Database Develop

[Q] galaxy s mic problem

hi:
besides the galaxy s I have a nokia 72e and I want to ask if anyone has a problem with microphone (with Galaxy s)? maybe is not something serious but when i`m talking from the e72 the people hear me more clearly than i talk from Galaxy s;they complain that my voice is muffed.
i don`t know what to do .... if i go to warranty and stand in lines and let the phone for almost a week in their custody,and find out after that the phone was alright...?!
i discovered the difference by chance,when I called the same person from both phones shortly.
if anyone knows this kind of problem please let me know......

First of all, this doesn't belong in development.
Secondly, yes there is a known issue with the mic on the SGS, or rather the mic drivers and settings. I don't think there is a community fix for this, and Samsung has not acknowledged it publicly, so I don't think it will be fixed any time soon.

jap, I just finished my mic mod there. I looked the youtube video
how to disassemble the phone and bettered the mic part.
The mic is situated 90 degree and little rubber channel is used
to direct the sound to mic. This tiny rubber channel was incorrectly
pressed in so half of the input was covered. So a I widened the channel input
and also drilled the hole in case little bigger (do not do that! it may ruin the
case chrome). Sounds little bit better.
Now, is this normal, to make a mod to better mic sound for a elite phone ?

yes, there absolutely a known issue. I purchased two of these phones, and both had the exact same thing you describe. It was absolutely horrible!! I received two replacements, and the sound quality is MUCH MUCH better... BUT, it is still no where near where i think it should be. all my previous HTC devices had far superior sound quality than the Samsung GS. The Galaxy picks up voices 100 feet away... and noises from other crap that none of my other phones ever did... I'm hoping that it is in fact a software thing, and once 2.2 is released, it has better canceling technology built in. Will see..

Construction of built-in microphone is not a problem... The problem lies in software. If you connect external mic (fe. headset) sound is still disorted. There's no way 2 microphones will be broken. This is the same headset which is shipped with Samsung Wave and that phone has no problems with build in and headsets microphone.

uberberben said:
Construction of built-in microphone is not a problem... The problem lies in software. If you connect external mic (fe. headset) sound is still disorted. There's no way 2 microphones will be broken. This is the same headset which is shipped with Samsung Wave and that phone has no problems with build in and headsets microphone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Good point !
But in my case there was 50% better quality with headset ..
Now that I have some of yours attention - why don't I see more post
of video jerkiness, stuttering problems ?
In my phone After every 1 sec. the video recording stutters slightly.
I saw this we saw this all ready in first galaxy test video.

My main problem with the mic is the distortion... It's so bad you can't even record a clip in the car with the radio on. It already gets distorted, something to be ashamed of samsung.
Nice to have HD recording, too bad the only thing worthwhile is the picture since the audio is utter crap.
(Yes, a bit frustrated )

Is it still this bad with the JPK Froyo firmware?

Moved thread to Q&A section

Never noticed this before. I hope this is software related. More and more bugs keep on appearing, almost wishing I picked another phone. The Galaxy S has downright amazing hardware, yet Samsung choose to let it down with all the bugs
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App

I've just bought the Galaxy S for my other half and have noticed exactly the same problem . Went back to the shop and tried the test phone they have in the shop. I only noticed a very marginal improvement (guy in the shop didn't notice any difference).
Anyway I would be interested to know if anyone has swapped the phone since noticing this problem and had an improvement - i.e. is it just a dodgy batch of microphones from Samsung?
Thanks all!

Is there still no fix for the microphon problem? 5 million items sold and each owner of it cannot take a proper video from a concert or on a fair or even on a birthday party, where there are louder surroundings. Annoying.
Please, devolopers, have an eye, ups, ear on that!

I've been complaining about this since July... no response
Sent from my GT-I9000M using Tapatalk

ranjib said:
Is there still no fix for the microphon problem? 5 million items sold and each owner of it cannot take a proper video from a concert or on a fair or even on a birthday party, where there are louder surroundings. Annoying.
Please, devolopers, have an eye, ups, ear on that!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Most smartphone will get crappy sound when using built in microphone on High volume environements. Basically, it's hardware limitation with the built in microphone.
I've done some test (see in the accesorie sections for result with video) and you can use an external microphone with an adapter for theses type of recording.

