Database Users

Problems with Music Playback on the HD2

Hello!
I have searched now for several hours in different forums and many threads, but I did not find my specific problems or any solutions to them. Therefore I want to start a new thread.
One thing in advance: I have my HD2 now for about 3 weeks and generally I am very happy with it. Unfortunately, I am experiencing some really bothering problems with music playback, and as this is the second most important feature to me (after telephony), I really hope, that there is some solution out there.
1. According to some Internet pages the integrated music player of the HD2 should be capable of gapless playback of MP3 files since a software update. Well, I have installed the latest 1.66.xx ROM for my device, and unfortunately gapless playback does not work at all. When I am listening to a concert and one track ends and another starts, I always hear a small interruption in the applause. When I play back the exact same tracks on my PC with Winamp everything works fine and both tracks play back to back without any interruption at all. As far as I know Winamp prebuffers approx. 2 seconds and in my opinion for gapless playback the integrated music player of the HD2 should too, but obviously does not.
2. Especially when I am listening to tracks with a quite low volume (e.g. instrumental Soundtrack), I always hear a short "crackling" sound at the transition from one track to the next (or at the beginning of the new track). One forum entry claimed, that this "crackling" sound is caused by the fact, that the HD2 disables the headphones output after approx. 2 seconds of silence and just reactivates it again when there is sound again. The reactivation of the headphones output seems to result in the "crackling" sound.
3. I thought that I can get rid of both problems just by using another player software as alternative, I even bought one of these. I tested "Microfi Nitrogen", "MortPlayer", "Slide 2 Play" and "PocketMusic".
Using the "Cross Fade" mode of "PocketMusic" in fact solved the first two problems effectively, so I got gapless playback without a "crackling" sound between two tracks.
Unfortunately, with all of these alternate players I experienced one even more bothering problem: Every now and then (approx. 1 to 2 times per minute of playback) a short "clicking" sound is audible during playback, which reminds of an scratched vinyl disc. If I rewind the track, the "clicking" sound does not occur at the same position, but at another at a later time. These "clicking" sounds do not occur at all with the integrated music player of the HD2, but with ALL of the mentioned alternate music players I tested. Of course, the "clicking" sounds are audible better, when you are listening to instrumental or classic music with a relatively low volume than with loud Rock or Heavy Metal music tracks.
To avoid the obvious suggestions:
- The problems were already present with the 1.48.xx ROM and are still present with the 1.66.xx ROM.
- I tested several different headphones (cheap and expensive ones) including the original HTC ones which shipped with the HD2.
- I can rule out the MP3s as cause of the problems: There are absolutely no problems with them when they are played back on the PC with Winamp, a Sony-Ericsson phone, an iPod or when played back with the mentioned alternate players on Pocket LOOX N110, N120 (Prototype), 420, N500 and N520.
- It does not matter whether the MP3s are located on the internal memory of the HD2 or the SD card.
- I already tried to disable all data connections on the HD2 and closed all other programs using the Task Manager to avoid any interferences.
- I even performed a Hard Reset without installing additional software or tweaks (except for one of the alternate players).
- I tested "PocketMusic" with all possible settings regarding Cache, Buffer Priority etc..
- It does not matter, whether any Equalizer (if available) are enabled or not.
- I also tested my brother's HD2, and both devices - my own HD2 and my brother's HD2 - show the same problems.
My questions now are:
a) Can anybody verify the "clicking" sounds when using an alternate music player software? If not, which music player software do you use at which settings?
b) Is it possible somehow to disable the interruptions between two tracks with the integrated music player of the HD2 and thus enable true gapless MP3 playback, for example by an undocumented registry setting regarding (pre-)buffer size or Caching?
c) Is it possible to disable the deactivation of the Headphones output after some seconds of silence (which is said to cause the "crackling" sound), so that the Headphones output is always enabled when there is playback using the integrated music player of the HD2, for example by a Registry setting?
Generally, I would love to continue using the integrated music player of the HD2 (which I am doing now anyway, and it looks really nice, by the way), but the missing gapless playback and the "crackling" sound during the transition of tracks is really bothering me very much.
Many thanks in advance for your help!
DotWin

I dont get the crackling sounds you speak of but it is a little off putting when I'm listening to a non stop mix CD thats broken up into tracks, when a track abruptly ends it's followed by a half second silence only to head right back into the music.
Is there some registry tweak that we can use to either eliminate this gap or even shorten it?

