yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] ipmanwck:
I was getting crackle in YouTube a d player pro.

Custom Stock Rom 4.1 Eternity

Brilliantly Stock
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] droidrob:
My i9505 has the crackling problem. It is apparent on some tracks more than others. "Bloom" by Radiohead is a very bassy track and it crackles even at volume level 3!

Rev. No. is 02

Phone says: MADE BY SAMSUNG underneath battery cover.No country anywhere.

Will be taking it back tomorrow for a new phone, and will test it in store. Surely all of them wont have this same issue?
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] elfary:
Tried on an S4 9505 my SE215 (17.8 ohms constant impedance)

No fuzzies to report.

Actually i think my SE215 have not sounded better even off my treasured iPhone 4S.

So the 9505 it's ok with SE215 and UM3x.

I have to try the SE420 (20 ohms at dc)

I was about to get a cheap note 2 but now i'm in doubt since it has hiss where the S4 it's pitch black.

Success is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] trenzterra:
What earphone are you using?
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] toadsurfer:
Has anyone got a phone that crackles on one head phone but not another? My I9505 crackles on my Klipsch S4 and Sennheiser Cx300ii. I like bass and I can't turn it up on any bass heavy tracks as it crackles on even low volumes. Paul Wellers Broken Stones is almost unlistenable at all but the lowest volumes.

If I'm going to have to buy new earphones I need to know they'll definitely work!
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Beefheart:
http://forums.hardwarezone.com.sg/s...ackling-higher-volumes-galaxy-s4-4199380.html
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] otacon888:
Well i tried my XBA4 today on a few I9500s and another I9505. Absolutely no issues on the I9500s but crackling in the I9505 hw revision 0.2. I now switched to my I9500 as my daily driver. The crackling was simply unbearable on my I9505.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] droidrob:
Ah I'll add that to my post

they are Sony Mh1c - 15 Ohms
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] jaaystott:
I watched a video on YouTube about he the S4 fails in certain places, it said that setting the volume level to 11 in the Samsung Music App would cause 'distortion' and a 'constant clicking' throughout playback. It also said that the more expensive the headphones, the worse it seemed to be.

I'm using a pair of Beats Studios and I have no issues at all. The only think I find a little 'weird' is the volume is quiet (though still loud) compared to other devices I think.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] mathieulh:
Just to keep you informed, all the retail versions of the GT-I9505 are hw revision 0.2 a few review units (pre retail) and engineering units are rev 0.1

Mine is revision 0.2 (made in China) and does not seem to have the issue (though the impedance of my Klipsch x10i is most likely not low enough to reproduce it) . Sadly it does look like a manufacture defect that happened to a lot of units out there. I'd guess something went wrong with the QC on those.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] NZtechfreak:
If you read the thread a little you will see it is affecting low impedance IEMs, my quick search shows the Studios have an input impedance of 40ohm, well above the point where the crackling problem would be an issue.

Oh, and checked my affected handset, it is revision 0.2
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] trenzterra:
It's the lower the impedance, not the more expensive it is! Price doesn't tell the whole story, and if this were Head-Fi we could probably go on all day talking about the Beats itself haha

BTW Google announced the S4 without TouchWiz today. Wonder if that will suffer from the same problem too.

---------- Post added at 03:51 AM ---------- Previous post was at 03:50 AM ----------

Could it be that the rev 0.1 do not suffer from these issues?
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] mo_mail:
I too think that the quality has degraded on mine. I had my original headset replaced, swore that the problem went away and you may notice I had to retract that. It does seem to have become worse over time, but still not as bad as my original headset which was completely unacceptable.

Super disappointing for me given that I was warned against samsung for their crappy builds, thinking that was a thing of the past.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Buszidko:
I got rev 0.2 and dont have crackling issue.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Beefheart:
And you're not going to if you're using stock earphones or another set with a high impedance.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Buszidko:
I dont use stock headphones i got cheap in ear phones, they got no more then 16ohm, no crackling at all
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Beefheart:
Some 16ohm earphones don't show the issue apparently whilst some do.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] deelz001:
http://www.addictivetips.com/mobile/how-to-fix-distorting-audio-in-samsung-galaxy-s-and-galaxy-3/

Is there anything like the above we can do for the s4 that may fix this??
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Beefheart:
I can't find an equivalent menu code.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] deelz001:
i found *#0011# but not sure how to use it though lol
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Beefheart:
It's operated by an APK in the /system/app folder. The service mode on the S4 is simply different than the S3 and doesn't appear to have the options that article talks about.

