I have more than 40 years and i hear all frequencies. BUT, this is beacuse i think the Realtek equalizer help me. I do not know how to switch it off or set up. When all buttons are up its very easy to hear them all. Although 11 to 13 are really unbeareble.

5 October 200827. Nick:

ha i find it interesting how 1 person adds their age and everybody else has to share thier age. i am 15 lol. but seriously, i can hear the 18 w/ headphones, i dont hear much w/out them. i think since other ppl shared sum life "info" i will 2. it does get annoying sometime hearing tv's being turned on. sometimes ill just hear the random noice and it bothers me because i usually can never figure out what is making the darn noise. yes the "old fart" frequencies (11-14 or so) are very unbearable through headphones. jk i love old ppl. they make me laugh:)

13 October 200828. chelsea:

i can hear all of them except the 18KHz

17 October 200829. tim:

im 15 years old and i could all of them.. they all were annoying.

17 November 200830. nic:

I'm 42 and my GF is 53 and we both heard them all. My GF is losing her hearing through degnerative nerve disease.

17 November 200831. Stew:

I'm 37 and have been exposed to some loud music. I can hear 17 but only hear the start and end of 18.

17 November 200832. Stephen:

This is very interesting!

Im 39 and I hear all of them. Whats confusing to me is that 16 is relatively quiet but 15, 17 and 18 are horribly loud and annoying.

Any theories for this?

17 November 200833. mark:

11 made my ears bleed, 17's audible (i'm 35!)

17 November 200834. Owen:

I heard em all
there was a wierd dead spot when i turned my head for the 18KHz one, though.
turned 14 on the 15th, so.. yeah...
im also one of those ppl who can ehar the TV next door if its turned on, so long as its an older one

17 November 200835. Pyotr:

Oi, I have cheap headphones that can't play these notes. :(

17 November 200836. Cindy:

42 here and I can hear them all just fine. This is wonderful because my husband mumbles and tells me my hearing is off. HA! I'm going to test him on this later.

17 November 200837. Forrest Voight:

I'm not so sure about computer's ability to play these notes. Due to aliasing, they might be playing much lower notes, for example if they are being downsampled to lower than the Nyquist frequency. (38khz for the 18khz note)

17 November 200838. Forrest Voight:

Oops, 36khz if anyone cares.

17 November 200839. Meghan:

Wow, I could hear them all fine enough...But my ear drums started to hurt after 17.

Have anyone tried two at a time? OUCHY

17 November 200840. Lindsay:

I'm 17, and I could hear all bu the 18khz. Uh oh. Based on all of you guys' comments, I feel like my hearing is that of a 30-year-old.

17 November 200841. Mies:

Hear them all!! I'm 32 :) Even hurts...

I hear the bats too, when i'm in nature...

17 November 200842. fyre-chan:

I'm 30, 31 next month, and the 17 I noticed something, but it wasn't much, the 16 hurt a little, the 15 really hurt! I was scared to try the other ones...

17 November 200843. fyre-chan:

I'm 30, 31 next month, and the 17 I noticed something, but I'm not really sure that I heard it and wasn't just expecting to hear something... the 16 hurt a little, the 15 really hurt! I was scared to try the other ones...

17 November 200844. mr zauber:

Im 41, my brother is 33 - we both heard all of them quite clearly over the puter speakers at about half volume. Guess all of that metal in the 80's didnt do that much damage after all !

17 November 200845. zw:

My tinnitus is higher than 18 KHz, but it is some comfort to know I can hear 17 KHz as well as I think I always could.

17 November 200846. Andrew:

heh, I'm surprised I could hear all of them. I'm 19 going on 20, so yeah, I guess I'm a youngun', but I listen to so much loud music that I would have thought I'd have some hearing damage.

17 November 200847. hunter:

I can hear 17 KHz easily but I can barely hear 18....but it makes my head hurt when I hear it tho. im 15 going 16

17 November 200848. Matt:

Well, I could hear 18 if I turned up my volume. What's strange is that I can hear 18 through 20 just fine if I use a software tone generator...

17 November 200849. Julie:

I can hear up to the 17. But at 18 I can't really hear it, I just notice a difference in the ambiance. Of course, now my ears are ringing a little.

17 November 200850. tye:

ouch should have read the comments first im 30 i can hear them all to 18 and dam that hurt my head i thought i would be part deaf by now from working with air tools all day

17 November 200851. Adelle:

I heard 11, 12, 13, and 16. It was strange not to hear 14 and 15, and then for 16 to come through VERY faintly.

I am 48 years old. My 15 year old son could hear up to 16, but nothing beyond that. huh.

17 November 200852. Ross:

That's pretty neat.

I'm 34 and I could hear them all, loudly. What puzzles me is that I have ALWAYS used earbuds (way before the ipod made them trendy), I've ALWAYS played music (walkman, discman, mp3 player) at full volume - screaming loud. I still do. I've gone to over 300 concerts, and I still go very very often. LOUD concerts (try spending a night in front of Derek Trucks 2 amps). Anyway, neat experiment, I wasn't expecting to hear 16, let alone 18.

