[X 2014 Accessories] jms_uk:
I posted this over on the Motorola forums, but the general chatter around the Hint has gone pretty quiet on the internet which is a shame...

A US friend recently bought me a 2nd gen Moto Hint on his visit to the UK and I've got to say that the microphone

performance is really erratic. I did loads of testing and searching on the internet in case the problems were:

a) Related to the Nexus 5 I was using

b) Related to a faulty unit

c) Related to me not using the correct "gel" or positioning it in my ear correctly.

After a LOT of digging and reading the few reviews out there, I found that in quite a high proportion of the reviews I did eventually find, people mentioned about how others heard them; that people speaking into the Hint came across as quite faint and distant - exactly the problems I was getting.

A bit more digging and testing later, and I managed to eliminate both a) & b) from the equation... using a really crude test

involving a Bluetooth recorder app, I uncovered the following (Hope this helps!):

Option1.

Believe it or not, I can get consistent clear audio recorded - and subsequently call quality where others can hear me

very clearly if I... Take the Hint out of my ear and BLOW HARD into the front mic before quickly putting it back on!! I know it sounds crazy, but every time I do this, the Hint's mic works flawlessly for me (I should add, there is no debris or or anything else blocking the hole to actually be cleared and my ears are clean :) )

And this trick works whatever the orientation of the Hint in your ear is.. it can be positioned so the mic is level with your eyes, pointing a bit further down towards your mouth, whatever... this to me, completely dispells any previous info about rotational position in your ear being critical to mic's pick up (no consumer device suitable for everyday use should be that sensitive to position IMHO)

FYI, an audio engineer friend of mine thinks the sudden burst of white noise caused by blowing into the mic, might re-set the noise cancelling audio sampling start up processes but without pulling the thing apart and reverse engineering its code, they're at a complete loss to comprehensively explain why this should work..

FYI 2, The same audio engineer friend thinks the noise cancelling algorithms are broken in some way which is the root cause of the mic pick up being so poor out of the box, and could be fixed with a software update. They've got an older Moto Elite Sliver with Mics positioned no closer to the mouth than the Hint and the mic audio quality in comparison is damned good without having to resort to tricks..

Option 2. A bit more fiddly but also do-able, is to hold your hand up around your ear "Secret Service Agent/FBI Agent" style. Don't actually touch the hint, just have a couple of fingers brushing against the top of your ear with your palm and wrist towards your mouth to help channel the audio from your mouth into the Hint's mic. YMMV and in someways, having to do this to get enough audio to the mic kinda defeats the purpose of having such a small Bluetooth earpiece - may as well hold your phone up to your ear instead! ;)

Anyway, I hope my findings help someone who's had problems, might've left it in a drawer etc.