What is a Decibel? — Logarithms & Math

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In the previous post, we learned that the decibels belongs to a group of units called a relative units. This means that decibels are always expressed as a ratio of a measured value to a known reference value. There is, of course, a bit more to decibels than dividing one number by another, but don’t worry—the math isn’t too bad. We’ll walk you through it nice and slow.

So, why bother with more math in the first place? Shouldn’t it ...

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What is a Decibel? — Relative Units & Reference Values

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The word decibel, abbreviated dB, seems to show up everywhere in acoustics: sound pressure levels, sound power levels, intensity levels, and even voltage levels. With so many usages, it is no surprise that a cloud of confusion lurks around the term. How could one unit describe so many different things? Shouldn’t different quantities have different units?

Well, the firstly it’s important to understand that the decibel is not an absolute unit like seconds or meters—it’s a relative unit. Absolute units can ...

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Adding Decibels

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Let’s say you are preparing to go camping and mountain climbing. When you look through your supplies, you find ropes of many sizes. Two of them are tied in knots. You think that combined the two knotted ropes might be long enough for your plan, but you aren’t sure. So what do you do?

Easy: you untangle the ropes so you can measure them.

Adding decibels works the same way—they need to be untied before you can use them to go adding ...

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