17 November 200853. Mike:

Well Im 45 almost 46 years old and I could hear all of them quite well!

17 November 200854. Mike:

Well Im 45 almost 46 years old and I could hear all of them quite well!

17 November 200855. Mike:

Well Im 45 almost 46 years old and I could hear all of them quite well!

17 November 200856. Mike:

Well Im 45 almost 46 years old and I could hear all of them quite well!

17 November 200857. Mike:

Well Im 45 almost 46 years old and I could hear all of them quite well!

17 November 200858. KJM:

I could hear them all. Kewl. I must be aging well. There might be something to be said for not shoving your head inside of speakers or conversely shoving speakers inside of your head. Rock on young ones1 I am 50. My boys (and grandsons) will get a kick out of this if they can hear it!

17 November 200859. Jimmy:

I'm 24 and I could hear all of them. I was actually worried I wouldn't be able to because of all the concerts I've been to. I've had plenty of that nice old tinnitus afterward (http://www.toothpastefordinner.com/111408/the-tinnitus.gif) so I guess I'm kinda happy I haven't totally hosed my ears. Cool beans.

18 November 200860. Bryan Bonilla:

If it interests anyone, I was waiting for one to load and clicked another. Playing two of them at the same time makes for an entirely different sound.

18 November 200861. Mel:

I'm 72 and my wife is 69 and we hear them all loud and clear.

18 November 200862. Jeff:

When I was in my high school health class, the TV would always get left on after the announcements and I always went and turned it off because our teacher couldn't hear it whistling. Now that I'm in college, the 17Hz ringtone interests me, but I wonder if young professors (in their 30s) may sometimes be able to hear it. I guess if that does happen, it won't sound like a ringtone. Let's just hope that they don't stumble.

18 November 200863. Max:

Hi all, I'm a mastering engineer, so I work with audio all day, and I've got really trained hearing.
I'm 27, but I can still hear the 17khz just fine. And yes, me too I'm one of those guys who can hear if a tv is on from the faint noise coming from the cathodic tube.

I can't hear the 18khz tho, but we're approaching the limits of human hearing there anyways.
We all lose the capability to hear 18khz very soon in our life.

I'm pleased I'm still ok with the 17khz tho :)

18 November 200864. AnJaCo:

I'm 55 and I could hear all of them loud and clear. So I too fired up Audacity to make sure I was hearing what you say we are hearing. Sure enough, we are. So I tried 19KHz and 20 KHz. Heard them too. And Audacity doesn't go any higher. [Darn, what IS my limit?].

Its all rather puzzling, 'cause when I was tested by an audiologist about 15 years ago, my chart showed a clear drop-off in the higher frequencies, as one would expect from some one who had done some [loud] factory work when younger, plus there was that Who concert [Quadrophenia tour] that left my ears ringing for three days.

Can any Ear People explain this?

18 November 200865. gWallet:

Very strange. I've heard this theory as well, but was able to hear all the tones (aged 32). Like some of the other posters above, I went into Audacity as well and generated the tones just to check your test examples. All checked out. Odd.

18 November 200866. Roy:

I am 38 and I have tinnitus ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tinnitus ) but I can hear all of those sounds. I wish the ringing in my ears would go away tho.

-=R=-

18 November 200867. Leslie:

I am 34 and I heard them all quite clearly and loudly. The 16Khz was the the only one I could barely hear. What does that mean?
I got teenager hearing?

18 November 200868. Bas:

I am 31 and I can hear all of them except for 18kHz. My daughter of 3 is hearing that one too (but it hurts her neck ?!?). Like some others: I can still hear it when a television is on.

18 November 200869. fanny:

on my speakers the 17 and 18 produce a lower tone than the 16

18 November 200870. Lozzaaa:

I'm 17 but i couldn't hear the 18KHz tone... Too many nights spent next to the speakers at gigs I guess.

18 November 200871. Michael:

I can't hear 18. But try playing 11 and 18 at the same time. It's the magic of science happening in your ears!

Then try being an experimental electro-composer by pressing all the buttons randomly.

This helps you forget your long lost youth.

18 November 200872. Jason:

I've heard of this before, but never tried it out until I found this site with Stumbleupon.

I can proudly say that I recently turned 30 and can hear every single one of them with crystal clarity which is kinda amazing cause I listen to my music really loud.

Anyways, woot, go me! :D

18 November 200873. brittynoel:

@sara
no, 18 is not a trick.
i can hear them all.
im only 16, though. :]

18 November 200874. Misty:

I'm 42 , been subjected to very loud music and noise from work every single day, never wear hearing protection and have some hearing loss but i can still hear them all and find the lower frequencies unbearable to listen to.

