iPhone 6s Sound Quality

[Slaphead]

Just a quick question to those who are hearing this buzzing:

Are you listening while charging the device? I only ask because I have an iPad Air that, when used with sensitive headphones, buzzes very quietly when on charge, but is totally clean when running just from the battery.

It never bothered me as I the only time I use that device for audio is when it's not on charge.

 

[a_recording]

Okay I made the following video that shows the noise I'm talking about, recorded directly off the headphone out into the line-in of my video recorder. It's not amplifier 'power on' noise, it's not noise from a cable or environmental EMI. It's directly related to processing activity on the phone. Every phone probably has these problems, but the 6S seems worse (or at least my unit). The headphone out on my unit really seems poorly isolated from everything else going on in the phone. I wish I knew if this was batch specific.
 

 

[sgrwn98]

  I did a quick test yesterday with my IE80s and couldn't hear anything. I was able to hear the buzzing in Lachlan's video, but nothing from my 6S so far. I'll do some more tests later today with my other IEMs.

Hey clee290,
 
Could you please provide me with more feedback?
 
I am thinking of buying the iPhone 6S and I am making a jump from the 4S. I have the IE80s and I love them. 
 
My mum does have a 6S and tested my headphones on them and I really could not hear anything that I thought would bother me. 
 
But I am looking for more opinions/inputs from other IE80 owners.
 
Thanks!

 

[clee290]

  Hey clee290,
 
Could you please provide me with more feedback?
 
I am thinking of buying the iPhone 6S and I am making a jump from the 4S. I have the IE80s and I love them. 
 
My mum does have a 6S and tested my headphones on them and I really could not hear anything that I thought would bother me. 
 
But I am looking for more opinions/inputs from other IE80 owners.
 
Thanks!

I've taken my IE80s and 6S out with me the last 2 days and haven't really heard buzzing/static like in Lachlan's video. Though being out on my commute isn't the best time to listen for EMI noise I'll do more in-depth tests later today when I'm in a quieter environment (completely forgot to do this yesterday). 

 

[Whitigir]

Well, EMI should be taken care of by how the iPhone 6s was designed. There had never been an issue with this from the previous products, and the 6S is using the same technique with shielding on board. Even if it had 3 chips. I would say that Lachlan phone is more likely to be a defective one as in one of those chips are producing noises on it own.

All is just speculation, I would urge Lachlan to confront with Apple and get it replace at least once, to clarify about the defect or design flaw before any "phobia....or ignorance" comes in to play. Regardless, I still remember the first batch of iPhone 4-4s had the receptions flaw where holding both attenna will lose out signals. Therefore, Apple design flaws is real...unless..

 

[Erukian]

Well, EMI should be taken care of by how the iPhone 6s was designed. There had never been an issue with this from the previous products, and the 6S is using the same technique with shielding on board. Even if it had 3 chips. I would say that Lachlan phone is more likely to be a defective one as in one of those chips are producing noises on it own.

All is just speculation, I would urge Lachlan to confront with Apple and get it replace at least once, to clarify about the defect or design flaw before any "phobia....or ignorance" comes in to play. Regardless, I still remember the first batch of iPhone 4-4s had the receptions flaw where holding both attenna will lose out signals. Therefore, Apple design flaws is real...unless..

Apple won't admit to a flaw in their design, not after they sold >13Million on opening weekend.

 

[mephiska]

Just bought a 6s yesterday.  I put iOS 9.1 beta on it and am not hearing any electronic noise.  I am using Audio Technica ATH-CK10's (107dB/mW) and I have the IM02 at home. I tried to replicate what OP was doing in the video and could not reproduce it.  
 
Maybe they fixed this in 9.1?

 

[Whitigir]

Just bought a 6s yesterday.  I put iOS 9.1 beta on it and am not hearing any electronic noise.  I am using Audio Technica ATH-CK10's (107dB/mW) and I have the IM02 at home. I tried to replicate what OP was doing in the video and could not reproduce it.  

Maybe they fixed this in 9.1?

Both of those, especially IM-02 is very sensitive to output impedance and hiss. If you can't hear it, then it would be that Lachlan has a faulty unit. This is the reason why I said instead of hyping something, please make sure to have confronted the manufacturer about the problem on your unit, unless not fixed, then go all out in a bashing Internet videos and stuff.

No offend to anyone, no bias...just a fair inputs

 

[elfary]

Come on people.
 
