Solving problems with headphones. One speaker is quieter than the other. Different volumes in the headphones.

Many people use headphones to listen to music and play games without disturbing others. However, it often happens that a headset that initially has excellent volume loses it over time. Listening to music brings discomfort: you have to strain your ears. What to do if your favorite headphones, which we almost never part with, start playing quietly, and why does this happen?

Why the headphones began to transmit sound quietly is not as easy to find out as it seems at first glance. There are several reasons.

If one earphone works a little worse - quiet sound, extraneous rustles, then perhaps it the contact closes to the body. You need to check the plug for breakdown.
One of the speakers is demagnetized, so the sound became much quieter. For high-quality products, the likelihood of such a defect is reduced to zero, but devices from China sometimes suffer from this - repair is impossible, you can only buy a new product.
During long-term use, headphones may accumulate foreign debris, which screens sound and does not let it through, the product must be disassembled and cleaned with a brush.
When the sound is different - one of the headphones has a quieter sound, then try check balance.
If there is a volume disturbance towards the left or right device, then you need to check them on another product, for example, connect it to a laptop - everything is fine, which means the settings in the phone are to blame.
High humidity, drop or mechanical damage cord may cause temporary silence in one or the other earphone.

Having certain skills in working with electronic devices, you can dismantle the product yourself and find out the condition of the sound card, otherwise you need to contact a service technician.

Human factor

Young people have a tendency to listen to their favorite tracks on headphones with the volume turned up at full volume. With this habit, even small “pills” inserted into the ears can cause damage to your eardrums over time. After a long time of such vigorous listening, your hearing becomes dull, and it seems to you that the sound from the headphones becomes quiet or that one earphone is louder than the other. Rest for a few days and your hearing will return to normal. If not, then immediately contact an otolaryngologist.

The yellow-brown lubricant protects our hearing organs. But when it gets on headphones for internal use, it can clog the metal mesh and it seems that the product now has a quiet sound or does not work at all.

There are cases when only one of the headphones is more clogged - this is due to anatomical features user's ear canals.

There is only one method to get rid of this problem - rinse and clean the mesh using improvised means using a simple method.

Visually check the quality of the flushing and connect the device to the phone - the headphones begin to work, the sound is the same, which means that all actions were performed correctly. Enjoy listening.

Save and read later -

Of all the types of audio devices I've dealt with, only headphones have been problematic. In many of the panel tests I've done for Sound & Vision, and the ones I'm doing now for The Wirecutter, there are huge differences in how different people perceive the sound of certain headphones. After reading the reviews and comments, you can see that different opinions more than it seems. Even excluding the opinions of "trolls", it is still obvious that different people hear sounds differently.

There are several reasons for this. I described one of them a few months ago in the article “Why headphones sound different for different people. Part 1". I promised that I would write part 2, and now I have done it. Part 1 was lost during the ongoing renovation of About.com, so I will include it below as part of this article.

No pair of ears are alike

Reason 1: The auditory canals are very different

Jacob Soendergaard, sales agent for G.R.A.S. Sound and Vibration (the company that makes my headphone testing tools) told me about this phenomenon and was kind enough to show me a very interesting PDF document describing the development process for modern hearing simulators and head and torso simulators.

Scientist S.K. expressed himself very wisely and wittily. S.C. Dalsgaard from the University of Odense, who is associated with the above project, said: “We model human perception with a very large error.”

Soendergaard said:

“Every minute change in the geometry of the ear canal (shape of the ear canal, number of folds in the canal, aspect ratio, location of double bends, size of the eardrum, etc.) affects auditory perception“especially on the perception of high frequencies with very short wavelengths.”

You can see this in the graph above, which is a simplified version of the diagram presented in the PDF I mentioned. The graph compares readings taken inside the ear canals of 11 subjects with readings from a device designed to test hearing aids. For each tested frequency, you can observe the amplitude-frequency response of the device (solid line), the average sound pressure values of 11 test objects (a circle) and the amplitude of the impact (a thing that looks like a wide letter H laid on its side).