So, the delivered headset does nothing better than the onboard mic.
It is definitely a matter of the hardware?
Asap I'll give an external mic a try....(using the Nokia-made TV-cable...)

Grashoper said:
yes, there absolutely a known issue. I purchased two of these phones, and both had the exact same thing you describe. It was absolutely horrible!! I received two replacements, and the sound quality is MUCH MUCH better... BUT, it is still no where near where i think it should be. all my previous HTC devices had far superior sound quality than the Samsung GS. The Galaxy picks up voices 100 feet away... and noises from other crap that none of my other phones ever did... I'm hoping that it is in fact a software thing, and once 2.2 is released, it has better canceling technology built in. Will see..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Pls reply to other forum messages showing that u also have the same problem after replacing the phone (it only solve part of your problem), because I see your msg from another post that u were saying that u have no problem after replacing the phone. And that is not totally correct, u still encounter some problems

My problem is slightly different
Hi,
I got a sgs early 2011 and I quickly noticed that the voice recorder gives a very bad sound when listening back. I started to be afraid I would be as bad when calling someone. The problem I have is a horribly distorted sound with a terrible noise in the background. The recorded sound is simply useless.
later I was very happy when I did the call test as the use of the embedded microphone to call is alright. I even rang a friend beside asking what he thought about the sound qualify and he said it was ok. Then we swapped phones and I too thought the sound was fine.
But we tested again a recorded sound & video with my friend and it was awful.
After finding this thread I decided to try again and to compare with the head set microphone. For me it makes a huge difference ! The noise disappears and the distortion too.
first I thought the problem came from the compression rather than the microphone and now I don't know what to think...
My phone is on Froyo 2.2.1 (thanks to this website).

My problem is slightly different
Hi,
I got a sgs early 2011 and I quickly noticed that the voice recorder gives a very bad sound when listening back. I started to be afraid I would be as bad when calling someone. The problem I have is a horribly distorted sound with a terrible noise in the background. The recorded sound is simply useless.
later I was very happy when I did the call test as the use of the embedded microphone to call is alright. I even rang a friend beside asking what he thought about the sound qualify and he said it was ok. Then we swapped phones and I too thought the sound was fine.
But we tested again a recorded sound & video with my friend and it was awful.
After finding this thread I decided to try again and to compare with the head set microphone. For me it makes a huge difference ! The noise disappears and the distortion too.
first I thought the problem came from the compression rather than the microphone and now I don't know what to think...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLZbz6KXLso
I have the same issue.
Check the comments, there is a guy who says how to fix it, but he is not very precise, so i asked for more info.
We'll see
Πάνος

Try out Speedmod by Hardcore in the dev section. Includes fixes for the mic and headphone output.
No need for Audio boost or any hacks. Sound is the way it should be now
A lot less background noise on mic now and no more EU regulations degrading the audio quality anymore.
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App

[Q] audio distortion when video recording

i was at a concert.....was recording one of the songs.....however on playback, it had an awful audio quality....too much of distortion like the speakers blew up or something......my friend had an iphone 4 and another had the n8.....for them audio was perfect.......i only encountered this problem at concerts......my other normal videos are fine
i am very pissed at this!!!
is this a hardware problem or software????

Yes, it's a known issue and it doesn't look like Samsung is going to do anything about it... You can try going to a service department and go for a repair but if it's the mic itself another one isn't going to fix it.
It seems that some other apps (can't remember the name now) are able to record more properly so hoping for a software fix in the future (and more in the way of CyanogenMod then a fix by samsung).

Bump - remains a problem. I have all latest froyo/updates, Galaxy S.
Have recorded video alongside a friend with iPhone. His phone = great audio, mine = solid hash of distortion, unrecognizable original sound.
Has ANYTHING been done about this????
Call quality is ok - definitely not the same problem.
To be clear - I am not looking for an audio-only recording solution, but one that fixes the quality of audio in video recording.

