I was sitting in the metra with my headphones on. My headphones are of high value and have updated technology for noise cancelation. They are good at active and passive noise cancelation. But my next person was continuously chattering and was disturbing me, Then I thought is there any headphone which can cancel the human voice?
I have written in my article “headphone tutorial part 5”
“Eliminating unwanted outside noise in order to enhance the listening experience is noise cancellation. However Noise-canceling
Active noise canceling (ANC) is usually limited to lower frequencies of sound, below 1 kHz.Technically, it detects and analyzes the sound pattern of incoming noise and then generates a mirror “anti-noise” signal to cancel it out. The end result is that you hear a drastically reduced level of noise. It can eliminate jet engine noise, screaming babies noise but not hiss from the airplane’s ventilation system.”
Human Voice Cancellation
But I never thought of human voice cancelation. On googling I found active noise cancellation technology performs best for frequencies under 500 Hz and efficient only up to approximately 1000 Hz.
Current active noise canceling technology works best for frequencies below 500 Hz and is somewhat effective only up to about 1000 Hz. So engine roar and traffic noise are mainly under 500Hz and significantly turned down or fully eliminated with active noise cancellation.
The human voice starts at 500Hz and goes up to 2-3KHz.Now here comes my article handy.ANC can not cancel this noise. This type of sound-canceling works well on monotonous continuous sounds quite well, such as motor noise, air duct noise, etc. It does not work well on sounds that continuously change in frequency and amplitude, such as human voice (conversation) and even music (especially the more dynamic variety). Electronics so far available can not cancel this
I have explained about Passive noise. The human voice is passive noise and can be best avoided by the type of padding of the cups. I conclude this human voice can be canceled to some extent by physical means of designing ear cups and their tightness to ears.
The best noise-canceling headphones have the technology to reduce the noise level up to 15-20 dB for frequencies of 500Hz to 1.5 kHz. Human noise is above this level. Thus they can’t cancel human noise because of their high frequency.
Noise-canceling headphones work through a system that picks up the exterior sound and then adds the inverse to the audio, effectively (more or less) canceling or reducing the exterior sound. Microphone and electronics that analyze incoming sound and generatee the opposite sound to cancel those sound waves. Now it all depends on how fast the signal can get through the process for creating the opposite sound to cancel the income sound.sound travels at 767.269148 miles per hour. That’s 4,051,181.1 feet per hour, or 1125.3 feet per second, or 13,503.9 inches per second. Now, this is a challenge to acoustic engineering to how fast the opposite wave is created to neutralize the noise.
A challenge to acoustic engineering
Noise-canceling headphones work through a system that picks up the exterior sound and then adds the inverse to the audio, effectively (more or less) canceling or reducing the exterior sound. Microphone and electronics that analyze incoming sound and generatee the opposite sound to cancel those sound waves. Now it all depends on how fast the signal can get through the process for creating the opposite sound to cancel the income sound.sound travels at 767.269148 miles per hour. That’s 4,051,181.1 feet per hour, or 1125.3 feet per second, or 13,503.9 inches per second.
Now, this is a challenge to acoustic engineering to how fast the opposite wave is created to neutralize the noise of high frequency more than 1.5KHz.
Solution to counter Human Noise
Keeping this inability of ANC I tried some of the best passive headphones (Sound Isolating) without bothering for the ANC system. I found they were great at music and with pretty good reduction of surrounding noises only because of the technical physical design of earcups, thoughtful cup material, and comfortably tight to ears.
Alternatively, In-ear models also called canalphones can seal off most external sounds as well, if they are properly used and seal your ear canal effectively. Choosing the proper eartip, whether the right size of soft silicone ear tip or third-party options like Comply foam replacement tips or Laprite Earphone Tips, is crucial to make this option work well.