As you can see, the sound pressure on the ear canals at frequencies below 1 kHz does not change much compared to the device, at frequencies above 2 kHz the differences become larger, and at frequencies above 10 kHz the difference is simply huge and amounts to +- 4 decibels. Objectively, I will say that a difference of +- 2 dB, say with a simultaneous decrease in bass by 2 dB and an increase in the level of high frequencies by 2 dB, is enough to affect the tonal balance of the headphones.

Soendergaard and I analyzed the measurement data - we had to conclude that everyone's hearing is different, because our eardrum is a measuring device, the principle of which is similar to the microphone in the hearing simulator. As Soendergaard said, if you move a person's eardrum even a millimeter, then research at frequencies from 10 to 20 kHz (the hearing threshold of the human ear) will give completely different results.

Thus, differences in the shape of the ear canal, as well as the fact that headphones are used by people with different ear shapes and ear canals, can affect the perception of high-frequency sound. A difference of just 1mm can affect the smooth sound of the headphones and make it either too pronounced or too muffled.

I experienced this firsthand a few years ago when a composer (who shall remain nameless) told me that he really liked some in-ear headphones. These were headphones that sounded incredibly hollow, and most reviewers agreed. The measurements I took confirmed deviations at 3 kHz. I had collaborated with this man in the past, and we both came to the same conclusions about on-ear and over-ear headphones, but his conclusions about in-ear headphones were radically different from mine (the audiologist later said that the shape of his ear canal was extremely unusual).

Everyone's sense of space is different, at least with headphones.

Reason #2: The transfer function in everyone's brain works differently.

Your brain uses the transfer function of your head to determine sound in three dimensions. The function takes into account differences in the time it takes for sound to reach each ear, differences in volume for each ear, and differences in frequency response caused by the acoustic effect of your head, shoulders and ears when sound comes from different directions. Your brain processes and interprets all of these signals to tell you where the source of the sound is located.

Using headphones eliminates the influence of acoustic effects from the body and changes the arrival time of the signal and its volume compared to listening to music through a speaker system or at a “live” concert. Unfortunately, your brain can't just turn off the transfer function. When you put on headphones, your brain keeps trying to identify the source of the sound and cannot do it correctly, resulting in the feeling that the source of the sound is right in your head.

I realized that everyone has their own unique head transfer function after visiting Virtual Listening Systems in early 1997. To create the headphone processor that later became the Sennheiser Lucas, VLS studied the sound perception properties of hundreds of people. To do this, they placed tiny microphones in their ear canals and placed them in a soundproof room. A small speaker on the robotic arm played an M-sequence of sounds. The robot moved the speaker to one of 100 different positions, at different angles, each time producing a series of beeps so that microphones in the testers' ears could "hear" how the body and ears affected the perception of sound.

(Headphone enthusiasts may note that this procedure is similar to the measurement method used by Smyth Research and used to create the A8 Realiser processor)

I took the VLS test myself. The company's scientists fed my results into a processor that modifies the audio signal and makes it identical to the transfer function of the head. The result was amazing, I have not heard at least one audio processor used in headphones reproduce something like this. I heard an accurate, perfectly centralized picture, as if the vocalist was directly in front of me - an effect even Dolby headphones had never had on me.

VLS took readings from hundreds of people and created 16 different presets for the Lucas processor, each of which simulates a transfer function. Going through each of them in turn, it is difficult to stop at just one. I remember that some settings were clearly better than all the others, but I had a hard time choosing one among the top four or five. But none of them gave the same result as the one selected individually for me in the VLS laboratory.

This is probably why most headphone processors have much less settings, and they operate on some average transfer function. Maybe you'll get lucky and your transfer function will come close to this approximation. Or not, then the sound will seem too rich, or maybe too weak.

Since each has its own head transfer function, each also has a different compensation curve that affects the sound - something like an equalizer. When your body's characteristics are superimposed on the compensation curve, the result is the sound you hear every day. If you remove the influence of body parameters by using headphones, your brain will rely only on the compensation curve. And since each of these curves is individual, the effect of the same headphones varies from person to person.

No isolation - no bass

Reason #3: The shape of the headphones changes the sound

Good sound reproduction largely depends on the shape of the headphones. In particular, on how the ear pads of full-size headphones wrap around your ears, how on-ear headphones sit on auricle, or how comfortable the silicone or foam in-ear earphone fits in your ear. If the headphones have good noise isolation, then all the bass they are capable of producing will flow into the ears. If there is a “sound leak” somewhere, the bass will be less pronounced, and you will notice how the tonal balance will shift towards the high frequencies.