If the world didn't suck we'd all fall off !

18 November 200875. scott:

i can hear them all, i am 34 years old, however i found that 16KHz was the one i almost couldn't hear. odd, maybe too many 2 cycle engines and all the guns i have fired have affected that frequency.

18 November 200876. CharlyO:

At 51 I'm very pleased to hear all of these tones - all as complete sounds. There was one sign of fading in the 16k tone - it was only about one half the volume of the rest. But 17k and 18k were both strong and clear. Wow.

18 November 200877. Dawnstar:

I"m 41 and i heard them all

18 November 200878. j_teether:

I'm 19 and could hear up to 16 and mostly feel 17 & 18.

Try playing all of them at the same time. That's a funky noise.

18 November 200879. casio:

I couldnt hear #18! its it true that your wife heard it?

Dan, you heard them all?

18 November 200880. Rian McCarthy:

I'm 18 and I could hear them all loud and clear! It's a very uncomfortable sound! :(

18 November 200881. Samuel Wright:

Funny... I could hear them all, but 15 and 16 actually made me dizzy and 18 gave me an almost instant headache.

I am 40, but my high range hearing is excellent. I can hear a digital watch alarm from the other side of the house, and my wife's ultrasonic jewelery cleaner used to almost drive me to tears until I made her get rid of it.

Thanks for posting this. At least now I know if I get dizzy or a sudden headache around a kid, it is not just because they are annoying.
;-)

18 November 200882. katie:

Hmm, I'm 15 and I can hear them all fine, the first few really hurt my ears though.

18 November 200883. Rebecca:

24 and I could hear them all! 18 made me dizzy and made my headache not very happy with me .

18 November 200884. Colleen:

32 years old here, and I could hear them all. I always thought my hearing was going too...

18 November 200885. pete:

I'm 31 and could hear all of them clearly na-na-na-na-na-na

My ears are still ringing...

18 November 200886. Shadus:

31, can hear em all. The 17hz is hideously offensive. The 18hz I can hear, but it doesn't hurt my ears like 17hz. Oddly I play music at what most people consider deafening, and have listened to music in headsets at max volume for over 20 years. Apparently either my ears are resilient or they're completely off on loud noise effecting your hearing.

18 November 200887. Sarah Leap:

I tried this with my 3 yr old daughter sitting nearby. I played the 11 first and she asked what it was. I told her it was just my computer. Then I want down and played 18 and she said there it is again! She could hear every one of them. I only heard down to 15. 16 was total silence to me. I'm 25. Pretty cool though.

18 November 200888. jamie:

im 34, ive got a sore head now, im going to bed

18 November 200889. EWOKDUNG:

I'm 51, and I could hear 16 KHz, however, after reading through a year and a half of posts, I'm now blind!

18 November 200890. LesLie:

im 17 and i can hear all of it...17khz is much louder than 16khz though for me...and the same goes with the 18 and 16...is that weird?

19 November 200891. Tom:

I'm 21 and I couldn't hear 18!

19 November 200892. Laura:

I'm 28-29
Couldn't hear 17hkz and 18hkz at laptop speakers, but could hear it at headphones.

19 November 200893. Brian Szymanski:

Neat idea, but it doesn't really work. I can't hear 16 or 17, but I *can* "hear" 18khz -- really I'm just hearing some miscellaneous noise that my laptop speakers are putting out because they aren't designed to reproduce such high frequencies (there's no need). If I listen to the notes in order, there is a big disconnect. With headphones, I can hear somethng at 16 and 18, but not 17. So the tone test would only work if you could control the hardware producing the frequencies too - ie you'd have to make a physical device.

19 November 200894. P.Tsunami:

27 years old here, and I've already had quite an impact on my ears from many years doing rock gigs and a year in the armed forces. I heard the 15k somewhat clearly. Everything above, I -think- I heard, but it's impossible for me to tell if I did hear it, or if I imagined it because I -knew- it was playing.

So here's an open suggestion: Samples without the starting clicks (and even better, samples with a few seconds of dead silence before hand) would make it easier to see if you can hear them, or not. IMHO.

19 November 200895. AndyB:

Whoooo!!!!
32 and can still hear all of them. The downside is that the mosquito above the local minibank is a reyt royal pain in the (_._)

19 November 200896. Antti:

This depends on the sound system you have.
I played them with my home system (which is high end) and could hear all of them easily but the 3 highest were really weak with my head phones.

19 November 200897. Hostgator Hosting:

I am 24 and I can't hear the 18kHz!! :( 17kHz is still okay..aiks..

19 November 200898. Tim:

This is kind of funny. I'm 23 and I can hear them all perfectly.. listening to them I was thinking to myself 'how could one *not* be able to hear this.. it sounds so clear?' The brain is a mysterious thing I suppose.. I'll bookmark and come back in a year :)

19 November 200899. terrafirma:

I am 34 and My headphones acoustics do not respond after the 12Khz.... grrrrrumph...

