Re: Lumia 800 disastrous audio quality

xumix · ‎2012-01-16

@stavrojones
Unreal, since the same Zune software prodces good sound via bluetooth.
@rahulxsinha Zune players have very good audio quality

stavrojones · ‎2012-01-16

@xumix Have you tried the experiment? Spotify is free to download and use for 48-hours without any credit card information. Please don't claim it's unreal until seeing for yourself.

xumix · ‎2012-01-16

@stavrojones Unreal means Zune is not the problem, since it produces good quality via bluetooth.
The problem might be somewhere in the audio subsystem or the way nokia implemented it.

stavrojones · ‎2012-01-16

@xumix I would tend to agree with your second point; there is something wrong with the output sent to the audio subsystem (pipes), because Spotify handles this perfectly. This fact is partially good news for us since there are no hardware problems nor necessarily software bugs within the OS itself... why Zune gets the analog output wrong is beyond me though. Anti-piracy feature perhaps?

treysparker · ‎2012-01-16

I ran the test and the results are the exact same no matter what player I use.

The lower frequencies still arent there.

It's not Zune.

stavrojones · ‎2012-01-16

@treysparker Strange, but I've noticed there is an inconsistency also. Sometimes it works perfectly, other times not. This is a major issue. Could you please try the test one more time but this time reboot the phone and load spotify straight away before Zune... they seem somehow not to play nice with each other.

astim · ‎2012-01-16

My Lumia 800 with Sennheiser IE 4 sounds very similar to my ancient Nokia N-Gage QD with basic mono headset.

Hardware version: 112.1402.2.4, software: 1600.2479.7740.11451. I hope I can return it back.

Tonkerdog · ‎2012-01-16

Just tried it and miles better. Much louder and much more bass. Not quite as much as I want but if Zune was 35% of what I want Spotify gives me 95%. At last. Used Bang and Olufsen A8's Now as I have loads of music on iTunes, and don't want to subscribe to Spotify what else can I download that works and just plays imported sound files?

stavrojones · ‎2012-01-16

@Tonkerdog Thanks for trying the experiment, glad it worked for you and that I'm not the only one with which this works. You might not want to be a Spotify subscriber, but the good news is that if Spotify can get it right then why can't Microsoft or another third-party application for that matter? Unbelievable that the default Nokia music player was not tested properly in this regard. At least we know the phone is capable...

stavrojones · ‎2012-01-16

@Tonkerdog wrote: "Not quite as much as I want but if Zune was 35% of what I want Spotify gives me 95%."

The output on Spotify is quite liveable. Agreed, the bass is still slightly light but at least it's there this time (enabling proper-use of EQ on a HIFI unit if desired). Overall@ I find l the sound-stage is nicely defined though and a certain amount of 'air' is not unwanted.

Tonkerdog · ‎2012-01-16

All we need now is a non subscription player, with a tool bar on the bottom for advancing the track etc(like iTunes !) and an equaliser

WhiteAlien · ‎2012-01-16

I did some extend tests and I have come to some interesting results. I used 4 type of earphones - Creative EP-630 earbuds, Panasonic earbuds (dunno model), Nokia shipped earbuds and Plantronics earphones. 1st two gives extremely poor sound totally flat with no bass at all. The last 2 gives average sound quality with some bass and overall I could support that quality. Then I decided to check resistance and it turns out that first 2 have 16Ohms, Nokia shipped have 35Ohms and Plantronics have 38Ohms. So it turns out that higher resistance earphones gives better sound quality. This also explains why when nothing is plugged in it gives you the best sound quality, like bluetooth earphones. This would also give the answer why we have different opinions about sound quality. I also did test with Spotify as well as with other Music Player from market and I did not notice any big difference. Sound output is still kinda flat. If you have doubts about that then the easiest way to check that is to listen the same track on PC and then on phone. You should notice a big difference. Nokia can keep silence as long as they want, but they can't deny that there is definitively some big screw up with audio jack circuits, audio chip, faulty hardware component or in the best case simply problems with audio drivers or audio chip power management. Unfortunately only Nokia knows what exactly is going on. Sooner or later I want an official answer from them for this issue or I will throw that phone against wall and ask for warranty repair because I'm one big enraged and furious customer. Cheers, Whitealien

