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Possible damage from noise cancelling headphones?

Hi, I have purchased some noise cancelling headphones to listen to music on the train to work. My reason for buying them is to prevent the damage caused by listening to my music loud enough to block out the sound of the train. I am under the impression that noice cancelling technology works by listening to whats going on outside and having the reverse sound waves played through the speakers, thus cancelling the sound waves. My question is, do the sound waves actually get cancelled, and therefore can't cause hearing damage. Or actually, are they still there, even louder, but unaudiable? I know that when I am at very noisy stations, it feels like there is intense sound "pressure" on my ear drums, even though I can't hear anything. Am I worrying over nothing?

Cheers, Martin

Reply to
Martin Butt
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Yes. The phones probably can't cancel the really low frequencies ('pressure').

Reply to
Homer J Simpson

A review by 'The Gadget Show' a while back (channel five, UK) showed that passive noise canceling phones perform better and are cheaper. They have expanding rubber on the end which fills the ear to stop ambient noise. You can pick up a good pair for around £60 ~ $115. Also see these:-

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they fit on the end of your regular earphones to give a similar effect.

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Brendan Gillatt
brendan {at} brendan \removethis// gillatt {dot} co {dot} uk
http://www.brendangillatt.co.uk
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Reply to
Brendan Gillatt

Yes. The pressure waves are cancelled.

I could concieve of another type of noise cancelling system that I guess might damage your ears. It would involve balancing the pressure either side of your ear drum. Problem is that would need an anti-noise speaker up your nose ! If either of the speakers (the one on your ear or the one up your nose) was to break then your hearing would be subject to uncorrected noise - still only as noisy as the source though.

Reply to
CWatters

You could always ram a pen down your ear hole, cancelling all sound, ever again.

CWatters wrote:

Reply to
Martin Butt

But there surely is an idea !

Sound can be conducted through the bone in the head (just try tapping your teeth with a pen !)

A small 'piezo' disc transducer held onto a tooth and fed with anti-phase ambient sound might just cancel that heard by the ears ?

It's Sunday morning and I am almost inclined to give it a try !

Just Googled for 'tooth microphone' and found:

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Reply to
Mike Meakin

Bone conduction headsets have been available for many years. The earphone is also the microphone.

Reply to
Don Bowey

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