19 November 2008100. Sierra:

I can hear up to 17 and wow is it high pitch and gave me an instant headache!
My mom, who is 45, could only hear up to 12! very interesting. =]

19 November 2008101. Kolino:

My dog left the room and i got an earspliting shriek now my ears are ringing.

19 November 2008102. Peter:

I'm 56, and unfortunately, can't hear 12kHz and above. have worked in noisy industry most of my life though. There is a slight blip, just as each tone starts @ 12kHz and above.

19 November 2008103. Lee:

I'm 52 and could hear all of them except 16ghz...?

19 November 2008104. RobS:

What ? I'm 50 and deaf as a post. Worked in noisy industry all of my life and I could hear all but the 17 &18 kHz of these frequencies loud and clear.
My deafness threshold is much lower and completely gone when multiple voices are present. strange huh ? I think the tinnisitus is the same frequency as the 18kHz as I can still hear it as I type.
ha ha ha

19 November 2008105. Jason:

I'm 37 and I heard them all, really loud. I wish I hadn't as my ears are still ringing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

19 November 2008106. Geezer:

Im almost 60 and heard them all clear as a bell...

19 November 2008107. Vicky C:

This is really weird I heard all of them except 17. Why would I be able to hear 18 and not 17? Weird.

19 November 2008108. Amanda:

I can hear all of them, but for the last two my volume has to be up higher than the others to hear them and they weren't as harsh on my ears as the others. I'll be turning 20 next week. I find it odd that i had a harder time hearing the last two since I usually hear the awful noise a tv makes when it's turned on.

19 November 2008109. Grumblebum:

Could hear 13 and just hear 15, despite tinnitus, traffic noise, and the fact I'm 72 in the shade.
But don't ask me later to remember what numbers I could hear ... short-term memory-loss will delete my scores! Sigh!

Ageing is a bummer, but it beats the alternative.

19 November 2008110. Minte:

Ooh, I got some people from my house to come over, since they were like, "what the hell is that noise? I think my ears are ringing." My Uncle (old guy) couldn't hear a single one of them, and my 13-yr-old sister could hear all of them.

The strange part is that I'm 17 and I couldn't hear very well past 16khz, and I had to turn it up to get that much. My mom wasn't that far behind, I think she could hear up to 14 or 15.

...You can actually get a beat frequency by playing more than one at once. >.

19 November 2008111. Joel:

I'm 33, and I can hear them all very clearly, except for 16 khz. That one I can't hear even a little bit - but 17 and 18 are easy to hear. Strange to have a gap like that...

19 November 2008112. Misty:

I can hear all the tones easily, but then, I'm only 18. My mum can hear up to 16, but not past that.

19 November 2008113. Michael:

I'm 67 and I heard them all with just ordinary speakers.

20 November 2008114. Sergio:

I am 40 years old i could hear all but 16. 12 was very faint but bothersome. All the rest were loud and clear.

20 November 2008115. Jenni:

I am 14 years old, 15 in June.

I can hear all of them and they all make me want to writhe in pain on the floor with my speakers on a low volume!

20 November 2008116. lykus:

I could only hear the final three while my music was playing.

20 November 2008117. Jamie:

If you're in the UK, the TV whines at 15.625kHz (the horizontal scan rate). For the US, it's 15.750kHz.

20 November 2008118. Bob:

I am a 61 year old male who worked in a noisy environment for many years.

I can hear all the tones when I turn up the volume?

20 November 2008119. Raizy:

I can hear all of them. I'm 22. Thats so interesting. How do I get that as a ringtone?

20 November 2008120. Manysounds:

FYI You can only hear these tones if your computer speakers are capable of reproducing them also!
In other words, don't take this as a real test unless you are playing the test back on professional audio equipment.

20 November 2008121. Born in the 70's:

I am almost 33, and I could hear all of them without headphones. (I did have to turn off the oscillating fan in my room to hear 18, though.) I thought for the longest time that I had a hearing problem because if others were talking around me, I found it hard to hear what the person I was talking to was saying. I went to an audiologist who told me that my hearing was great and that I just needed to try harder to pay attention. I eventually found out that I that the real reason for this problem is that I have ADD which is compounded by my overly-keen sense of hearing. argh! It's sort of ironic that my good hearing is often the biggest stresser in my day. I am certain that my days would be less stressful if I could not hear quite so well. However, it is a bit like having a second set of eyes, as I can acurately identify a whisperer from across the classroom. I suppose it is both a blessing and a curse for me.

20 November 2008122. davesworkout:

I could hear them all, and I'm 33.

Of course I can still hear the tv on somewhere in the house just like the other guy said - the whining of the tubes.