---------- Post added at 11:35 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:13 AM ----------

So what are the chances of getting a device that doesn't do this if you return for an exchange?
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] deelz001:
I tried 4 different devices at my store, all had the same problem.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Beefheart:
Won't bother taking it back then as everything else works perfectly. Not too noticeable on mine and I don't use it for music playback anyway (got an iRiver H340 with Rockbox on it for that which blows away any mobile phone for volume and sound quality). My main concern is when watching movies or Youtube but I will just have to buy some high impedance, high sensitivity earphones for that.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] droidrob:
Ah s***, are you in the UK by any chance?

I'm going back to the o2 store today to try and get one without this issue, otherwise I will have to either cancel my contract and just get a htc one.

I really hope I do find one without the problem!
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Beefheart:
I upgraded with O2 at a well known brand of reseller and they have a no cancellation policy. However, I did take out their insurance which includesa no quibble replacement handset if your one stops working so I might wait a few months until the next batch are out and take this back.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] kevlarman:
White I9505

Made in Korea

HW REV 0.2

No crackling with:

Sennheiser CX500 impedance 30 ohms @ 1KHz (though other literature say 16 ohms)

Sennheiser MM450 (wired mode) impedance 32 ohms

I used the test tones obtained here, at various volumes and equalizer settings, plus some other music such as Bass Mekanik.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Beefheart:
It won't happen on earphones with 30ohm impedance.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] droidrob:
I suppose if I do want to keep this phone I'll just have to find a great IEM for not more than £70 over 16ohms..

can anyone recommend any? I am thinking of taking it back still but the HTC one isnt my thing and after using the S4 I can never go back to my Xperia Ray :laugh:
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] trenzterra:
Spoke to a technician at the service centre today. I sent my phone in for an unrelated issue, but I mentioned if he knows of the audio distortion problem. He said he knew of such a problem and that they have already escalated it to Samsung HQ. He also claims that the demo units have a better motherboard (to withstand the screen being turned on the whole day), and maybe that's why those demo units do not experience the same issue.

It's great that at least the local service centre knows of such a problem I guess.

---------- Post added at 02:26 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:25 PM ----------

I suggest you buy a 15 ohm impedance adapter over at eBay. Costs about US$18 and should solve the issue.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] deelz001:
I got mine from the 02 store in the UK, it must be the batch that they have been getting as the others in the store had the same issue. I have noticed a few others mention 02 on this thread too
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Jensigner:
To reiterate, based on the measurements I reported in that web article and reading most of the responses here and in other forums, I'm almost certain that this is NOT a QC issue with the i9505 and SGH-I337. I'll bet that if I tested 100 units (with resistive headphone loads varying from 10 ohm to 30 ohm), the units would all behave similarly, all likely exhibiting that "buzz" (aka "crackle" ... aka "frizzies"). So imo this is a DESIGN FLAW and it appears to originate in the inadequate design involving the audio DAC part of the Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 Soc.

My SGH-I337 has this problem but, apart from the resistive headphone load tests I've performed, I have only tested my S4 with the following headsets with absolutely no problems. The impedance threshold for this problem seems to be ~ 14 ohm (below which there are problems). Since headphone impedance does vary with sound frequency, some headphones with nominal (1 kHz) impedance higher than ~ 14 ohm will exhibit the problem if its impedance drops low enough at some other frequencies.:

- stock S4 headphones (~ 35 ohm imped. at 1 kHz)

- several Creative Technologies 32 ohm earbuds

- Sennheiser HD598 ~ 50 ohm

Fabulous sound at all volume levels with the above 3 headphones, using native Music player app with default settings (no EQ)

---------- Post added at 09:42 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:37 AM ----------

A good workaround solution. In fact at the very least, Samsung should offer to send EVERY S4 i9505 and SGH-I337 owner one of these adapters, paid by Samsung with shipping and handling also covered by Samsung. Other than that, they need to do a "total recall" :silly:
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] deelz001:
funny you say that, I got it from an 02 store. Good luck with changing it and let me know how u get on as when I exchanged it all the handsets had the problem!!
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Beefheart:
Good idea about the adapter - that will allow my current earphones to be used. Anyone got a link for such an adapter in the UK? Can't find any on eBay.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] droidrob:
Just came back from my local o2 store, the woman at the counter had no idea what I was talking about and kept going on about diagnostic checks and kept telling me to listen to her £5 ipod headphones cause she couldnt hear the crackle on it. When she listened to my 15ohm headphones she could hear something, but said it might just be the headphones. I'm going to go to a bigger o2 store tomorrow or saturday and sort it out there with someone who knows a thing or two about mobiles.

The other reason I wanted to change it was due to the volume rocker being loose, hopefully my new unit wont have such an issue.

