Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

AirPods get stuck in low-quality 16 kHz audio mode when starting a VM

jeffgeerling.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 170 posts

Re: AirPods get stuck in low-quality 16 kHz audio mode when starting a VM

#71

Post by TipVFL »

I recently ran across similar issues while developing a web app, https://rap.coach , that features simultaneous audio playback and recording. A lot of people are saying that Bluetooth headsets have to go into a super-low quality mode when both playback and recording are enabled, but based on my testing it appears to be a software issue.

The issue appears when I use Rap Coach with Chrome on Android, but doesn't happen in Firefox on Android. It is very frustrating, getting better control over the audio hardware is one of the main reasons I'm going to end up building app store versions of this thing.

Re: AirPods get stuck in low-quality 16 kHz audio mode when starting a VM

#72

Post by oneplane »

jtbayly wrote: post #51
vkou wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've never had the left half of my keyboard crap out when I plugged it into a USB port. I have never gotten both the input, and the output half of a bluetooth headset to work on Windows 10. But that's understandable, since I'm sure Microsoft is strapped for resources, and has more important things to work on - like the bricking the data in My Documents in an OS update. Even if you don't want the microphone to work, g…

I’ve never gotten input and output from a Bluetooth headset working on MacOS, either.

I have had it work on multiple hardware, software and headset combinations over the past 15 years, perhaps you just had a bad combo?

Re: AirPods get stuck in low-quality 16 kHz audio mode when starting a VM

#73

Post by gok »

DiabloD3 wrote: post #35

I will also repeat what has been said about twelve times thus far: Enabling microphone makes Bluetooth headsets turn into pure shit. Guess what 5.0 finally allows as per spec? You can use any codec you want for telephony mode, including 44.1 stereo + 44.1 mono SBC. Guess what Apple does not implement, and guess what every 5.0 headset I've seen so far also does not implement? Sigh. Bluetooth is 20 years old this year,…

AirPods aren't BT5.

Re: AirPods get stuck in low-quality 16 kHz audio mode when starting a VM

#74

Post by pfranz »

csours wrote: post #66
freshhawk wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My reaction to reading that this happened when the microphone was turned on was also a mental "well yeah, welcome to Bluetooth". I have literally shifted my rating scale for crap technology completely to make room for Bluetooth to be far enough below everything else. The nice part is a monkey brain interprets that as everything getting better, so I am generally more content with software and tech in general. So, than…

Guess what the number one car infotainment complaint is... I don't have a public source, but for some vehicles bluetooth problems are the number one complain OVERALL.

I wouldn't be surprised, but my frustration is a poor implementation or unintuitive implementation. Quite a few cars go into USB-mode as soon as you attach a phone--almost 100% of the time they just want to charge their phone and already have things set up via Bluetooth or the radio. iPhones won't let you play through the phone if you have an attached audio device. Some cars seem to be able to do album art and track progress via Bluetooth--most will do it via USB but not via Bluetooth, which confuses people. Few cars seem to have a play/pause button. My most recent car would crash the infotainment system when I tried to use Siri. The only way to reset things were to turn off the car--bummer for road trips.

I get why car tech lags a few years in cars, but I'm constantly surprised by how terrible it is even in high price ranges. Since stereos are no longer swappable modules in the dash, the buttons have sprawled around the console. I was driving an in-law's Mercedes over Christmas and couldn't figure out how to turn on the stereo. When I did, I couldn't tell which buttons were for the stereo, climate control, or other, more core car functions.

Re: AirPods get stuck in low-quality 16 kHz audio mode when starting a VM

#75

Post by hombre_fatal »

csours wrote: post #66
freshhawk wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My reaction to reading that this happened when the microphone was turned on was also a mental "well yeah, welcome to Bluetooth". I have literally shifted my rating scale for crap technology completely to make room for Bluetooth to be far enough below everything else. The nice part is a monkey brain interprets that as everything getting better, so I am generally more content with software and tech in general. So, than…

Guess what the number one car infotainment complaint is... I don't have a public source, but for some vehicles bluetooth problems are the number one complain OVERALL.

There's also the problem of wireless tech UX being difficult in general.

For example, people want the experience of turning on their devices and auto-pairing with their other devices. But headphones, for example, don't have much of a UI to manage this.

There's the hellish scenario of everyone in your car hearing the conversation you thought you were having on your back patio in private just because you walked too close to the car (happened to me). But it's not obvious how to prevent that while offering the seamless phone-to-car handoff that people may also expect.