Hi,
i found something by installing voodoo sound kernel and the voodoo control app.
You can change microphone recording settings to "Loud enviroment -with DRC"
MfG

Possible workaround for a noisy mic

The microphone for the Nexus 4 is very noisy. A user on another thread described a video he recorded
to sound as if it was "recorded underwater".
I looked up the Android SDK and the MediaRecorder object has access to the following audio streams:
CAMCORDER, DEFAULT, MIC, VOICE_CALL, VOICE_COMMUNICATION, VOICE_DOWNLINK, VOICE_RECOGNITION, VOICE_UPLINK.
http://developer.android.com/reference/android/media/MediaRecorder.AudioSource.html
I noticed that while audio and video recorders sound bad on Nexus4, voice calls are of decent quality.
Not all phones have the hardware to handle all these so most sound recorders use MIC or DEFAULT.
I found the source code to the MIUI Sound Recorder and it was easy to add a setting that lets you
manually select which hardware stream to record from.
I ran some tests on the Nexus 4 and came to the following conclusions:
- MIC, DEFAULT and VOICE RECOGNITION are probably the same stream and sound bad.
- the CAMCORDER audio stream is the cleanest.
I propose that until Google and LG fix this issue ROM developers alter the Android API on Nexus 4 (only)
so that the CAMCORDER stream always overwrites MIC and DEFAULT.
I'm attaching the modified MIUI Sound Recorder with manual stream select if anyone wants to do
tests on their own. Here's an amplified view of MIC vs CAMCORDER.

-Mindroid- said:
The microphone for the Nexus 4 is very noisy. A user on another thread described a video he recorded
to sound as if it was "recorded underwater".
I looked up the Android SDK and the MediaRecorder object has access to the following audio streams:
CAMCORDER, DEFAULT, MIC, VOICE_CALL, VOICE_COMMUNICATION, VOICE_DOWNLINK, VOICE_RECOGNITION, VOICE_UPLINK.
http://developer.android.com/reference/android/media/MediaRecorder.AudioSource.html
I noticed that while audio and video recorders sound bad on Nexus4, voice calls are of decent quality.
Not all phones have the hardware to handle all these so most sound recorders use MIC or DEFAULT.
I found the source code to the MIUI Sound Recorder and it was easy to add a setting that lets you
manually select which hardware stream to record from.
I ran some tests on the Nexus 4 and came to the following conclusions:
- MIC, DEFAULT and VOICE RECOGNITION are probably the same stream and sound bad.
- the CAMCORDER audio stream is the cleanest.
I propose that until Google and LG fix this issue ROM developers alter the Android API on Nexus 4 (only)
so that the CAMCORDER stream always overwrites MIC and DEFAULT.
I'm attaching the modified MIUI Sound Recorder with manual stream select if anyone wants to do
tests on their own. Here's an amplified view of MIC vs CAMCORDER.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I modified my kernel to fix this and I used your apk to test for both mic and camcorder and I don't notice the difference with my updated kernel.
http://faux.androidro.ms/mako/beta/mako-jb-kernel-004b06.zip
check for me to see if I really fix it or not since I am not an audio expert

Thank you, faux!
I've been meaning to try your kernel for a while so now I just have to.
Please treat my ideas about how Android exposes the audio stream as a speculation for now.
I didn't run any in-depth tests and I didn't trace the kernel code.
To my ears the MIC/DEFAULT streams are very noisy. The CAMCORDER one is noisy also
and but somewhat less so. They all sound bandpassed (probably a microphone limitation).
I'd like to know what other users think of the sound.

Very interesting.
I agree that N4 mic is so sensitive that it picks up a lot of background noises. I have been tweaking with mic volume to offset it.
If OP is true, then there's a hope for VoIP users who use Csipsimple. Without changing the kernel, csip can use CAMCORDER mode by changing the settings under media>audio troubleshooting.

The very high mic gain is the main issue with the sound quality. It needs to be adjusted from
the kernel driver which is not a trivial procedure. Gain from apps works on top of the hardware
gain and does not affect distortion that happens earlier in the signal chain.
One user put scotch tape on the mic to mechanically attenuate the sound and reported good results.