I use Coreplayer, and it seems they screwed up the standby keepalive at least on the HD2. With BT headphones, if I start music and then turn the screen off with the power button, I'll start getting random skips. With wired headphones ith completely stops playing music. So I've bound long press windows key to "turn screen off" in AEBPlus, and I now have no more problem with that (when I remember to press that one instead of the power button, that is...). Works perfectly, never heard a skip anymore (I have a set of Sennheiser PX200II, way good enough to make anything noticeable )
Your problems with 3rd-party players could be linked, no idea...

Not sure about the crackling, as I listen to music for at least 2 hours a day on the way to work and I use a pair of Sennheiser HD-25 headphones (http://www.sennheiser.co.uk/uk/home...onal_headphones-headsets_dj-headphones_502188) and I don't hear any crackling between tracks or in periods of silence. Only hear vinyl crackle where the source for the MP3 is vinyl.
The lack of gapless playback, as jmwarren85 mentioned is really annoying as I listen to a lot of mix albums... one solution I use is to take all the MP3's from that disc and splice them into a single track and then listen to that on the HD2.
Also finally I can't say I have heard any clicking noises on my HD2 but I know what sort of clicking you are referring to and that may be due to the encoder used and/or its settings when the MP3's were encoded. Some of the codecs that players use for decoding MP3's aren't the best (ie not well optimised, which can especially be a problem on a mobile device) and you occasionally get audio artifacts.
I use LAME with VBR-0 with quality 0 (highest) and the minimum bit rate of 128 and maximum bit rate of 320 using 44.1kHz instead of 48kHz for compatibility and I don't seem to get any problems.
Hope this helps...

Hi!
Thank you for your messages!
After extensive testing, I have finally bought "Pocket Player" which has solved all of my problems.
But I still think, that the integrated player (which at least looks great) has some bugs in the audio department that should be fixed.
DotWin

DotWin said:
Hi!
Thank you for your messages!
After extensive testing, I have finally bought "Pocket Player" which has solved all of my problems.
But I still think, that the integrated player (which at least looks great) has some bugs in the audio department that should be fixed.
DotWin
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Click to collapse
Hello there.
The crackling you've described may be in relation to network use, for example every time my phone uses the 'net connection (HSDPA) to get weather, location or email, the audio stops for a brief second and continues; this is almost like the crackle you describe.
This in turn disables the graphic equalizer, so I am regularly re-enabling this between songs or in the middle of songs.
Test the theory by putting your phone in airplane mode or disabling all data reliant services to see if this is the issue. Even if it is I can't offer a fix, but at least you know what the issue is at least with the built in HD2 audio app.

I have the exact same issues as the OP. I contacted HTC about the gapless playback and they said they're testing...
I hear a soft/small pop between tracks too when I'm using headphones.
I also sometimes experience another issue where sometimes instead of going to the next song after finishing the current one, it just stops. Time remaining shows 0 secs, it's 'playing' (pause button is shown) but it doesn't move on.

I know it's a little late to reply to this post, but it was just to say that you can remove the gaps between the tracks using Ogg Vorbis encoding instead of MP3 encoding. Winamp for Android can read ogg tracks
About sound quality, there is always a quiet background interferences noise that bothers me. It is particularly annoying when listening quiet music (OST, classical...)

MP3 distortion

Here's an odd one, and I was wondering if anyone else had experienced this;
The opening track on the Elixa Doolittle album is a song called 'Moneybox,. I have this as a 320kb MP3 file on my X10 and PC. I notice when I play this on the X10 there is a lot of distortion especially in the first 30 seconds or so, sounding kind of like a blown speaker, and mainly in the left channel. I have tried several media players and earphones but it is still there, yet I can play the same file on my PC using same earphones and it sounds fine.
I haven't noticed as yet any other tracks exibiting this problem, and I do listen to a lot of music.
So I was wondering,
a) is there a fault with my handset,
or
b) has the mastering engineer of this particular album cocked up slightly, as (and being in the business I know this next bit to be true) they are supposed to produce a finished product that sounds great on pretty much any playback media.
It's almost as if there is some sub bass stuff going on that the X10 amplifier stage just can't deal with.

distortion
it happens when mastering is too HOT i mean roughly >95dB and clipping occurs. Mp3gain the only solution http mp3gain.sourceforge.net it will not change the quality of a song -just its loudness (preamp). I can honestly recommend it --> all your mp3s and mp4s (AAC there is an option for that too) will have equal volume. just scan and fix Your whole collection (it may take some time). Some sh*tty mp3s are so loud that even at the lowest setting in a phone are too loud and distorted,
Cheers
Simon

thanks for the advice, so do you think maybe the x10 pre amp stage or D to A is more sensitive to this than say, my PC sound card (Tascam US-144)? Turning output volume down doesn't reduce the effect BTW.

tried it, reduced level but distortion still there - bizarre...