Re: AirPods get stuck in low-quality 16 kHz audio mode when starting a VM

#76

Post by wildmusings »

pfranz wrote: post #74
csours wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Guess what the number one car infotainment complaint is... I don't have a public source, but for some vehicles bluetooth problems are the number one complain OVERALL.

I wouldn't be surprised, but my frustration is a poor implementation or unintuitive implementation. Quite a few cars go into USB-mode as soon as you attach a phone--almost 100% of the time they just want to charge their phone and already have things set up via Bluetooth or the radio. iPhones won't let you play through the phone if you have an attached audio device. Some cars seem to be able to do album art and track…

I have a 2017 Mini and I have all these problems. The audio clips and has other issues when played over USB, but not Bluetooth. So I have to choose between good audio and charging my phone. I’m about to buy a USB adapter that plugs into the cigarette lighter just to fix this problem.

Just as you describe, the entertainment system UI is god awful too.

Re: AirPods get stuck in low-quality 16 kHz audio mode when starting a VM

#77

Post by shadowoflight »

hombre_fatal wrote: post #75
csours wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Guess what the number one car infotainment complaint is... I don't have a public source, but for some vehicles bluetooth problems are the number one complain OVERALL.

There's also the problem of wireless tech UX being difficult in general. For example, people want the experience of turning on their devices and auto-pairing with their other devices. But headphones, for example, don't have much of a UI to manage this. There's the hellish scenario of everyone in your car hearing the conversation you thought you were having on your back patio in private just because you walked too clo…

Couldn't NFC or some other proximity-sensing tech largely solve these issues? For instance, AirPods will offer to pair with a new iPhone when they're within some fairly short range (I think around 5ft, but I don't know the specific distance) - theoretically, car stereos (and a slew of other devices, for that matter) could use a similar approach, possibly combined with NFC for pairing-on-contact.

Re: AirPods get stuck in low-quality 16 kHz audio mode when starting a VM

#78

Post by mcny »

loeg wrote: post #57
TylerE wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would it be possible for the device to essentially expose itself as two devices, one stereo audio sink and one mono audio source? I mean, yea, it's more of a pairing headache but it solves this whole class of problems without requiring cooperation from the other half of the system.

Your SoC probably only has the one BT modem so gluing on a second one might be tricky. I doubt any BT modems do this natively, but I am not familiar with the market.

IIRC Bluetooth 5.0 allows connecting to multiple speakers at the same time, no? I imagine we will see implementations become more common within a year or two?

Re: AirPods get stuck in low-quality 16 kHz audio mode when starting a VM

#79

Post by joecool1029 »

csours wrote: post #66
freshhawk wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My reaction to reading that this happened when the microphone was turned on was also a mental "well yeah, welcome to Bluetooth". I have literally shifted my rating scale for crap technology completely to make room for Bluetooth to be far enough below everything else. The nice part is a monkey brain interprets that as everything getting better, so I am generally more content with software and tech in general. So, than…

Guess what the number one car infotainment complaint is... I don't have a public source, but for some vehicles bluetooth problems are the number one complain OVERALL.

I had a 2012 VW Golf TDI. Before VW bought it back for making asthma great again, it had bluetooth issues. Out of the factory it would only play mono, the right channel specifically.

VW issued a TSB for it and the radio firmware could be updated by the dealership but it was a 3 hour process. I did it, dealership went in thinking it was 1 hour billable and were pissed that I only agreed to pay 1 hour!

Re: AirPods get stuck in low-quality 16 kHz audio mode when starting a VM

#80

Post by ppseafield »

vkou wrote: post #48
snazz wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bluetooth is equally or more universal than Wi-Fi, though. There aren’t that many connectivity standards that are present in just about every single device under the sun, including stuff like headsets and wireless mice and keyboards. It’s effectively wireless USB (from a user perspective), with all the good and the bad that that brings.

I've never had the left half of my keyboard crap out when I plugged it into a USB port. I have never gotten both the input, and the output half of a bluetooth headset to work on Windows 10. But that's understandable, since I'm sure Microsoft is strapped for resources, and has more important things to work on - like the bricking the data in My Documents in an OS update. Even if you don't want the microphone to work, g…

I had trouble with my Bluetooth keyboard as well, both in Linux and Windows 10. Commonly it would disconnect between keydown and keyup, so my editor would be filled with nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn, etc.

My bluetooth headphones regularly disconnect from my laptop. Thankfully they have a mini stereo plug. (It's much higher quality audiothat way anyways.)

Post reply on HN