In part, physical features your body is determined by which headphones are right for you. For example, if none of the replacement eartips on your in-ear headphones are the right size, you won't find them to sound good. This could be a problem for me because I have unusual big size ear canals, and for my colleague Geoff Morrison, since his ones are unusually small. For this reason, I always commend headphone manufacturers who include five or more different ear tips in the headphone box. So if you're unhappy with the sound of your in-ear headphones, it might be worth taking a look at the foam earbuds from Comply.

Poor fit on over-ear and full-size headphones is also not uncommon. I dare to suggest that this applies to a greater extent to the latter, since in order to achieve good sound insulation, many factors need to be taken into account. Among such factors are long and/or Thick hair, glasses and even earrings. Move the ear pads even a millimeter away from your head, and some of the bass will disappear, which will noticeably affect the sound quality of the headphones.

Over-ear and on-ear headphones work better for some people than others. Some headphones for audiophiles, such as those, have ear pads so large that they can completely cover the ears and part of the cheeks of relatively petite people, especially women. At the same time, some supposedly full-size headphones are not even able to cover large earlobes like mine.

It is worth noting that poor sound insulation can also have a positive effect. A little less noise isolation can make bass-heavy headphones sound smoother, as we found in our Best In-Ear Headphones Under $100 review for The Wirecutter. Of the headphones reviewed in that topic, my favorites are Grain Audio IEHP, which for me produce excellent smooth and natural sound. I decided that the IEHP sounded so good because the silicone pads provided good noise isolation. Although, for everyone else, the IEHP's bass was too strong. Apparently, the earpads did not provide adequate noise isolation for me, but they provided it for others, and this radically changed my attitude towards the headphones for the better.

Reasons that do not depend on headphones

Reason #4: Personal preferences

Of course, there are reasons, not just for headphones, why people differ in their perception of sound.

The first reason is also the most obvious: different people have different musical tastes. Some people like a little more bass than you, or a little more treble. Obviously, you will choose different headphones.

Continuing the topic. Besides the usual, normal taste preferences, some people have a mistaken, or, frankly speaking, wrong opinion about the sound. We've all met people who believe that good sound is nothing more than a ridiculously loud bass. Some enthusiasts prefer strong high frequencies, which they mistakenly think of as accuracy and detail. I went through this myself, but the invaluable writings of J. Gordon Holt set me on the right path.

Whatever makes such listeners happy is valid, but their opinions about sound can only be useful to those who have similar extreme tastes, and such people try to justify their choice with unprofessional and unfounded judgments.

Reason #5: Hearing capabilities change with age, depending on gender or lifestyle

Although most of us are born with approximately the same hearing abilities, they change throughout life.

The more you are exposed to loud sounds, the more likely you are to lose some of your sensitivity to high frequencies. This is especially a problem for people whose leisure (going to loud concerts, driving race cars, hunting, etc.) and/or work (construction, military, manufacturing, etc.) involve loud noises.

The older you get, the more likely you are to lose your perception of high frequencies. This especially applies to men. According to the article “A Study of Gender Differences and Age-Related Hearing Decline” from the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America: “...hearing sensitivity for most frequencies declines more than twice as fast in men as in women...” In part because men are more likely than women to be employed, where they are exposed to loud noises, such as the one mentioned above. Studies have also shown that men perceive much better loud sounds, 6-10 decibels above the sound level comfortable for women.

Obviously, the perception of the characteristics of an audio device will change in accordance with changes in hearing. For example, harmonic bending high order, which occurs at frequencies 5 or more times higher than the fundamental frequency of sound, will obviously bother a 25-year-old woman more than a 60-year-old elderly man, in addition, he may not even hear a sound with a frequency of 12 kHz, but it will be unbearable for a 25 -year-old woman.

What can we do about it?

This begs the obvious question: “How can any headphone be evaluated in a way that is informative and useful to any listener?”

Unfortunately, not at all. But we can try.

In my opinion, the key is to take testimony from many listeners with various forms heads and ear canals. Lauren Dragan did it in a headphone review for The Wirecutter, and we did it when I was at Sound & Vision.

