why does music sound so different through headphones compared to listening in your computer or in your car?
In: Technology
I would like to indirectly answer your question. Sound from a distant speaker (i.e., not-headphones) is, of course, “acoustic” (sound waves). However, when the source of the sound is actually touching you as headphones do, the sound waves can actually bounce around your skull which changes your perception. With sophisticated computer software, we have a pretty good idea of how skull resonance works so we can do fun things like use stereo headphones to fake 3D sounds. Sound processing can make it *seem* like you can hear sounds in front or behind you, or above or below you, even though you don’t have speakers in front/behind above/below your ears. Pretty wild stuff.
An extreme example of this is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bone_conduction. And here’s a product review that you may find interesting: http://www.techmoan.com/blog/2019/1/13/bone-conducting-headphones-aftershokz-trekz-air-review.html
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