[PD] Headphones question on pd list

[Mathieu Bouchard]

On Wed, 24 Aug 2011, Jonathan Wilkes wrote (outside of pd-list):

> If I do this, can't I be fairly certain that I won't get a sound with 
> greater perceived volume than the clipped [noise~]--[*~ 999999] that I 
> started with? [...] I'm just talking about things that could potentially 
> cause ear damage.

a harsh-clipped [noise~]-[*~ n] is probably close to the highest loudness 
you can get, even for not-so-high values of n.

However, if you want to find the loudest, you'd have to start from the dBA 
loudness curve, and try to solve an equation involving a bunch of samples 
that can range from -1 to +1... at 44100 Hz over 1 second, that'd be 44100 
variables, for example, though a lot less variables could be enough to get 
an idea. It doesn't look like an easy problem to me, but I haven't tried.

And then, the loudness curve, the pain curve and the damage curve are 
three different things. I don't even know whether the latter two have been 
computed. My only real experience with the loudness curve(s) is from 
writing Alexandre T Porres' externals (for what he presented in Weimar). I 
haven't studied the topic much more than that.

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| Mathieu Bouchard ---- tél: +1.514.383.3801 ---- Villeray, Montréal, QC