I think that Lachlan is just trying to raise awareness of a POSSIBLE issue. He just wants to gather data from other users. He has forked out a lot of cash for an iPhone to drive his high end iems and he has being greeted with spurious sounds that earlier iPhones did not exhibit. Just that. I don't think that he is trying to raise an EMIgate.
 
How could we possibly blame him for the videos? It's the other way around, we would have to thank him because he could spare us from a waste of money, I just purchase iPhones to drive my high end in ears. If it is no longer able to do that i won't spend a dime on an iPhone. So caution seems to be the right approach to iPhone 6s. For the time being.
 
So far he has tested half a dozen iPhones and all exhibited the noises. Hence best outcome would be a bad batch. Worst: that's the way iPhone 6s works per design. Then praying for 7 going back to excellence in the blackness of the background area.

 

[Whitigir]

Never mind, don't want to get too far off topic. I appreciate what Lachlan does, don't take it wrong

 

[Baroninkjet]

If you can't hear it, then it would be that Lachlan has a faulty unit.

 
In the first video, he stated that he went to store and found it on multiple units.

 

[elfary]

Never mind, don't want to get too far off topic. I appreciate what Lachlan does, don't take it wrong

If you don't get tonality right, nothing else matters.

 

[a_recording]

@Whitigir No worries about your comments, I understand where you are coming from. I've learnt from the past that in these cases it's best to verify these sorts of things before posting about them, which is why this time I was very careful to confirm on the demo units that I could hear the noise BEFORE I went ahead and posted the video. I also have already gone to the Genius Bar, where the technician confirmed that they could also hear the noise. There's been a report that as far as I know has been escalated one level up; don't know if I will hear anything from that. I've also emailed Tim Cook Apparently this works sometimes?
 
In Australia we get a 14 day return / replacement window from Apple. I was a little discouraged by my findings with the store demo units though, and I didn't want to get a replacement if it turned out to be a waste of time. That said I may take up the option just to roll the dice now that I've basically done all the recordings I can do from this unit.
 
I've now gotten more than a few Youtube and Reddit comments from people remarking that they can hear the noise, including some quite specific reports that talk about which earphones they can hear the noise on and which ones they can't. At the same time I've also gotten reports, also quite detailed, from people who can't hear the noise. So I'm suspecting either bad batch OR different variants of the phone with different cellular radios might have different noise. I really post these videos as a way to gather data and to give people a way to recognise and more importantly replicate the issue.
 
I've tried hard not to over sensationalise the issue. As I've said repeatedly now, this won't be a problem for most people with most earphones in most situations. But it is very irksome in the sense that this is the most expensive iPhone I've bought so far (thanks to the $AUD exchange rate) and it seems like at least on a few units Apple has mucked up an aspect that I was previously very, very happy with. Nothing is perfect but this seems like a senseless sort of performance regression.
 
I have owned 4 iPhones prior to this one. I really like them. My hopeful outcome from all this is that Apple says "bad batch, sorry, here's one we know is good."

 

[clee290]

Did a bit more testing. Tried some of the other things Lachlan did in his videos (I initially only tried the app switcher) and I also tried other IEMs.

I did notice a bit of static with my VSD3S but it wasn't consistent. For instance, I would get some static when activating the app switcher 2-3 times, then I would try something else (opening the control center, turning Wi-Fi on and off, scrolling through my music library) but heard nothing. Then went back to the app switcher and the noise was gone.

Also tried my RE-400s, GR07 and IE80s again. Wasn't able to hear anything from those.

I did read on Macrumors that there are two versions of the A9 processor, one by TSMC and one by Samsung. So perhaps one of them is more 'noisy' than the other?

 

[elfary]

More evidence from a guy at macrumors:

"I upgraded from the 5s to the 6s on Friday. In the car I use an aux port to play music from my iphone to the car stereo.

On the 6s, I occasionally get static on the line that I never got on the 5s (or before). I hear it more when connecting to an internet app (such as facebook, or an email pull). It's not very loud, but I do notice it.

I've tried two different 3mm cords, thinking one may just be cheaper and not have enough shielding, but I am hearing it on both.

It seems to be an intermittent problem, sometimes it happens, sometimes it doesn't, and I don't get it on my iphone earbuds.

Has anyone else seen this?

Thanks.



If the tonality it's not right, then nothing else really matters.