21 November 2008123. marciegreen:

im 35 and heard them just fine

21 November 2008124. Jeremy:

17 is ear piercing! I can't imagine anybody not hearing that. So odd how that works. Btw I hear them all fine, 16 being the "softest" but still no problem hearing it at all. I'm 30 and have earbuds in all day at work w/ music and talk radio O.o

21 November 2008125. Daven:

I could hear all of them quite clearly (28 years old). However, i've always had the problem of being able to hear high pitched noises. It kills me when people leave a tv on even if it is muted because of that really high pitched sound it emits along with a lot of other electronics. It's kind of annoying really. You're not missing out if you can't hear them.

21 November 2008126. Sexy Cheese:

I can hear up to the 17khz. It gives me a head ache though. Its weird. Im 29.

21 November 2008127. Old guy with young ears:

My ears really need to grow up. I'm 35 and could hear them all clearly. I'm the same as other posters and can hear a mute TV whine or stereo left turned on. I unplug my microwave oven because I can hear the clock when it's flashing.

21 November 2008128. Ally:

I heard all of them really well except for 16, which was weird, because I couldn't hear it at all, yet 17 and 18 were really loud. I'm 23.

21 November 2008129. Shackleford:

I'm 34, and 16 was quiet, couldn't hear 17 or 18.

I can tell if a telly is on and muted in another room just by listening.

21 November 2008130. Christopher Richardson:

I'm 52 and I can hear everything except the 16khz. I think it is because I have a permanent 16KHz ring in my ears.

21 November 2008131. Anne:

I am 40 and I can only hear up to and including the 15. Even when turning my speakers all the way up. But, my cat hears them all, and I don't think she cares for them.

21 November 2008132. Jayenkai:

Tried on Vista, heard everything..
Tried on XP, heard it as it should sound.. (Same system.. VISTA SUCKS!!!!!!)

As is should be, I heard up to and including 16, and nothing beyond. That's kinda worrying!

21 November 2008133. Jessica:

I'm turning 18 next month, fyi.

I could hear 11 thru 13 clearly.
14 faded half way through it.
And I couldn't hear the rest.

My ears are old. ;-;

21 November 2008134. Gemma:

All the way to 18! I'm so glad, I think I would have cried if I couldnt.

I turned 24 this month.

21 November 2008135. Caroline:

I'm 30 and I can hear them all, they are horrible! Maybe it's genetics or something that means some can hear them for longer. My parents can hear up to 15 but they are in their 50s after all :)

21 November 2008136. Gomez:

Surely all this is testing is the upper frequency responce of your PC's speakers?

21 November 2008137. Gub~Gub:

I'm 38 and can hear them all.

That reminds me of a fourth grade field trip to an art museum. A lot of kids were complaining of a high pitched tone, which we were told was caused by the 70's era security system. None of the adults said they could hear it. I got a headache.

21 November 2008138. beegly:

I heard them all, I'm 19 next week.
There we go.

21 November 2008139. Elena:

they are all so loud! and my sound wasn't even up loud!
xD
mind you...i'm 16
they are rather annoying though

21 November 2008140. SkUG:

I'm 28 and I heard them all, why are they so damn loud?

21 November 2008141. Rebecca:

I'm 36 and I could hear all of them too....maybe it's because I don't blast my music all the time.

21 November 2008142. Simon:

The odd-numbered ones are a lot lower in pitch than the even-numbered ones.

I call shenanigans.

22 November 2008143. Carter:

I could hear all of them(im 13) but about the snapple cap i can lick my right elbow and have been able to for 2 years because im "triple jointed" my friends say.

22 November 2008144. dav0995:

I'm 37 and could hear all the noises quite distinctly and also for my work i've had to take a medical which only gave me average hearing so I don't think this test is that relevant and dosen't include any particularly high or low frequencies, although in the u.k. they have introduced low frequency emitters in some places to stop teenagers hanging around shops etc.

22 November 2008145. Vince:

Some of the higher frequencies sound lower than the lower ones, probably because the samples have been mp3 encoded which strips out frequencies we're not supposed to be able to hear.

Also, you need to set your sample rate to 96KHz in Audacity (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyquist%E2%80%93Shannon_sampling_theorem )

Here's a real 18000 Hz clip
http://www.filedropper.com/18000

22 November 2008146. Sei:

Age 37, can hear all of them, had to turn the vol down to min as some of them are a bit painful. I can also still hear a CRT across the house through closed doors but seem to have managed to lose whatever frequency my wife speaks at.

22 November 2008147. Namowal:

I turn forty soon and I can hear all of 'em.
Whoohooo!

22 November 2008148. Norm:

I turned 40 this year and I can hear them all easily.
You kids.....

22 November 2008149. joel:

as anyone else tried pressing more than one tonw at a time? interesting effect...

