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    Headphone jack static?

    Discussion in 'Hardware Components and Aftermarket Upgrades' started by shinakuma9, Dec 14, 2011.

  1. shinakuma9

    shinakuma9 Notebook Deity

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    I bought a new pair of headphones, and now when I connect them to my headphone jack on my ASUS, when nothing is playing there is always static and buzzing sounds coming from the headphone. I don't think its the headphone problem because connected to my tablet and phone, nothing of the sort happens.

    Any ideas?
     
  2. Tsunade_Hime

    Tsunade_Hime such bacon. wow

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    Did you try reinstalling the sound drivers for your laptop? Have you tried a known working pair of headphones/speakers to test your laptop's headphone jack with?
     
  3. shinakuma9

    shinakuma9 Notebook Deity

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    I have my earphones, but no static from them. I think its just the noise cancelling feature on the headphones that's causing it. When I turn it off I can't hear any static, but when it's on and music stops playing, the static comes back in a few seconds. I can't really find any trace of the static when theres music playing on the lowest possible sound. Also this happens with the laptop...really weird problem. No static on my phone or tablet.
     
  4. niffcreature

    niffcreature ex computer dyke

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    Yes, cheap noise cancellation is not a good thing. I have had your experience (on none other than surplus store headphones).

    If you paid a lot for them I suggest you RMA.
     
  5. Syndrome

    Syndrome Torque Matters

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    Laptops have a very dirty sound signal. Especially if your headphone port is right next to a HDD. I always use an external sound card with my notebooks even the cheapest of options will give substantial results just by simply getting the electronics out of the notebook casing.

    But after reading your second posts, active noise cancellation is said to have that hiss to it. And it also works best for canceling out repetitive noises, such as a motor, or fan. In most cases passive noise canceling will work better.
     
  6. niffcreature

    niffcreature ex computer dyke

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    Yes, in case anyone was wondering active noise cancelling works by negative feedback, essentially recording the outside noise and feeding it into your signal flipped.
    So, visualize my er triangle wave as background noise:
    /\/\/\/\/\
    The headphones try to record that and play it back like this:
    \/\/\/\/\/

    Its no wonder that technology alone costs over 100$ to do well, and then you have to make sure the headphones are good enough to do it effectively.

    Besides all that though, yeah I've noticed my laptop has a noisy signal especially because the tip of the jack is broken I think. The tip meaning the sleeve of the plug which grounds and insulates the signal.
    So watch out for that, too.