If the the sound system on the nexus 4 is built on top of ALSA, I.e. if the directory /proc/asound exists, then microphone levels can be adjusted in user-space. There is an app (ALSAMixer) available on the market that could be used here.

What would be the effect of covering the mic with something to reduce it's sensitivity?

chdloc said:
If the the sound system on the nexus 4 is built on top of ALSA, I.e. if the directory /proc/asound exists, then microphone levels can be adjusted in user-space. There is an app (ALSAMixer) available on the market that could be used here.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not sure if that will do it. The textbook audio recording chain goes like this:
microphone -> preamp -> analog-to-digital converter
If I'm not mistaken ALSA(the driver) will take over afterwards. We need a way to control
the hardware gain on the preamp. It's possible that preamp gain is permanently fixed by design.
On the other hand almost all modern preamps have automatic variable gain so it might just be
a matter of figuring out how to turn it on.
EDIT:
ALSAMixer doesn't work at all on my phone (stock 4.2.1 - rooted)
Do you know of any custom kernels for the Nexus4 that use ALSA?
donec said:
What would be the effect of covering the mic with something to reduce it's sensitivity?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Aside from the ugly look it should work OK. I would suggest using some kind of soft thread fabric.
Wool is one of the best materials for sound absorption but you should try different materials.
The downside is that mechanical methods don't attenuate all frequencies linearly - they work much better
on higher frequencies so you will have to try and see what material works best.
If this works out it would be ideal to open the phone and plug the microphone hole on the inside with the proper material.

I don't have a Nexus 4, but I do know that the Nexus 7 uses ALSA. Have you checked for /proc/asound? If it exists, then you may need the proper ALSA libraries first.
Sent from my Nexus One using xda app-developers app

im starting to think LG just used cheap mics to keep cost down. From the buzzing to the sub par recording quality

-Mindroid- said:
Aside from the ugly look it should work OK. I would suggest using some kind of soft thread fabric.
Wool is one of the best materials for sound absorption but you should try different materials.
The downside is that mechanical methods don't attenuate all frequencies linearly - they work much better
on higher frequencies so you will have to try and see what material works best.
If this works out it would be ideal to open the phone and plug the microphone hole on the inside with the proper material.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have my Nexus 4 in a case and thought maybe I could improve the quality by placing a piece of cloth between the case and the phone.

Lockeskidney said:
im starting to think LG just used cheap mics to keep cost down. From the buzzing to the sub par recording quality
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The specs for the microphone do not look bad either. http://www.knowles.com/search/prods_pdf/SPU0410LR5H.pdf is the spec sheet and it should be working to 116 dB, which is louder than I'd want to be in - though it is only the loud end of rock concerts. Noise also looks okay on the spec sheet, but you cannot expect Schoeps quality of course..
The underwater sounds I'm hearing with the sound recording tool remind me of processing, heavy compression andf such. Not what I heard on my camcorder tests, which had a pleasant sound.
Overload is more likelely to be caused by audio codec settings. A voice call has the mouth close to the mic, that is loud too, and works well. But applications like movie recordings crank up the gain to record sounds further away.

jutezak said:
The specs for the microphone do not look bad either. http://dl-bacon.bbqdroid.org/GeebCM/EN_LG-E973_SVC_ENG_121127.pdf is the spec sheet and it should be working to 116 dB, which is louder than I'd want to be in. Noise also looks okay on the spec sheet, but you cannot expect Schoeps quality of course..
The underwater sounds I'm hearing with the sound recording tool remind me of processing, heavy compression andf such. Not what I heard on my camcorder tests, which had a pleasant sound.
Overload is more likelely to be caused by audio codec settings. A voice call has the mouth close to the mic, that is loud too, and works well. But applications like movie recordings crank up the gain to record sounds further away.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nice find! Thank you for sharing!
Microphones in general are almost never bad. It's the preamps and digital processing that add more to the mix.
Regarding the "underwater" sound I now suspect a lack of a Low Pass filter. Check out my other thread:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=36856100&postcount=18