22 November 2008150. Sarah C:

I did a little experiment with both earbuds and with the pc speakers. When I listened with the earbuds I heard all of the frequencies but when it was just the speakers, I only heard up to 16 khz clearly, with 17 khz just faintly there, but I don't think I could hear it if I wasn't viewing it on the screen and 18 khz wasn't detected at all. I did better than I thought I would because hearing loss is common in my family, especially starting at my age (32) but maybe it's not hereditary deafness we get but selective hearing ! ;-)

22 November 2008151. RobR:

I'm 62 and with earbuds can clearly hear #15. I believe I can just make out 16 and 17 but they're almost buried in the noise. #18 is just wishful thinking for me.

22 November 2008152. Kryn:

I don't know how I can hear all of them except 16. The others are as audible as one another (and painful) but 16 is completely silent to me.

23 November 2008153. Jamie:

At 35, I can;t hear the 18KHz one at all, but 17KHz is very clear.

The TV frequencies, if anyone cares are: 15.75KHz (NTSC, US) and 15.625KHz (PAL, UK).

23 November 2008154. Liza:

Well, I dunno what this test has proved. I turned 60 this year and had no problem hearing ALL of them! I know I'm over-sensitive to noise, frequently complaining about the neighbour's dogs barking, their radios, their doors banging. Perhaps, thanks to this test, I can now say to people 'see? I hear more than you do!'.

23 November 2008155. Paul Janaway:

My left ear can hear 11 KHz - 16 KHz and my right ear can hear 11 KHz - 14 KHz on this test.

I am 22 years old.

23 November 2008156. George Donnelly:

37 yo. hear them all. not especially painful either.

23 November 2008157. Siria:

Hmmm. Are you sure these are the correct frequencies?
I'm not doubting you but I'm 40 and I could hear all of
them, very loud and clear. Interesting test, thank you.

23 November 2008158. Brian:

Youngsters could hear them all but probably don't as they just don't listen ;)

I'm 43 and could hear the 15KHz painfully loud, the 16KHz just about but not the 17KHz, I had to use computer speakers.

23 November 2008159. Toni:

This drove my cat crazy.

23 November 2008160. Naomi:

I'm 19 and could hear all of them easily with headphones in, but only up to 14 without which worried me slightly until I decided I would stop being lazy and go and get my headphones out of my bag!

23 November 2008161. Gary:

I clicked 11kHz and didn't hear anything. My wife, however, sitting a few feet from me minding her own business said, "What the hell is that?"

She can hear 13kHz, but not 14kHz. (We're both 40). Our five year old can hear 15kHz. I don't know if he can hear any higher because he got bored and wanted to move on to other things.....

24 November 2008163. vic:

heard everything, and Im 30 already

24 November 2008164. Patch:

Im 35 and can hear all frequency's perfectly

there again A : I've always had sensetive hearing and B : I'm probably just a freak !

24 November 2008165. Kaolin Fire:

To the folks who tried it in Audacity and generated really high tones--Make sure your sampling rate can do them. ;) An 11khz sample is not going to represent a 20khz sound.

I bumped the sample rate up to 44khz and generated a 20khz sound and all of a sudden I couldn't hear it anymore. ;)

It's seeming like I can't hear over 10khz. 30. Lots of heavy metal and motorcycles? Definite (minor) tinnitus.

24 November 2008166. Karl:

hi! great article/blog! thanks for posting this. most interesting...

i'm 32 years of age and i came across this article after a friend sent it over following a mastering session for an album we're compiling...

i'm an audio engineer by profession... so i have my hearing tested once every two to three years. as you can imagine i have to really look after my hearing in this "loud" world in which we live i.e. ear plugs in loud clubs, only use open end headphones, etc... without it, i couldn't mix or master tracks properly...

and i'm happy to say that in the last ear exam i had, i could just make out a 17khz test tone at Sound Pressure Level (SPL) -14dB *.

* for those of you who are not familiar with dBs, 0dB is the highest SPL one can record at... it signifies maximum level, if you like... if any more volume is added, the signal simply "clips" or "distorts" (this is with a digital system). and as the level decreases, so the dB goes into negative numbers i.e. -14dB is lower than 0dB. each 3dB loss being equivalent to a halving in perceptible loudness (as dB is a logarithmic scale).

when i initially played your tones on my laptop, i could easily hear 16khz but i got nothing with either the 17khz or 18khz tones... as one might imagine, this baffled me somewhat, as when listening to them i noticed the SPLs for each of your test tones were 0dB i.e. maximum level recordings!?

so when i couldn't hear the 17khz at 0dB... well. it got me thinking about environmental noise...

i then decided to bring my laptop into the studio (a "dampened" or "sound proof" room) and trying playing the test tones there to see if that made a difference... but still i couldn't hear the 17khz nor 18khz tones.

again i sensed something was a miss (or perhaps i'm sensitive about my age, ha)... so had another think and figured perhaps speaker build/quality might be playing a hand in my apparent loss of hearing...

