High Definition Audio Test Files

Foreword

This page gives you access to high definition audio test files, with sample rates as high as 192 kHz. Unlike our other sections, these sounds won't play online: higher sample rates are not your browser's best friends, and cannot be encoded in the mp3 format either. Instead, these high definition files will download straight to your disk as uncompressed .wav files.

The purpose of these test tones is to offer you a way to assess the quality of your digital audio interface or digital-to-analogue converters, when fed with high-definition sample rates. These rates are able to reproduce frequencies beyond the human hearing range but can generate aliasing in the audible range too.

Use the frequency sweep files to determine if what you hear strictly relates to the input file's content, or comes from deficiencies in your high-end digital audio system as well.

High Definition Frequency Sweeps

These sweeps start from 1 Hz up to the Nyquist frequency (half the sample rate) in a 30-second time span (linear time sweep), playing at -3dBFS.

The test starts by playing frequencies that are in your hearing range, and then they will steadily increase. As the sweep enters ultrasonic range, the sound will fade away. Listen carefully; the rest of the file should remain perfectly silent.

If you hear anything while the file sweeps the ultra-sonic range, either you have bat-ears, or - more likely - your digital audio system suffers from severe aliasing.

High Definition Chirp Tones

Chirp tones are similar to sine sweeps, but span the whole frequency range in a much shorter time: here 0.5 seconds. Each chirp tone plays at -3 dBFS. Use these files to measure frequency responses, or capture room reverberations through the impulse response method.

High Definition White Noise

White noise is characterized by a flat power spectral density: the signal contains equal power within a fixed bandwidth at any centre frequency. All files are 30-second long, and play at -3 dBFS.

High Definition Pink Noise

Pink noise is characterized by a power spectral density that is inversely proportional to the frequency: each octave carries an equal amount of noise power. All files are 30-second long, and play at -3 dBFS.

Related pages

Internal Links

• What is Aliasing?
• Limits of the human hearing range

External Links

• High Quality Test Tone Generator (sample rates up to 96kHz)
• Advantages and drawbacks of higher sampling rates

Help Me Help You!

Is AudioCheck free? Not for me. Your support keeps this site running. Any donation will be rewarded with • uncompressed .wav file download for every test (a download arrow will appear next to each sound icon) • increased durations and sample rates up to 192 kHz in the Tone Gen section • and, best of all, the removal of these pesky payment buttons below 😜

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Pure (Sine) Tones

• Full Sine Sweep (20-20,000 Hz)
• Low End Sine Sweep (20-200 Hz)
• Perceptual Sine Sweep (20-20,000 Hz)
• Sine Bursts (20-200 Hz)

Distortion

• Total Harmonic Distortion NEW
• Intermodulation Distortion (IMD) Test Tone

Noises

• White Noise
• Pink Noise
• Brown (Red) Noise
• Blue (Azure) Noise
• Violet (Purple) Noise
• Grey (Perceptual) Noise

Impulse

• Impulse Tone

Dynamic

• Dynamic Test Noises

Higher Sample Rates (up to 192 kHz)

• High Definition Audio Tests

Others

• Brown Note
• Shepard Tone Illusion