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Apple has not fixed the macOS audio left/right balance bug for nearly 10 years

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Re: Apple has not fixed the macOS audio left/right balance bug for nearly 10 years

#4
post #2

What's the audio left/right balance bug?

The audio balance on Apple computers changes randomly, and has done so for at least a decade. https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/79384/audio-balanc...

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Re: Apple has not fixed the macOS audio left/right balance bug for nearly 10 years

#7
post #2

What's the audio left/right balance bug?

To quote Apple's own (no longer available) KB-article from 2012 [1]:

"In some cases the audio balance may unexpectedly drift towards the left or right channel. This can happen if you rapidly press the volume up or down keys while the computer's microprocessor is under heavy load."

[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20120630125615/https://support.a...

Re: Apple has not fixed the macOS audio left/right balance bug for nearly 10 years

#9
post #2

What's the audio left/right balance bug?

The audio balance on Apple computers changes randomly, and has done so for at least a decade. https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/79384/audio-balanc...

Following the link, and a few more, describes at as changing "when volume buttons are pressed during high CPU load". That is perhaps random-seeming, but also way different from actually being reandom.

I have never used a (modern) Mac long enough to listen to audio, so I have no experience with this I just thought it sounded odd.

Now having learned that, I really (really) wonder how such a bug can happen, and how it can stay ignored for so long by the always-ranted-about masters of vertically integrated luxury computers. More the former, though.

It sounds almost as if there already is software somewhere that is doing something to maintain the proper balance (perhaps due to bugs in the hardware), and then that something becomes CPU-starved and/or interrupted when the volume changes, and doesn't resume properly. This is a wild guess straight outta ... Hampton, I have no clue about Mac hardware or macOS internals. Fun to think about, though!

I hope they fix it for real, soon!

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