I'd love to do this here at About.com Stereos, but unfortunately it's not financially viable given the small number of headphones I review and how much I get paid for it. So the best I can do is link to my other reviews whenever possible. My articles for About.com Stereos and headphone reviews for SoundStage! I supplement Xperience with laboratory measurements to give an objective idea of what the amplitude-frequency response of headphones is.

The “gold standard” must take into account the opinions of many listeners and laboratory measurements. I did this when I worked for Sound & Vision, but at the moment I don't know of any publication that does this.

All of this leads to one simple rule: be careful before you make fun of other people's opinions about headphones.

Special thanks to Jacob Soendergaard of G.R.A.S. Sound and Vibration and Dennis Burger for their help and feedback on the article.

This article has been read 8,041 times.

If your headphones suddenly stop working, do not rush to the service center, do not rush to call repairmen. Often the reason is not so complicated; you can correct the problem yourself. Let's look at the reasons why the device is quiet or there is no sound at all, how to increase the volume in headphones, and remove noise. Depending on the identified error, we will correct the situation.

Headphones

The speakers on your computer/laptop are working normally, but a problem has arisen with the headphones: when you connect them to the USB port, they do not transmit sound. What to do when there is no sound in the headphones?

In the taskbar on your PC's desktop, look for the speaker icon at the bottom right of the notification area. Right-click on it.
From the menu that appears, select “Playback Devices.”
The “Sound” window has opened. When you connect a device to a USB port, its icon should appear in the window. If there is no icon, then you need to connect. Right-click on an empty field in the window and select “Show disabled devices.”
You'll see a device icon, but it will be greyed out and grayed out, with "Disconnected" written on it.
Right-click on the icon and select “Enable” from the menu.
The button became active, a check mark appeared in a green circle on the icon, which means everything was done. In this case, the icon with a check mark on the speaker button will change to an icon with a telephone handset, which means that the speakers are turned off at this time and do not work.
To configure the operation, right-click on the headphones icon and go to “Properties” in the menu.
Enter the name in the line and set the desired icon.
The “Device Usage” line should read “Use this device (on).”
Apply the changes and go to the Levels tab.
In the Speakers setting, move the control to maximum value. Check that the loudspeaker icon next to this control is in the on position (there is no red circle on the icon indicating the off state).
Click the “Balance” button, you also need to increase the parameters to 100%, check that the values of the regulators there are maximum.
Apply the changes, go to the “Additional Features” tab, uncheck all the checkboxes there, this will remove possible noise.
By going to the “Advanced” tab, you can check the sound in different formats and select one of the proposed ones.
Uncheck the boxes in the "Exclusive mode" section.

You have configured your headphones and they are now working correctly for you. If the next time you connect to the port they are again inactive, right-click on them and set the default operation in the menu. After this, each time you connect the headphones will automatically turn on.

Headphones do not work when connected to the front panel

You connected the device to the front panel, but it doesn’t work, there is no sound in the headphones. We follow the algorithm:

Go through the Start menu to Control Panel.
Go to the "Hardware and Sound" section.
There, go to “Realtek HD Manager”.

Go to “RealtekHD Manager”

The manager window will open.
You will see that the front panel is inactive. Click on the “Connector Parameters” folder. Both options should be checked there. Mark them, thereby activating the front panel.

You can also go to additional settings and adjust everything there, as mentioned above, to remove noise and interference.

The sound is dull, quiet

The headphones work, but some files come with a low sound, muffled. When you remove the plug from the computer/laptop and the sound passes through the speakers, the same files begin to sound normal. How to cure such a problem, how to increase the sound in headphones?

Go to Control Panel, located in the Start menu.
We follow the path: “Hardware and sound” - “Sound” - “Manage sound devices”.

Go to the “Recording” tab, select “Stereo Mixer”.
You need to increase the volume on the “Levels” tab, set the maximum value, and on the “Balance” button also set it to 100%.

The problem should be resolved: the quiet sound in the headphones will be corrected, the volume will be optimal.

Noise, interference

If the sound is not reproduced correctly, when noise or interference is heard, it is easy to correct the situation if it is caused by all sorts of effects installed by default. If there is noise in the headphones on the computer, how to remove it - consider this issue.

