Abstract: In room acoustic measurement, the results of objective parameters can be influenced by the measurement techniques and instruments used. Traditional techniques are based on common sources(balloon, spark or pistols), and new techniques on the loudspeakers driven by digital signals. In this paper, traditional methods for room acoustical measurement are described. For three types of popular sound sources, i. e. balloon explosion, spark and random noise, their characteristics in both the time and frequency domains as well as the results of typical applications are compared and analyzed. It is concluded that among the three sources, spark is the best. All these sources do not have a satisfactory repeatability. They are most adequate for the measurements in rooms with long reverberation time. The applicability and limitation of these sources are discussed. It provides a foundation for further investigation.