Basic earphone knowledge
Release：2018-07-04 15:50:35 browse：
Headphones have a long history of electroacoustic conversion components. Modern Hi-Fi headset has been undergoing a development for more than half a century of knowledge and innovation, regarding the essence of electro acoustic. As well as, new developed technologies and materials for the headset, has made it possible to reach a very high level of electroacoustic performance. Compared with loud speaker systems, headphone systems tend to have more acoustic details in smaller products.
1. Types of headphones
The earphone is classified according to its mode of energy conversion, mainly with moving coil mode, electrostatic type and balanced armature type.
There are different types of headphones; open, half open and closed. In the form of wear, there are in-ears, on-ears and over-ears headphones.
The difference between open and closed headphones
The shell of an open headset is light and free of pressure. The open headset entails no isolation, resulting in sound leakage and the environment noise can disturb the music experience. Although the sound in an open headset have a natural and airy sound.
The closed headphones isolate and prevents the environment sound from entering the ear, reduces the leakage of sound, and is used a lot in professional recording and monitoring studies. The sound is very clear, rich in detail, a natural frequency response, and for mostly the closed headphones are airtight.
2. What is a hi fi headset?
Hi fi stands for high fidelity, which describes the given headset have a high quality of sound. In efforts to create this high quality of sound, it is very close to the original recording, which creates a sound experience very close to a live one. The hi fi headphones are usually closed headphones, which helps with wider and more natural sound.
In more technical terms; it has been defined that Hi-Fi has to comply the DIN-45500 standard as a guideline to be considered as real Hi-Fi. The specifications tell that an acoustic amplifier, radio, CD, mobile player, mobile phone must comply to less than 1% distortion in the bandwidth from 100-15000 Hz with a deviation on less than 8 dB, plus some other system requirement.
3.What is the range of the earphone's frequency response?
Frequency response can vary a lot from headphone to headphone, because the sound will have a different clarity. Which in technical terms means, the range of frequency response refers to the bandwidth that the headset can deliver. The excellent earphone response frequency is 5Hz-40000Hz, while the hearing range of the human ear is only 20Hz-20000Hz.
It is important to note that the standards for defining frequency bandwidth are different. For instance, with some headphones the frequency response is focused on the bass and therefore the frequency is lower, and some use a higher frequency to make the music sound lighter.
4. What's the headphone impedance?
High impedance is measured in ohms, which is measure of how much the electric signal resist the electrical current. High impedance often results in better sound quality and less power consumption in your headphones. However, this also means that you need an amplifier to create the best sound possible. For instance, a smartphone only has 35-ohm impedance, which means the quality of sound is also limited to the quality of amplifier and therefore the sound will not be as nearly as good as if you had an external music amplifier. The headphone socket will normally match with a professional audio interface for computer, power amplifier, VCD, DVD TV and other headphone jack output equipment’s.
The general use of high impedance headphones is the most used. If you use the headset with low resistance, you must first turn down the volume and then connect the headset to the music device. To prevent overload on a headset by burning the voice coil or for damaging the hearing.
It is recommended to also look at the sensitivity measured in DB/V or efficiency measured in DB/MW of the headphone to have an overview of the quality of a given headphone.
5. What is the harmonic distortion of headphones?
The total harmonic distortion (THD) is a measurement of a signal compared to the distortion and is defined as the ratio of the sum of the powers of all harmonic components to the power of the fundamental frequency. Distortion factor is a term used as a synonym. In audio systems, lower distortion means the components in a loudspeaker, amplifier or microphone or other equipment produce a more accurate reproduction of an audio recording signal.
6. What is the sensitivity of the headset?
In popular terms, the sensitivity of headphones means the amount of power to be used as input for the headphone. The higher the sensitivity, the less input power is required. For portable equipment such as a smart phone, sensitivity is a very important indicator. For a desktop computer, this indicator is relatively less important due to the more power available.
7. Cables for headphones will affect the sound signature.
The effect of cable on headphone sound is an undeniable fact. The cable signal line, in HI-FI systems in the different speakers have obviously influence to the nature of the sound also called the sound signature. The headset cables are no exception. In recent years, there has been launched several cables to improve the sound compared to conventional speaker cables.
8. Under what circumstances should the headset be equipped with power amplifier?
One situation is when a source used, such as CD/DVD machine who does not have output amplifiers, then it can be equipped with a headset amplifier.
The second situation is that the low sensitivity, high impedance headphones, using an audio source, such as smartphones will not be able to drive the headphone, in that case then an external headphone power amplifier is needed.
