[owenploughman]

So I just got a ZO2 for christmas and I decided to try it out. I plugged it directly into my phone (a droid charge, if it matters) and into my headphones(pioneer hdj 2000's). I immediately hear a significant amount of hissing/white noise and strange distortion sounds. Also, whenever I did things on my phone (scrolling through pages, flipping across screens, etc.) I hear more weird distorted noises, synced with my interactions. I tried to play music and that worked, however, I feel like Im doing something wrong, and im hesitant to continue using it due to fears of damaging something. Could it just be the cords, or what??

 

[RPGWiZaRD]

You probably have the first revision of ZO2 which had some problems with hissing with sensitive IEMs/headphones. If you find it bothersome you can RMA it to get the latest version which also have 2 different gain settings.
 
The noise is quite common thing when using a lower quality DAC as source such as a phone, especially when you're plugging into the headphone out, the noise get just enhanced further by amping which isn't only limited to ZO but any other amp too probably so it's more an issue with the source than the amp. I can hear the same static noise when using Realtek HD onboard chip on my computer, it picks up noise from HDD activity especially flash ads. Using a PCI/PCI-E soundcard and the noise completely vanishes for me.
 
Now there might be a chance that with the lower gain mode it might pickup less noise, at least that's something I'm interested to find out when the ZO2 revision 3 arrives to me.

 

[owenploughman]

Oh, I thought the power of the source wasnt an issue with the zo, but yeah, so do I exchange it for the revision at the digizoid website?

 

[Anaxilus]

let it run for a week off and on and see if you still notice the issues after that time.  I had some odd experiences w/ my original ZO out of the box which might have been attributable to a phenomenon many believe is non existent. 

 

[MizMoxie]

Quote:

So I just got a ZO2 for christmas and I decided to try it out. I plugged it directly into my phone (a droid charge, if it matters) and into my headphones(pioneer hdj 2000's). I immediately hear a significant amount of hissing/white noise and strange distortion sounds. Also, whenever I did things on my phone (scrolling through pages, flipping across screens, etc.) I hear more weird distorted noises, synced with my interactions. I tried to play music and that worked, however, I feel like Im doing something wrong, and im hesitant to continue using it due to fears of damaging something. Could it just be the cords, or what??

To help me better understand what's going on, could you please clarify what you mean by, "I tried to play music and that worked..." Are you saying that when music is playing you don't hear any hiss and the odd sounds synced with your interactions go away?

 

[owenploughman]

I mean that music played, the hiss was still there, and odd sounds as well.
But anyway, update: My headphones have a mono/stereo switch, and I unknowingly plugged the zo into them and played music. Also, the bass produced by the zo now sounds distorted and weaker. Is this connected to the mono mishap?

 

[owenploughman]

*the headphones were switched to mono

 

[MizMoxie]

Quote:

I mean that music played, the hiss was still there, and odd sounds as well.
But anyway, update: My headphones have a mono/stereo switch, and I unknowingly plugged the zo into them and played music. Also, the bass produced by the zo now sounds distorted and weaker. Is this connected to the mono mishap?

No, that shouldn't have caused any problems.
 
Do you have another audio source that you can test the ZO with (i.e., an mp3 player, computer, a friend's Smartphone, etc.)? Also, what volume do you have your phone and ZO set at?
 

 

[owenploughman]

I have now sent it back for a replacement. Hopefully the new one wont have these problems. The hissing and noises were manageable, but i played several songs with deep bass, with the zo turned up around red, and the bass distorted and just sounded plain wrong and out of place, blocking some of the other sounds from the song that i would normally hear.(I played around with the volume levels on both the zo and my device, with no improvement, except when it was turned way down) This didn't happen within my first week and a half of owning the zo, i don't know what could have caused the sudden decrease in sound quality...