Ive downloaded a few from vodafone music store and theyre the same. Quality wise we have gone backwards! My nakamchi cassette deck wees all over mp3s
Sent from my X10i using XDA App

Nakamichi. .. now that's quality!
Amyway, I know we are only talking about one track but the fact that it sounds clean on anything other than my x10 is interesting. I want to find out if its a design issue or a fault with my handset.

Can u post it here so that we can check.
stig109 said:
Here's an odd one, and I was wondering if anyone else had experienced this;
The opening track on the Elixa Doolittle album is a song called 'Moneybox,. I have this as a 320kb MP3 file on my X10 and PC. I notice when I play this on the X10 there is a lot of distortion especially in the first 30 seconds or so, sounding kind of like a blown speaker, and mainly in the left channel. I have tried several media players and earphones but it is still there, yet I can play the same file on my PC using same earphones and it sounds fine.
I haven't noticed as yet any other tracks exibiting this problem, and I do listen to a lot of music.
So I was wondering,
a) is there a fault with my handset,
or
b) has the mastering engineer of this particular album cocked up slightly, as (and being in the business I know this next bit to be true) they are supposed to produce a finished product that sounds great on pretty much any playback media.
It's almost as if there is some sub bass stuff going on that the X10 amplifier stage just can't deal with.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sent from my X10i using XDA App

I guess I could put up 20 seconds that shouldn't upset record bosses lol. Ill do it when I'm back on Monday. Thanks: -)

stig109 said:
I guess I could put up 20 seconds that shouldn't upset record bosses lol. Ill do it when I'm back on Monday. Thanks: -)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, only the part where problem was discovered.
Sent from my X10i using XDA App

this is just plain odd...
I have just loaded the track into Cakewalk to clip 20 seconds off, then exported as an mp3 using LAME encoder. My plan was to put the clip on the phone, then record the headphone output so I could upload both a clean clip and a distorted clip for you to compare.
Thing is, the mp3 clip plays fine on the handset, yet it was taken from the troublesome file, which was originally a 320kbs file, and re encoded to 192kbs.
I wonder then if it is an issue with 320kbs mp3 playback?
I must stress that I did not alter levels at all during re encoding.
Odd.

Well, the obvious first question is: How are other 320kbs files? Also, have you tried a format other than MP3? Mediascape can handle AACs in the .m4a format... could be a corrupt file somehow.

Sound Issue While Using SRS, Dolbly, or Equilizer

Hi,
I just got my Desire HD yesterday and I love it so far and I am running the Android Revolution HD 3.5.
I have one issue though, when I have no music playing and I hit the play button with SRS, Dolby, or Equilized there is a loud 'click with base' noise right before the song starts, it almost sounds like I plug in the headphones into the jack and there is some electrical 'boom' , something similar to what you hear if you plug in a guitar with the amplifier on, if you understand.
It is really annoying as it happens evertime i pause a song and then start it again, note this only happens when I have the enhancements on, not on regular setting.
Using Bose Around Ear headphones.
Thanks

I know what you are mean ...
i had that problem too, but at this time i haven't it..
with the htc headphones it clicks but with the one i have now there is no problem

So you are saying that it might be the headphones?
Which ones are you using now, what fixed it for you?
Thanks for your reply!
BTW, if I use something like WinAMP would it go away?

Can anybody actually get good quality music from their DHD??
I have some rather expensive earphones which sound superb through PC, iPhone and iPod, plugged in the DHD, the volume is rather poor and the quality at louder volume suffers, I'm assuming this is down to poor hardware rather than software as I've tried several music players and I'm using lossless media.
Anybody managed to get near-iPod like quality music from their device?

