Hey guys,
I bought a One X recently, and I am noticing some static/hiss/noise coming from the headphones.
I tried connecting my One X to bigger speakers, and the noise is more noticeable this way. This is an odd issue, because none of my other phones behave this way.
The funny thing is, if you play music or notification noises play when the phone is connected to speakers, the noise goes away. But after one second, when the DAC shuts off, the noise comes back again.
My friend's One X has this problem as well, so I don't think I just have a lemon here.
Other forums seem to be talking about this issue as well
http://www.htconeforum.com/forum/htc-one-x-help/300-htc-one-x-sound-issues-headphones.html
http://www.htconeforum.com/forum/htc-one-x-help/327-sound-issue.html
I found one review that mentions this issue. They talk about it in the Beats Audio section, and there's a video with the noise.
http://www.tekgadg.com/home/2012/6/15/htc-one-x-rogers-review.html
I remember using a really cheap chinese knockoff mp3 player about 8 years ago, and the One X seems to have the same problem as that mp3 player. Could it be that the One X has a cheap DAC in it that causes this noise?
Anyone else experience this problem?
The first link is about the international version, the lte one x is technically the One XL, and this is the first time hearing about this. Mine doesn't have a problem and I listen to music all the time.
Just and idea possibly cheap headphones?
Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk 2
My music is crystal clear, probably one of the best quality sound outputs I've heard from a phone actually.
Mine has this problem, but I only notice when I hook it up to my car speakers (with an aux cable) and not with headphones (Bose). It's a lot more pronounced when the phone is plugged into usb as well. Once sound plays though, the hissing stops completely. It's only when there is no output that the hiss is present.
Edit: Could it possibly be interference from the cellular radio? Maybe once the DAC kicks in it filters out the interference?
Edit 2: Just read the 3rd link and yeah, my speculation seems to have some validity
"Adding insult to injury, HTC One X features a badly shielded headset jack that makes noise whenever it is hooked up to sensitive speakers. We compared it to high-end and low-end phones, and none of them made the annoying static noise that the One X makes. This isn't a serious problem for people who only listen to music through headphones, but you may want to stay away from the One X if you are thinking about playing music through it with big speakers."
I had the same problem. If you are rooted, disable beats audio notify with titanium backup. I did this and use power amp with custom eq settings and do not notice any hiss whatsoever.
Sent from my HTC One XL using XDA
Same problem here. WAY worse when plugged in and in my car. On regular headphones no problem. In my car it's huge. To me it reeked of a poor ground somewhere, to the point that I thought my unit was defective. If it were a shielding problem I would think it would be an issue all of the time, not just when the thing is "inactive" (ie not driving the jack). I've "disabled" beats to the extent that I can without rooting, and it had no noticeable difference.
Glad to hear it's not just me.
I notice the problem when I use both the microUSB charger and headphone jacket. Disconnect the charger cable usually solves my problem. Now, I switched to use BT car adapter instead of aux cable and I can use car charger without noise.
The problem is called BEATS AUDIO!
scroll to the bottom
http://www.gsmarena.com/htc_one_x-review-747p5.php
designgears said:
The problem is called BEATS AUDIO!
scroll to the bottom
http://www.gsmarena.com/htc_one_x-review-747p5.php
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I still get the hiss despite disabling Beats (as in just turning it off in the notification shade), although it is definitely not as bad as having Beats turned on. I'll freeze HTCBeatsNotify and see if it helps on the way to work tomorrow morning.
stnguyen09 said:
I still get the hiss despite disabling Beats (as in just turning it off in the notification shade), although it is definitely not as bad as having Beats turned on. I'll freeze HTCBeatsNotify and see if it helps on the way to work tomorrow morning.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sadly beats audio is integrated beyond what you can turn off in settings.
so, the only solution is to root the phone and completely kill Beats Audio?
I guess it's not a hardware problem then... Man, that sucks. Has this issue been brought to light by some big sites yet? We need to do something so HTC learns from this mistake.
By the way, here's the update I promised...
Like I said before, I disabled beats from the notification pulldown but the hiss was still there, although slightly less annoying. I froze HTCBeatsNotify (or whatever the actual name is) using TiBu so Beats doesn't even show up when I plug it in. Unfortunately, the hiss is still there at the same level it was at when I just disabled Beats from the notification pulldown.
Is Beats actually integrated into the hardware? Is the "poorly shielded headphone jack" mentioned in one of the OP's links still a valid assumption? Can someone running CM9/AOKP chime in on whether they get the hiss?