I can live with the crackling if I get these JVC 20ohm headphones that I've been looking at, but the volume rocker is p*ssing me off
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Beefheart:
As Jensigner points out above, changing to another unit will almost certainly not resolve the issue.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] trenzterra:
It's called Etymotic 4P to 4S adapter on eBay I think!
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] elfary:
I think the adapter will skew the intended frequency response of balanced armature drivers due to an increased output impedance and its interaction with the non linear impedance of that kind of iems.

At least that what i was told by a Westone engineer a couple of years back.

This great article on the output impedance might explain it quite well.

http://nwavguy.blogspot.com.es/2011/02/headphone-amp-impedance.html

In my view the best solution for the moment is getting iems above the impedance threshold. Provided that we can set that threshold.

At least on showroom units my SE215 and UM3x fared great. Which in this case point to 17.8 ohms of impedance at DC as "safe".
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Jensigner:
That would be fairly easy to measure and would be interesting to do some blind listening tests with and without that series resistance for those types of earbuds.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] trenzterra:
That is true, but I doubt using the GS4 by itself with its (relatively) high output impedance already brings out the desired frequency response of the earphones. And while some will probably discern the difference, I'm willing to guess that for most of us we probably won't be able to tell the difference that much.

If you are a true audiophile concerned about every nitty gritty then you would probably already have an external DAC plugged to the microUSB of the S4, or a portable amp, which in both cases you will not hear the audio distortion.

In any case, having said that, it's still a problem that Samsung needs to address!
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] elfary:
I found that very email from Westone. Here's the excerpt:

I recommend that you purchase your IPOD with the lowest impedance you can find. Better yet, there are some great mini-headphone amps to put between his IPOD and the phones. Whatever you decide, you should never use an in-line attenuator between the output of the IPOD and the phones if the quality of the sound signature is important to you.

---------- Post added at 06:11 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:06 PM ----------

I think that the frequency response is the most important aspect to the perceived sound. That's why i'd never go the attenuator path using balanced armature iems.

There's a bad design here. And there are a few ways to cope with it:

1. Write off that device. Which would be the best option to let Samsung know that we do not accept that kind of critical failures.

2. Use the attenuator.

3. Choose iems with an impedance high enough.

The most nasty side of the issue is that without fuzzies this is the one and only phone that i've heard that matches the iPhones black background and overall sound gloss.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] olaf63:
I want to clarify that the phones I tried where not demo special ones (like these on totems with demo software running) but units on sale and I found three perfect ones. This I bought was from a sealed box and the kind girl let me test also this that now is in my pocket. If all units where affected by the problem that mine showed now this discussion was 240 pages long and not 24.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] droidrob:
Interesting... what headphones did you try them with?
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] trenzterra:
If I'm not wrong you used the CX300-II. It doesn't crackle on mine either, so it may seem 'perfect' to you, but fact is, it crackles badly on lower impedances such as on my UE600. As I mentioned earlier in the thread I believe the average handset matches Jensign's results, which means crackling at <15 ohms. A small percentage will crackle at and above 15 ohms and probably a small percentage will not crackle at all.

You're probably right to say that all units do not suffer from the problem. But I believe a significant number, or a majority, will exhibit the problem with the UE600 (9 ohms from 0-150Hz, 13 ohms at 1kHz) and virtually all will experience the distortion with the Sony XBA4. If someone with a UE600 can claim to experience no distortion at all on max volume, please step forward!

The reason why this thread is not 240 pages long is because most people don't use third party headphones to begin with, or even so, they use dynamic driven IEMs which have a relatively flat impedance. IEMs with high and lows, characteristic of balanced armatures, are where you are more likely to see the problem.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] olaf63:
I have two S4, the first crackles badly with the sennheisers and the other I tried and this I've bought for second no. So for me not all crackle with the cx300 (I have cx300, cx300II, and anther sennhaiser with volume controls don't know model) nor with a Sony one that I don't know which model is. I don't have the knowledge to tell if the problem is more or less pronunced. What I think is that there are batches that suffer and other that don't or not in the same way, that's why maybe these in the store behave in the same way. I made the test and purchase seven days after I bought the first one. I'll try to test with a lower impedance IEM but it's hard to find here.

If the scenario is this described from you it's a big problem also trying to have the phone repaired, and I think so, that's why I bought the second one.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] droidrob:
[What is strange is that Samsungs demo song "Over the horizon" has no clipping or distortion even when turned up to 15....
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] olaf63:
Mine crackled also with that song, near the end. When I did my tests I went to the shop with otg cable and pendrive with my songs.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Lienot:
Just to inform, I have the problems, too - with all my headphones, but not with the Stock Samsung in ears.

I have HW REV 0.2, too.

I hope they will give me a new phone.

CU

lienot
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Beefheart:
The chances of your new phone not having the same issue is remote.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Lienot:
I can't believe it.

I tested 4 different Headphones I have at home, all in ear.