The third is in the high-end headset, where the amplifier is in a modest quality where the headset cannot play the headset potential, in this case, it should be considered to use a high-quality headset amplifier.
1. Types of headphones
The earphone is classified according to its mode of energy conversion, mainly with moving coil mode, electrostatic type and balanced armature type.
There are different types of headphones; open, half open and closed. In the form of wear, there are in-ears, on-ears and over-ears headphones.
The difference between open and closed headphones
The shell of an open headset is light and free of pressure. The open headset entails no isolation, resulting in sound leakage and the environment noise can disturb the music experience. Although the sound in an open headset have a natural and airy sound.
The closed headphones isolate and prevents the environment sound from entering the ear, reduces the leakage of sound, and is used a lot in professional recording and monitoring studies. The sound is very clear, rich in detail, a natural frequency response, and for mostly the closed headphones are airtight.
2. What is a hi fi headset?
Hi fi stands for high fidelity, which describes the given headset have a high quality of sound. In efforts to create this high quality of sound, it is very close to the original recording, which creates a sound experience very close to a live one. The hi fi headphones are usually closed headphones, which helps with wider and more natural sound.
In more technical terms; it has been defined that Hi-Fi has to comply the DIN-45500 standard as a guideline to be considered as real Hi-Fi. The specifications tell that an acoustic amplifier, radio, CD, mobile player, mobile phone must comply to less than 1% distortion in the bandwidth from 100-15000 Hz with a deviation on less than 8 dB, plus some other system requirement.
3.What is the range of the earphone's frequency response?
Frequency response can vary a lot from headphone to headphone, because the sound will have a different clarity. Which in technical terms means, the range of frequency response refers to the bandwidth that the headset can deliver. The excellent earphone response frequency is 5Hz-40000Hz, while the hearing range of the human ear is only 20Hz-20000Hz.
It is important to note that the standards for defining frequency bandwidth are different. For instance, with some headphones the frequency response is focused on the bass and therefore the frequency is lower, and some use a higher frequency to make the music sound lighter.
4. What's the headphone impedance?
High impedance is measured in ohms, which is measure of how much the electric signal resist the electrical current. High impedance often results in better sound quality and less power consumption in your headphones. However, this also means that you need an amplifier to create the best sound possible. For instance, a smartphone only has 35-ohm impedance, which means the quality of sound is also limited to the quality of amplifier and therefore the sound will not be as nearly as good as if you had an external music amplifier. The headphone socket will normally match with a professional audio interface for computer, power amplifier, VCD, DVD TV and other headphone jack output equipment’s.
The general use of high impedance headphones is the most used. If you use the headset with low resistance, you must first turn down the volume and then connect the headset to the music device. To prevent overload on a headset by burning the voice coil or for damaging the hearing.
It is recommended to also look at the sensitivity measured in DB/V or efficiency measured in DB/MW of the headphone to have an overview of the quality of a given headphone.
5. What is the harmonic distortion of headphones?
The total harmonic distortion (THD) is a measurement of a signal compared to the distortion and is defined as the ratio of the sum of the powers of all harmonic components to the power of the fundamental frequency. Distortion factor is a term used as a synonym. In audio systems, lower distortion means the components in a loudspeaker, amplifier or microphone or other equipment produce a more accurate reproduction of an audio recording signal.
6. What is the sensitivity of the headset?
In popular terms, the sensitivity of headphones means the amount of power to be used as input for the headphone. The higher the sensitivity, the less input power is required. For portable equipment such as a smart phone, sensitivity is a very important indicator. For a desktop computer, this indicator is relatively less important due to the more power available.
7. Cables for headphones will affect the sound signature.
The effect of cable on headphone sound is an undeniable fact. The cable signal line, in HI-FI systems in the different speakers have obviously influence to the nature of the sound also called the sound signature. The headset cables are no exception. In recent years, there has been launched several cables to improve the sound compared to conventional speaker cables.
8. Under what circumstances should the headset be equipped with power amplifier?
One situation is when a source used, such as CD/DVD machine who does not have output amplifiers, then it can be equipped with a headset amplifier.
The second situation is that the low sensitivity, high impedance headphones, using an audio source, such as smartphones will not be able to drive the headphone, in that case then an external headphone power amplifier is needed.
The third is in the high-end headset, where the amplifier is in a modest quality where the headset cannot play the headset potential, in this case, it should be considered to use a high-quality headset amplifier.
