soundcard limits (Score 1)

Even really "good" speakers cannot compensate for the limits of your soundcard.

The _highest_ frequency that a soundcard can produce is one-half of it's maximum sampling rate output. For must of us, that implies (44,100 * 1/2) = 22.05 kHz, which is not far outside the "average" upper limit of human hearing (20 kHz).

If you paid alot for your soundcard, you may be able to produce 24 kHz sounds (which, most likely, your speakers can't reproduce, your amplifier can't amplify, and you couldn't hear anyway).

I dont think there are any commercial speakers with a frequency response beyond 22kHz (yet), and most dont get past 20. Several companies are working on small piezoelectrics that will, at which point we will need better $oundcards and new $tereo $ystems.

The following article may be informative in this respect: Humans can't distinguish anything higher than 20 kHz, but...

-alec
Composer of "Music for 16 DogWhistles" (which uses a motif from Cage's 4'33")