Edit: Before I head home today I'll go into Airplane mode to try to rule out the headset jack shielding.
Annnnd of course my experiment failed...hiss is still there
If the headphone jack is indeed poorly shielded, couldn't it pick up interference from anything? Not just the internal radios?
This means we'll have to go into some radio-free environment in order to determine whether it's the headphone jack or Beats Audio that causes this annoying hiss.
In either case, I'm disappointed in HTC.
ai4281 said:
If the headphone jack is indeed poorly shielded, couldn't it pick up interference from anything? Not just the internal radios?
This means we'll have to go into some radio-free environment in order to determine whether it's the headphone jack or Beats Audio that causes this annoying hiss.
In either case, I'm disappointed in HTC.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well I mean, the internal radio would be the strongest signal in the immediate area that would cause interference. Just look at old, poorly shielded computer speakers, they had issues only when a phone would go off within maybe a yard of them. I was in a parking garage at the time I tested and I'm not sure if there was anything else around that would be powerful enough to cause the interference.
Also something I noticed which may lend credence to the DAC being the source of the issue...Just plugging my phone into usb and having the headphone jack attached does not produce as much interference as when I'm streaming from Google Music and it gets caught buffering. As in, when the DAC would still be active but no audio is output. The hiss during that situation is quite a bit worse than just having the phone sit there not doing anything.
Since Beats is just a glorified equalizer, it could be that Beats just happens to be boosting the sound frequencies of the hiss and making it sound louder, and not the actual source of the hiss itself. So maybe it is a hardware issue.
Again, I can't imagine ti being "poor shielding" because that would not immediately go away once you started playing music. Think about typical cell phone interference from a radio. You're playing music, and you hear that "bvvvvrerrerrr" sound.
In the case of the HTC, as soon as you start playing music, the hum goes away IMMEDIATELY and completely as far as I can tell. If shielding were the problem it wouldn't it still be distorted regardless of whether the jack was actively playing anything or not?
Seems more to me that the DAC is leaving some signals floating, leaving them susceptible to noise, when it's not active, when it should be pulling them to a known state (probably ground)
Not from DAC either. If you plug in a headphone, you will not hear these noises. It seems only occur when you plug into AUX import of car or amps.
So, it is a hardware design problem that causes dirty interference escaped into audio output. When you plug in a normal headphone, it has very low impendence and the noise will not get amplifed at all. If you plug it into an AUX import, it will have a much higher impendence and hence the noise get carrier over and amplified.
foxbat121 said:
Not from DAC either. If you plug in a headphone, you will not hear these noises. It seems only occur when you plug into AUX import of car or amps.
So, it is a hardware design problem that causes dirty interference escaped into audio output. When you plug in a normal headphone, it has very low impendence and the noise will not get amplifed at all. If you plug it into an AUX import, it will have a much higher impendence and hence the noise get carrier over and amplified.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Your explanation makes perfect sense. This seems to be the issue.
foxbat121 said:
Not from DAC either. If you plug in a headphone, you will not hear these noises. It seems only occur when you plug into AUX import of car or amps.
So, it is a hardware design problem that causes dirty interference escaped into audio output. When you plug in a normal headphone, it has very low impendence and the noise will not get amplifed at all. If you plug it into an AUX import, it will have a much higher impendence and hence the noise get carrier over and amplified.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ai4281 said:
Your explanation makes perfect sense. This seems to be the issue.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think we have a winner!
On my tablet I always get a slight static hiss/background noise during and a couple seconds after the tablet plays any sound.
This seems very odd to me since it's not affected by how loud the volume is (as long as sound is on, not at 0).
I don't have this on any other outputs (HDMI/BT/USB OTG/build-in speakers, all fine)
Every headset/speaker I use outputs this from cheapo Samsung in-ears to a quite expensive 2.1 setup.
I'm used to having a bit of noise at the highest volume levels (which for ex. my Note 3 has) and consider this normal.
But this is very annoying, especially when navigating the UI as I always have to endure this hiss for a couple of seconds.
I'm not sure if it's a hard or software issue, since normally static hiss always occured to me on lower-end devices with higher volume, and if it were a software issue should it not also do this on all outputs (including digital).
I haven't come across anyone with a similar issue.
Yep, this happens for me as well on my LTE version. It also happened on the Nexus 7 2013. The noise is from interference from the other board components in close proximity to the audio chip.
jaredmorgs said:
Yep, this happens for me as well on my LTE version. It also happened on the Nexus 7 2013. The noise is from interference from the other board components in close proximity to the audio chip.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, I also have the LTE version.