Go to device properties.
Go to the “Advanced Features” tab and disable all effects.
Return to the list of devices, go to the “Communication” tab.
Set the value to “No action required”.

Playback should improve, the sound should become clearer, the noise should be removed.

Driver problems

Sound problems may be due to incorrect sound card drivers. This can also cause unnecessary noise when connecting devices. If the previous measures did not help, use updating or reinstalling drivers, install compatible drivers, even if they are not native.

If the problem occurs after installing an update or utility, roll back the system. Open the properties of the sound card, on the “Driver” tab, click “Roll Back”. You will return the driver to its previous working state.

You can use another method: completely remove the sound card drivers and click “Update configuration” in the device manager. The system automatically finds and installs the necessary software.

If the system does not find the driver you need, install it manually. Find the driver on the official website. If your laptop's sound card does not work, look on the website of the manufacturer of that particular laptop. If the card is built into the motherboard, look for the driver on the motherboard manufacturer's website. If the card was purchased separately, check with the card manufacturer for drivers. When searching for drivers, pay attention to the matching system bit size: x64 or x86.

To ensure that the software is reinstalled and not just updated, first remove the sound card in Device Manager.

If there is a driver, but it is intended for an earlier version of the OS, then run the installation through compatibility mode. This mode is located in the driver properties on the special “Compatibility” tab. Specify the parameter of the downloaded driver and start the installation. The launch must be performed with administrator rights.

Thus, without resorting to calling specialists, in most cases you can solve the problem of poor sound or lack of it yourself, reduce the noise, increase the volume. Do not rush to resort to radical measures - reinstalling the drivers right away, perhaps the reason is simpler. Based on the situation, choose a recovery tool normal operation devices.

Problem: One speaker is quieter than the other. Today we'll figure it out possible reasons different volumes.

One speaker is quieter than the other

The following are possible reasons for different speaker volumes. But first of all, check what position the handle is in Balance, if your speaker system has one:

1. Computer problems

Incorrect software audio settings (more common)

Check your system volume and balance settings.

Launch Mixer:

Click on the icon Speakers or Headphones, depending on your situation:

In properties go to the tab Levels and adjust the balance:

Problem with PC hardware (rare)

The socket (3.5 mm audio jack) is damaged. Try connecting the speakers to a different panel (rear or front).
The sound card has failed. The solution is, naturally, its replacement.

2. Damage to connecting cables

Replace the cable connecting the sound card to the active speaker.
If possible, replace the cable that connects the speakers to each other.

3. Acoustic malfunction

If all else fails, you need to disassemble both columns and look for the problem inside. It can be:

failure of one of the amplifier channels (transistors, capacitors);
damage to commutations, oxidation of contacts;
damage to one of the speakers.

Before disassembling, check: connect headphones or another speaker system to the same computer. Or connect the “problem” speakers to another sound source. This should clear things up.

Headphones. The sound is quieter in one ear

With headphones and computer headsets, the diagnostic algorithm is similar: first of all, you need to check the balance settings in Windows, in the player, then make sure that the cord with the plug and the cable between the speakers are intact. But besides these, there are other potential causes of failure.

1. Volume control is broken.

Often this is where the problem lies. There are several manifestations of a malfunctioning volume control:

the sound fades in and out when you touch the control;
different speaker volumes;
The adjustment affects one ear, but the volume in the other does not change.

If you know how to solder, then it is best to replace the regulator or simply throw it out of the circuit. The volume can be adjusted on the computer without it. And also think about whether it makes sense to spend time on repairs. If you have an inexpensive headset model, it may be easier to replace it.

2. One of the speakers came unglued

It happens that the speakers in the headphones are held on by glue and one day one of them simply falls off inside. The volume does not decrease in it, but the sound seems quieter due to the fact that the speaker has fallen deep into the cup and is not adjacent to the ear.

If, when you turn the headphones over, you hear something knocking inside, then most likely this is your case. You will have to remove the ear pad, disassemble the ear cup and glue the speaker in place using any glue for plastic or silicone. There is no need to rush when disassembling the cup. Carefully inspect its design. Most likely, you will need to unscrew the screws and press the latches. The latter is best done carefully using a plastic card.