(either that or my memory of my recent ear exam, which demonstrated i could hear 17khz at -14dB SPL, was really another sign of aging!? a senior moment, as some call it...)

anyway... i decided to play it through the studio mastering monitors... these are high end speakers that give amazing detail and near perfect frequency response. if a 17khz or 18khz tone was there, these speakers would do their very best to reproduce it and allow someone to hear it... (the mastering monitors we use are Genelec 1032As, which are flat frequency response near field monitors).

and wow! what a difference they made... now i can easily hear 17khz... quite painful if listened to for too long. AND... *showing off* i can make out the 18khz, which is very very very faint. more of a "sensation" in my head than actually "hearing" it in my ears...

this got wondering whether others could hear these tones through these "high end" speakers... and over the last day we've had five people (age range between 30 and 40, most of whom love listening to their LOUD mp3 players for an average of two hours a day on the train)... and low and behold, they could all hear the 17khz tone... AND two of them could "hear" (or perhaps "sense" is a better description) the 18khz tone!!!

so according to the chart (and i flatter myself now) we must all actually be between 18-24! which is kewl... and sorta scary! but perhaps the real issue at hand is not hearing so much as... it's sound reproduction errors which result from marginalized, tacky and inferior speaker build!?

either that or we are freaks and our families (at some point in their convoluted mating rituals of the past) laid with bats!?

24 November 2008167. chris:

I have pretty poor hearing (even at 21!) but I heard all of them pretty clearly, 17 was piercing while 18 sounded quite low. Near where i work they have an 'anti-youth' security system that plays a really high pitched sound all the time, it's agony for me and I get strange looks off adults who are walking past as I clutch my ears screaming.

24 November 2008168. chris:

Oh, and whatever you do, don't play them all at once...

24 November 2008169. silverfin:

Thought I would let you know that I tried playing them on two different computers and they sounded quite different in timbre (same headphones). I'm not techy enough to know why this is, but it meant that on my Eeepc I could hear all of them, but on my iBook I could only hear the start of the 18kHz, not the full 5 secs.
(I'm 35, btw)

I also read somewhere that the (negative) correlation between age and audible frequencies is much weaker than it used to be, because the younger generation tends to spend so much time listening to loud music on headphones, and their hearing deteriorates earlier. Also gigs are louder, in general.
Hell, even unamplified orchestras are louder.

24 November 2008170. Dave:

This has made me sad how much I miss. I didn't hear any of them. I'm 55 and didn't realise my hearing was playing up until my daughter nagged me for ignoring her about ten years ago. I suppose it's got progressively worse and tinitus has increased too. I miss bird-song and such. Take my advice, don't blast your ears with loud music, I think that's what buggered my hearing when I was in my teens.

24 November 2008171. spikyface:

Couldn't hear any of them in firefox (cos the player doesn't work in it)

Which I thought was odd cos I can hear 2 types of high pitched whine just from my computer and the usual background tinnitus

Then played em in IE and decided this just punishes people with sensitive hearing (and I blast my music all the time too)

am 26 by the way

24 November 2008172. wef:

Karl (response 166) is the one that got it. Unless you have a system capable of reproducing these frequencies, you may misinterpret your results (and perhaps believe you cannot hear frequencies that in fact you can). In many of these responses, it's possible that the people are not hearing a limitation of the frequency response of their ears but instead their system - sound card, amplifier and (especially) speakers. Many speakers are not able to reproduce frequencies this high...

24 November 2008173. Tumleren:

Tried with a headset. Could only hear up to 15 KHz. And that's me, 17 going on 18 in a few days.

I noticed that 13 and 15 KHz doesn't really register for my left ear. I tried putting the headphones on backwards, thinking that they might be the problem, but it seems my left ear just isn't as good as my right.

24 November 2008174. badger:

I turned 29 just over 3 weeks ago, first time I've tried this and I heard all of the tones loud and clear. I used to be in a band and would've assumed that I had done some damage to my hearing over time but it genuinely appears not to be the case.

24 November 2008175. Terra:

Oh god- they all tickled my ears and into my nose. Made my right eye water. Heard them all loud and clear (surprising after so many rock concerts) and now my eyeball hurts. Thanks.
-26, metal head

25 November 2008176. simon:

where can i get these to download? as in the mp3 files?
thanks

25 November 2008177. Ellen:

I'm 57. I could hear all but one. Some were so loud, I had to pull away the headphones. On #16, all I could hear was humming & clicking. What's up with that?

26 November 2008178. Beto:

I'm 21 and had no problem hearing any of them. 16 was the quietest while 17 and 18 were the loudest. Now that I think about it, I do observe excessive silence when I stay up at night. From my own observations I've found that sound travels much further through cold air.

26 November 2008179. SpaceLister.com:

31 and heard them all

26 November 2008180. Mark Mueller:

33 here! I can hear all of them except 16 (like another poster said, I can hear that something is going on, but I can't really hear the tone.) That seems kind of weird.

27 November 2008181. Scott:

it is really cool to mix the sounds together!

27 November 2008182. max:

im 23 can hear all of them in both ears !