Alize said:
Can anybody actually get good quality music from their DHD??
I have some rather expensive earphones which sound superb through PC, iPhone and iPod, plugged in the DHD, the volume is rather poor and the quality at louder volume suffers, I'm assuming this is down to poor hardware rather than software as I've tried several music players and I'm using lossless media.
Anybody managed to get near-iPod like quality music from their device?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have to say that I am happy with the sound. I have noticed the issue to my problem though, as i paus the song, the phone tend to turn off the sound enhancements after few seconds and the sound that is really annoying is when it turns back on after that, so is there any hack to not allow it to turn off?

Alize said:
Can anybody actually get good quality music from their DHD??
I have some rather expensive earphones which sound superb through PC, iPhone and iPod, plugged in the DHD, the volume is rather poor and the quality at louder volume suffers, I'm assuming this is down to poor hardware rather than software as I've tried several music players and I'm using lossless media.
Anybody managed to get near-iPod like quality music from their device?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try CM7 with the snd3254 dspmode hack ... its much better

srikanth.naidu said:
Try CM7 with the snd3254 dspmode hack ... its much better
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I tried CM7 but it just felt unpolished for some reason and I just want stock stock 2.3 if im gonna make the change, just got the phone so want to get tired of Sense first.
Mixzing app had an equilizer that worked perfect, not the greatest looking app thats around but it works.
I still cant figure out the problem with the regular Dolby stuff, really annoying, I mean its not a cheap phone.

Strange static noise

I have noticed that when using the supplied earphones I can hear static background noise when I scroll through menus and buttons while music is playing. This only happens when music is activated and I can hear a low annoying fuzzy static that gets louder the more I scroll for example.
I can barely hear it when I put on headphones but can with earphones, seems quite strange wonder if anyone else experiences the same thing?

No one? Just try it, turn the volume down while listening to music then go to home screen and scroll left constantly or right and the hissing noise will get louder.
Audio chip or whatever must be quite crappy.

Restarted phone and can't seem to hear it now. Strange.

I'm glad that by talking to your self you've managed to fix this problem.

I spoke to myself to soon! Its back and I suspect it has something to do with the wifi sharing. As I activated kies air, uploaded a song, listened to song and hissing is back! argh.

jonkrav said:
I spoke to myself to soon! Its back and I suspect it has something to do with the wifi sharing. As I activated kies air, uploaded a song, listened to song and hissing is back! argh.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try force stopping it? I've frozen most Samsung apps but even before then I had no problems at all with something like this tbh...although I don't use the stock music player.

I have annoying static background noise while using earphones, it can be better heard whilr using the phone when no music is playing.
This is a general issue or isolated cause?

I have this!!! I seem to get possibly some kind of audible distortion just before i play a song, and then when i pause the song and touch the screen it makes the weird static noise (and possibly when the song is playing as well, but its less identifiable). For me this noise only lasts for about 5 seconds after i have paused it and then stops. And yes, it also seems to be louder in earphones than headphones.
HAVE YOU FOUND A FIX? Firmware upgrades? Sent it back and got a replacement? what did you guys do? Let me know, thanks.

Could it be evp?
Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk

I installed the Backslash Kernel and THEN noticed this, rebooted and it went.
It came back a while after. I also unplugged the headphones with the music app running and the phone rebooted.
Re-flashed the CF-Root KG1 Kernel and it went away, not had any 'noise' or reboots since :/

I got a replacement from orange as this issue was too distracting. My replacement has just come, but exactly the same 'static noise while and after listening to music' issue is still here!!! Is this really what its like for everyone but people don't bother saying?
PDA: I9100BVKE2
PHONE: I9100BVKE2
CSC: I9100ORAKE2
BUILD INFO : Wed May 11 22:56:39
KERNAL VERSION: [email protected] #2
On my last phone i tried flashing to generic KE7 AND KF3 (using odin). Both seemed to make the sound last for not as long after i pause the music, but did not solve the issue. Will rooting the phone, using different kernals and whatnot fix this? Could it be a dodgy batch of phones from orange? (I have no knowledge of what rooting and kernals actually is, let alone what ones i should use)

I have also experienced this. It seems the screen is the problem since the noise is gone when the screen is off.
What headphones are you using?

I have used the supplied headphones, but i have also tried other headphones as well. All seem to give the same sound but possibly at varying levels of volume. Do you still have the problem?