Bleh, that's no fun and really annoying. I have never had anything from a reputable brand do this.
The next test would be to see if it does it through USB Audio or Bluetooth Audio. I have a Microsoft LifeChat 3000 headset that I have successfully connected to the tablet, which doesn't seem to have the hiss. It could be due to the impedance of the speakers of this headphone compared with my Shure SE425 IEMs that I notice it more. I also use Tri-flange tips on my IEMs which makes everything more pronounced.
jaredmorgs said:
The next test would be to see if it does it through USB Audio or Bluetooth Audio. I have a Microsoft LifeChat 3000 headset that I have successfully connected to the tablet, which doesn't seem to have the hiss. It could be due to the impedance of the speakers of this headphone compared with my Shure SE425 IEMs that I notice it more. I also use Tri-flange tips on my IEMs which makes everything more pronounced.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I did, My USB headset doesn't have this issue (plugged into the shield with a USB OTG cable), my 3.5 mm headphones and cheapo IEMs don't have the issue when plugged into a Sony SBH50 connected to the Shield (via Bluetooth), but they do have the issue when directly plugged into the Shield. Meh.
So that proves that it is the shielding on the 3.5mm jack.
Unfortunately, that's case closed. If it's any consolation, you get used to it after a while.
An update:
I tested with my PC's line-in input, and when I put it in any 24bit mode sound is crystal clear 24/7, I don't get any issues.
mic-in sounds garbage but that's to be expected (I can hear the tablet's internals cause distortion all the time.), it also doesn't always get detected by the tablet.
Is this of the lower impedance that the static noise gets filtered out? I'm not an audio expert.
Hello, my friend has an older phone with Android Gingerbread and she bought nice shiny new Sennheiser big headset with combined jack for both input and output. When she plugs it in and calls me she can hear me but I cannot hear her, because microphone does not work. The jack is totally the same as on other earbuds headphones with integrated mic which we have and which work with this phone just fine. The new shiny ones work with my newer (Xperia Z3 compact) phone with mic too. I don't understand what can be a difference. There is no settings in this LG Android regarding headphones or microphone. The icon in the top bar is always headphones regardless of if I plug the earbuds or the Sennheiser where mic does not work.
Any idea how to fix this or what can be causing this?
so this looks like a mystery I guess :-]
Hi,
Thanks for using XDA Assist.
What is the device of your friend?
Hi dear friends,
I'm having a weird issue with wired (jack) headphones during calls : I can hear my own microphone !
For example during a call, if I'm in windy conditions, I can hear the wind.
During such scenarios, my phone is in a pocket or in a bag, so the mic I hear is the one on the headphone's cable.
This problem arises with either the headphones provided with the Pixel, or with any other wired headphones kit (I've tested with a Samsung).
On headphones with volume control, I can even hear a loud sound when volume up or down ...
And this issue is here out of the box, without any APP installed.
My phone has already been replaced by Google support, but the issue is still there one the new one.
Does any of you Pixel 3a owners, have seen such an issue with its phone ?
This is normal operation.
If you are wondering why the noise cancellation isn't working better, you have to understand how it works. It compares the audio from the mic on the headphone wire with the audio from a mic(s) on the phone. Anything that both mics pick up is cancelled by the noise cancellation software because it is considered an "outside noise". But anything picked up on just the wired mic is considered part of the conversation and won't be cancelled out. That means if your phone is in your pocket and it isn't getting the same wind noise (for example), then the phone will not cancel out that audio because it's only being picked up by the wired mic and not both mics.
Hopefully that helps. If you want wind noise to be cancelled out, try holding your phone in your hand and see if that helps. But the wind noise may not be picked up even then depending on which way the wind is blowing vs what orientation your phone is being held in, so you might have to hold the phone a couple of different ways to find one that works the best at that time.
sic0048 said:
This is normal operation.
If you are wondering why the noise cancellation isn't working better, you have to understand how it works .....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for your reply
My guess is that this issue is not related to noise cancellation.
1) I've indeed mention that, in my test scenario, my phone was in my pocket. But I can remember of several times I was holding the phone in my hand, or phone was lying on a table, and even then the sound captured by both mics was audible by me.
2) When I'm in call with another person, and I'm hearing the wind in my own mic, the other person does NOT hear the wind.
Isn't anyone here using jack wired headphones ?