What is typically used to visualize the frequency components of sound?

A spectrogram is a powerful tool that visualizes the frequency components of sound over time. It displays how the frequencies present in a sound change, capturing the amplitude of different frequency components with variations in color or intensity, allowing for a multi-dimensional view. The x-axis typically represents time, the y-axis represents frequency, and the intensity or color represents amplitude. This makes it particularly useful for analyzing complex sounds, such as speech, where multiple frequency components are constantly changing.

A waveform display, while useful for visualizing the amplitude of a sound signal over time, does not provide insights into the frequency components; it shows how the overall energy of the sound varies. A line spectrum represents the frequencies present in a single snapshot of a sound and is useful for analyzing steady-state sounds, but it does not convey changes over time. The source spectrum specifically refers to the frequency components generated by the sound source, but like the line spectrum, it does not give a dynamic view of how these frequencies change. Hence, the spectrogram is the best choice for visualizing the frequency components of sound comprehensively.