I use the Sennheiser CX300 II and I do not experience it any longer.
It depends on the impedance of the headphones. If the impedance is 16 ohm I cannot hear it but on 12 ohm headphones it is pretty obvious (but they are able to play louder).
I have not tried the supplied ones myself because they ALWAYS sound awful but if you had a specific name for a proper headphone you have tried, you can easily find their impedance on the internet.

Hmm well i have tried my creative EP-630 headphones which have impedance of 16 Ohm and i can still hear the noise. I have used many terrible headphones on terrible 'mp3 players' over the years and i have never experienced this, so i don't see why i should now go out and buy some new headphones. Although if you are really saying that the Sennheiser CX300 II headphones completely cured your problem then it might be worth it? Was your problem exactly the same as the one i described? Cheers.

It's obviously a problem of the audio amp picking up electrical noise from the other components of the device. I'm skeptic that anything can be done to solve it.
I also can hear some faint background noise on mine when scroling the screen and using memory, but anyway it's very faint... not enough to bother even in quiet environments.

I have to agree, it's bad shielding in the design. Something we will all have to live with.
I notice it most between songs when listening to music. Each songs starts with a little blast of noise.

Hmmm well i've heard that with certain kernals it is not there. Also for me, simply changing to different stock firmware reduced the time that the static sound lasts after i pause a song, so surely that can mean it can be stopped altogether. Im not prepared to give up on this (yet).
I would be grateful for other information and reports from other people about this issue, even simply if you don't have it. :/

...anyone?

tgg12 said:
...anyone?
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Click to collapse
i have this problem too...
but i have found that it does with some earphones... i guess its a matter of shielding, as posted before.

Music player without DRC and noise gate??

The stock music player on the note, besides not being able to do gapless playback also has really annoying DRC - very noticable compressing going on if you use custom EQ - and a noise gate which chops out very quiet passages/the tail end of fades off.
Is there any music player out there that gets round these issues or is it Samsung thoughtfully building this into hardware?
I used to love the Note but the more time I spend with it the more I realise the only thing I like is the screen size

Music
My choice is power amp, flexible, has it's own eq & dvc limit facility + a free trial, I bought early days.
hope this helps

I like Winamp (paid) or Mortplayer (free).
Sent from my Galaxy Note running ICS

Do they still have Dynamic Range Compression and the noise gate on?
Good example of the noise gate kicking in is track 12 of The Feeling's Twelve Stops and Home when it drops to the pub noise and walkign home the sound cuts in and out as the (unwanted) noise gate kicks in. I can understand having it on phone calls but why the ferk does it need to be on in music player?

I don't think it's the stock music player. I've noticed this DRC/noise gate thing everywhere, in the flash plugin, in vplayer, stock music player, ...
Whenever a certain volume level is not reached, it gets muted. E.g. the heavy breathing of Tony Soprano in the Sopranos when he's at his shrink's are muted, and totally ruining the experience.. Doesn't matter if it's in vplayer or in the standard video player app.

smashmash said:
Do they still have Dynamic Range Compression and the noise gate on?
Good example of the noise gate kicking in is track 12 of The Feeling's Twelve Stops and Home when it drops to the pub noise and walkign home the sound cuts in and out as the (unwanted) noise gate kicks in. I can understand having it on phone calls but why the ferk does it need to be on in music player?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Why don't you try? All three propositions (Mortplayer, Winamp, Poweramp) doesn't cost you a dime if you want to try them. There is a trial version of poweramp, a light version of Winamp and Mortplayer is generally free. So take a look at the players yourself in order to see whether they suit you or not.

Background noise
Well there's no point trying, the thing is hardware related - no equalizer or software player can cure it.
I'm coming from HD2 and it had the same problem, way more audible.
Basically every phone I've tried had this kind of backround noise, the one with lowest levels of it is HTC Desire S.
This noise is barely audible or not audible at all when you're using low quality phones, but when using good ones (Fischer Audio Eterna here) you can easily spot it..
Currently my player of choice is PowerAmp - it has the best quality of MP3 decoding libraries, sound stage is rich, wide and detailed, so I can live with a little amount of noise. When I can't, I'm using Desire S as a MP3 player

So that's what its called, noise gate
I have had this since I bought the Note, through Gingerbread now ICS, watching films with headphones or listening to music, the low quiet bits are cut and simply go silent, hate it, as I listen to lots of music and watch films, its constantly cutting sound out and back on...starting to think its a hardware fault, but others are obviously getting this too, so surely there is a fix