jutezak said:
The specs for the microphone do not look bad either. http://www.knowles.com/search/prods_pdf/SPU0410LR5H.pdf is the spec sheet and it should be working to 116 dB, which is louder than I'd want to be in - though it is only the loud end of rock concerts. Noise also looks okay on the spec sheet, but you cannot expect Schoeps quality of course..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Human speech can generate 116dB SPL measured at 1-2" distance fairly easily. I just measured the level my speech at 1" distance (with a lab-grade device) and I did not have to shout to produce 116dB SPL. The spec sheet says that the microphone produces about 10% THD typically at 118SPL for a 1kHz tone.
jutezak said:
Overload is more likelely to be caused by audio codec settings. A voice call has the mouth close to the mic, that is loud too, and works well. But applications like movie recordings crank up the gain to record sounds further away.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Distortion of the microphone signal is generated (or amplified) in at least four locations:
1. The microphone itself (analog or digital if the microphone is a digital microphone as many MEMS are; the above referenced Knowles mike is analog)
2. The amplifier (analog)
3. The analog-to-digital converter (ADC) which is spec'ed with a maximum input voltage to generate a signal that hits "digital rail", i.e. 0dB FS (full-scale)
4. digital gain along the digital processing path
Potential "clipping" (i.e. signals producing 0dB FS at the ADC) can only be avoided if the analog amplifier (if there is one) can be controlled. By looking at the ALSA mixer settings for the Nexus 4 my only hope lies in the controls that are labeled "ADCX Volume" where X=[1,6], i.e. numid. I believe -Mindroid- shared his "idle" settings vs. settings during a call and only X={1,3}, i.e. numid={48,50} have changed. Give changing those two parameters a try...

I posted this in a different thread, but thought it would be useful here as well as a potential lead to a workaround:
Looks like the audio chip in question is a Qualcomm WCD9310.
It's used in a few other devices as well (eg: GS3 USA). If their audio runs fine, perhaps we could try running their audio drivers on our device?

Noisy video (camera)

I have a problem with my Samsung Galaxy S5 (G900A) where my video recordings are noisy.
Even in the quietest of conditions I hear this hissing sound in the background in my videos that I record using my phone camera.
I've searched the web and found out that I'm not the only one, but I can't seem to find any solution to it.
I've cleared the cache partition, the phone isn't wet...
Any suggestions? Such an expensive phone with such a big problem...

I want to try this hack to enable stereo sound on the phone but I am not sure if it's for the ATT version and if it'll work with the current ROM (stock, rooted Android 5.0.0 rom)... is there a similar thing available for my phone here? Or am I safe to try this hack?

Well, that hack works... I now have stereo sound (or something resembling it... now plays music through both speakers) but that didn't help with the camera thing...
I was kind of thinking that the hack had to do with microphones and not speakers... had to read more into it.... but the hack is still nice lol

I've read online of people fixing the issue by using a pin to clear the holes in the case where the microphone is... well I tried that (using the dull edge of a needle) and now the recording is much louder but the noise still exists (this hissing).

Facebook Live Audio Volume Low

When I take video for Facebook Live, I do save the videos in HD to my phone, but I also notice that the audio volume is low. How can I adjust this? I generally take videos at live band performances where I'm right at the front of the stage.. Unfortunately, I have to turn my headset speakers up to hear the sound.
Additional information: Normally, I keep my phone's volumes on mute. Would this have an impact on audio recording quality? Those that normally take Facebook Live videos, how are your volumes set? And also, can you hear the sound pretty well? When taking video, I'm normally towards the front of the stage, or at it, where the speakers are. Not sure if this has an impact on audio quality being so low or not.
8/25/19 EDIT: Over FOUR months later, still no replies to this topic, will bump. OP has been edited with a second paragraph.

I was about to post this question again but apparently I already had, over 4 months ago. No response, so this is a shameless bump. I've edited the OP a bit with "Additional Information". I took another Facebook live video yesterday and I'm still getting the same low volume in my recording.

Does anyone have any experience using an attached microphone with the Galaxy Note 9?