Vsync · ‎2012-01-16

I really can't get good sound quality out of this phone no matter what software or headset I use. For the meantime I am using my ipod touch from 2008 that has 10 times better sound quality... it's embarassing... I really hope Nokia fixes this, even if it's a hardware problem we demand a fix, we didn't buy a phone of this calibre to have a seperate mp3 player dancing in our pockets. For the meantime I'm not recommending this phone to anyone who listens to music on the go... that's bad publicity that could of been avoided.

Overmann · ‎2012-01-17

I would really like to know how widespread this is. I was just about t pre-order one of these (Norway - avail. 1 feb.) But i cannot risk getting a device that I'm unable to use as a music player. It would be extremely helpful if Nokia commented on this. Is it a device fault? Is EVERYONE experiencing this (just not bothered)? Can it be fixed, and WILL it be fixed?

If they continue to keep quiet about this I'd go for a Samsung or HTC device. No way I'm getting a phone that's unable to play below 60hz. Ridiculous!

tannjew · ‎2012-01-17

@ Overmann: Until now I had three Lumias and all of them have (had) sound problems. Sorry, but I cannot recommend the Lumia 800 to anyone who wants to use his smartphone as a music player.

theoutermost · ‎2012-01-17

There's certainly some sound issues. There is notable noise interference when skipping tracks on mine, but during the track it seems to be fine.

Sound quality is ok certainly not 'disastorous' but not an Mp3 replacer for me as it is notablly thinner on the bass and is harsher sounding overall than my Zune HD (which by the way has excellent sound quality second only to a Cowon and better than an iPod).

I've tested with the following headphones:

Sennheiser HD 25-1 II

iGrado

Audio Technica ATH-AD700

and through AudioEngine 2 computer speakers.

stavrojones · ‎2012-01-17

@Overmann wrote: "Is EVERYONE experiencing this (just not bothered)?"

Most people are not audiophiles and cannot really tell the difference until demonstrated to them. Perhaps Nokia is bargaining on this by remaining silent so as not to compound the matter; you don't know what you are missing until shown better. There is also the placebo affect; people simply believe it has good sound quality because they are holding a relatively expensive piece of equipment therefore everything has to be the best, right?

Spotify is working for me, but it’s not always consistent and even this application crashes randomly. I have to say, it’s very disappointing that this phone has so many audio issues (points noted @tannjew). I purchased it specifically because I was keen to utilize my Spotify prescription better.

A slight side-topic and not connected with Nokia in this instance; it’s also frustrating that the phone does not have sound profiles. It’s too basic for my liking to have one global volume control. My Symbian used to remember different settings and would prompt when inserting a cable into the 3.5mm phono jack. That way my headphones would not blast me at line-level. Perhaps even worse; turning the headphones down quite a lot just to relax, then unplugging them will leave the phone’s ringer volume practically muted. Silly behaviour really for what should be ‘smart’.

vangrieg · ‎2012-01-17

I recently picked up my Lumia 800 from repairs. According to the papers, all they did was reflash firmware.

It did wonders to audio quality, the sound is beautiful, with tight bass and great sound stage.

The firmware numbers are the same.

So they either secretely replaced something (which I find somewhat hard to believe) or reflashing caused some low level drivers to initialize properly.

Of course, there's no way to find out officially. Or is there? I have no idea whether this can be done at home. Regular updates via Zune certainly didn't help.

It has absolutely nothing to do with Zune as a player or the jack for sure.

stavrojones · ‎2012-01-17

I've noticed that the sound is less likely to sound harsh and devoid of bass the longer I use the phone. Does it have a 'breaking-in' period or something?

crystal405 · ‎2012-01-17

WhiteAlien wrote:
[...] So it turns out that higher resistance earphones gives better sound quality. This also explains why when nothing is plugged in it gives you the best sound quality, like bluetooth earphones. This would also give the answer why we have different opinions about sound quality. [...]

I can confirm this.