All have these problems, only the samsung haven't got the problems...

My main interest in music - My Note2 was a Killer Phone - soundwise.

I think I will sell my phone as long as it is new and the price is as high as right now.

The only thing that hold me back a bit is that the samsung in ear headphones doesn't sound that bad.

CU

lienot
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Jensigner:
Yeah, don't they sound great? (the stock earphones) In fact since they are nominally ~ 35 ohm, you can use a pair in parallel with a headphone splitter (for net 17 ohm) and you'll get great audio for 2 without any snap, crackle or pop :laugh: Keep your S4 until we hear something from Samsung.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Beefheart:
Perhaps I received different stock earphones to you two or perhaps I have been spoilt by using Shures for so long, but the provided earphones sound bloody awful to me.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] marci4na:
finally it's here.

9505+cx300 II+poweramp with equ full bass and treble

WORKS FINE!!!

sound is clear without crackling even at the higher level.

quality is good...not excellent like the s3 with beats mod, but it's ok.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] NZtechfreak:
Good news!

The selected bits of the quote above make me doubtful that your assessment regards the sound quality are generalisable to other ears :)
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] marci4na:
Believe me: i can recognize if its crackling or not.

General feeling is another fact.

I have heard the file With the problem: here is perfect.

If you need some info let me know
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] NZtechfreak:
Oh I wasn't casting aspersions on your ability to hear the crackling, or even casting aspersions at all, only saying that your evident taste in sonic signatures means I won't take anything from your stance on the sound quality in general.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Jensigner:
My partners S3 headphones imo sounded very very good. However when I got my S4 I thought my earbuds (same impedance ~ 35 ohm) I thought sounded a bit "tinny" not enough bass no depth. I tried a number of things and it turned out that it was the plastic tips. The phones were virtually identically sonically. Only one pair of tips really sealed my ear properly to get a good resonance. In this case, to my way of hearing, I thought the stock buds sounded great (but not as good as my Sennheiser 50ohm HD 598). If someone finds a setup that they think sounds great, then it is great, frizzies/crackle or none. However, most low-impedance bud-users can't be wrong ... there is a problem there.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Eambo:
I've noticed the same issue, which is a real shame.

As other people have mentioned, the stock earphones just don't sound as good to me as my own (A pair of JVC funny enough, but great bass!), but the JVC have some serious crackling issues when audio is above the "warning" level.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] trenzterra:
Which headphones do you use? Would be helpful if you named them.

Regarding the stock IEMs, they fit weird in my ear, though it could just be the plastic tips. Anyhow, I'm a sucker for balanced armatures so going back to dynamic IEMs are just...

By the way if you turn the bass and treble all the way up I suggest you turn the pre-amp down. Otherwise you may hear audio clipping in the process. But then again if you turn both bass and treble up isn't it the same as not turning it up at all?
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] deelz001:
so instead of talking about pointless settings has anyone actually tried to speak to samsung or try anything with the hardware to fix this??

There is no way I am trying to 'live with it' by editing some amp settings.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] i4mt3hwin:
Aside from replacing the hardware how exactly would you expect to fix this? And there are multiple posts in this thread about what happens when you go to Samsung, they either acknowledge a problem then replace a completely unrelated part of the hardware(for some people they replace the screen????), or they tell you your headphones are incompatible, which happened in my case.

This isn't going to get fixed until either more people drum up noise about it till Samsung actually does something or someone comes out with a magic software fix for it themselves.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Jensigner:
I agree that a settings "fix" is not an acceptable fix. Based on almost all the evidence I've seen, the problem with the S4 i9505 and SGH-I337 models is a hardware design issue (not present in the S3 phones) which must be fixed at that level, something users are not able to do. User trenzterra (thanks for all your great efforts to contact Samsung) and I are doing about as much as we can to raise the issue to Samsung in an objective and respectful manner but the S4 users discussing this problem in this and other forums really represent a very very small fraction of S4 users (most who will probably just use the stock 35 ohm iems which don't have the problem and do sound fairly good imo). I haven't received any useful feedback from Samsung yet (I'll report it here) and I'm sure trenzterra will also report back here.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] otacon888:
After listening to lots of music on my I9500 since my switch from the I9505...I am sad to say that the problem ia still present on the I9500 but only on a small number of tracks and at max volume 15. On my I9505 everything crackled at volume above 3.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Jensigner:
Thanks for the feedback on the i9500. It's hard to say if that is the same problem. It could be an output driving limitation thing, which would a reasonable limitation, near maximum volume which isn't the same as the problem most people note with the i9505 and SGH-I337.
[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Beefheart:
This proves that it is worse on some phones and earphones than others. On my Soundmagic E10 it only happens occasionally and then only at high volume.