27 November 2008183. phrawzty:

I can hear each of the tones - and none of them are too pleasing. :P

29 years old, male, spent every weekend between the ages of 16 and 21 listening to loud pounding techno music...

27 November 2008184. Conal:

I'm pushing 41 and can hear all of them... all quite annoying.

29 November 2008185. Marty Winn:

I was surprised that I could hear them all (just barely) at 38 and with what my wife considers to be bad hearing.

29 November 2008186. Connor Krgr:

I'm 15 and I can hear all of them pretty well, although they get quieter once I reach 16, but I can certainly hear 18.

30 November 2008187. bigbro:

i could here only 11 and 12 with headphones on my wife could here all of them i new i was deaf but not how deaf

1 December 2008188. Wil:

Fudge man, I'm 15 and I heard all of them. And I have a bloody headache to boot, joy of joys, i'm a pissed off young'un now XD

2 December 2008189. Doyle Farr:

I'm 44, turn 45 in 4 months. I can hear all the tones loud and clear......I ran them through my my stereo speakers first, then tried them through my headphones (Noise Canceling). The tones gave me a slight headache.

Side note: The first 30 minutes of the French movie "Irreversible" has a background tone with a frequency of 28Hz (low frequency, almost inaudible), similar to the noise produced by an earthquake. In humans, it can causes nausea, sickness and vertigo. It was the main cause of people walking out of the theaters during the first part of the film. The tone was added with the purpose of getting this reaction as the first 30 minutes is a very brutal rape scene. I don't recommend the movie for the faint of heart. That first 30 minutes was hard to watch.

14 December 2008190. Lukki:

There is a huge variable missing from this test, and that is the sound replication capabilities of the speakers you are using.

I happen to be using studio near-field monitors, but I bet that more than half of you that cannot hear the tones above 15Khz is because the speakers you are using cannot reproduce sounds any higher than that.

15 December 2008191. Richard:

32 and can hear all of them even the 18Khz, I can also hear the high pitch wine CRT monitors and TV's make when on, Why I use LCD^_^. CRT's gives me a headache if i'm around them to long.

I think what it really is is volume, high pitch sounds at low volumes don't travel long distances, so the student with the cellphone can hear it but the teacher at the front of the class can not. Not that the teacher has worse hearing then the teenager.
Thats just plain Physics. High Frequncys require more energy to travel longer distances then lower ones, Why old Ham radio can traval around the world but FM can olny go about 50 miles from the source.

15 December 2008192. Jedi:

I didn't realize before that my HP notebook's speakers can play this high. Anyways, I tried with my amplifier, with the same results: I could hear neat sounds up to 17KHz, only the 18 was unhearable for my ears. I'm 35. I tried this with my sons, 10 and 6 old: both could hear all the tones.
About TV whine: I can hear it too, it really disturbs me.
Richard: the radio frequency is something else, lower freqs up to SW can travel long distances because they are reflected from the Stratosphere even multiple times, the FM is not, because it can penetrate the Stratosphere with no problem (think of the satellite communication). You can't receive FM broadcasts from farther distaces then 50 KM because it spreads in straight line, and the Earth is round, so after 50 KM u get "under" the wave. Get higher (on a mountain, for example) to receive transmissions from far away. Anyways, yo're right, the high sounds can't get as far as low ones (at least in the air).

23 December 2008193. thom:

im 29 and an audio (studio) engineer and live performer of some pretty fast and loud electronic music, have always been careful with my hearing especially in the past 5 or 6 years - i always thought my hearing was exceptional due to the pain threshold seeming much lower for me than my friends, and attributed my flair for audio work to be a natural extension of my 'superior' hearing but;

i can't hear past 16k on these files.

i think this is most likely to be an inaccurate test firstly because of the possibility of limited frequency response of the speakers on my macbook, and secondly compression artifacts introduced since the audio files left audacity.

if we ignore those considerations and accept the results as fact, i feel that they have more to do with natural deterioration due to age than to exposure to these frequencies at damaging levels in the past.

first thing in the morning i shall fire up protools and run the 18khz sine wave through my adam p22s which are rated upto 35k :)

2 January 2009194. Willem:

41 years old - all loud and clear!

2 January 2009195. Erin S.:

I am 19 and can hear all of them, though they all hurt quite a bit. Piercing noises are not my idea of fun. I'm surprised I could hear them, though, because I was a trumpet player in band for 6 years, always in front of percussion. If you don't know what that's like, here it is: OW. I also listen to music loud, so I have trouble hearing things but i can also hear the whine of the TV as soon as I enter the house. Weird. And because of band when it's quiet my ears ring. Another reason I'm surprised I could hear them all.

5 January 2009196. Lori:

I could hear all but the 18. I'd also like to point out that I'll be 32 tomorrow. My dog was none too pleased by it, though. He actually assumed a defensive pose in front of me! I have to say it was pretty funny. Thanks for making me feel young and fit!