Headphone hissing

[sinkoman]

I just got a new pair of headphones (BOSE TriPorts, please, stay ontopic though), and i'm loving them, aside from one thing.

There's this really really soft and annoying hiss when I have no music playing. The odd thing is though, that when I move my mouse (logitech G5) around, the hiss turns into a "REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE", but as soon as I stop moving my mouse around, the "reeeeee" turns back into that hissing sound.

I'm pretty sure it isn't my headphones, because I remember running into this same issue with my speakers a while back, yet because it was only with my speakers the sound was negligable.

But now that I can hear allot more with my headphones, this sound is starting to bug me out.

I've also noticed that when I restart my rig, the sound goes away until windows starts up. I've also noticed that if I move the connector to a different one of my audio jacks (I have 6, 2 inputs, 1 line out for 2 channel headphones and speakers, and 3 for surround sound), the sound goes away.

I'm running onboard sound, but I have an old 5.1 PCI sound card that I could throw in here. If not to solve the hiss, do you think it'd yield better audio quality?

Anyway, major question is how to get rid of this hiss

 

[Operational]

There's this really really soft and annoying hiss when I have no music playing. The odd thing is though, that when I move my mouse (logitech G5) around, the hiss turns into a "REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE", but as soon as I stop moving my mouse around, the "reeeeee" turns back into that hissing sound.

Do you have a wireless mouse? If so it sounds like its interfering with the sound signal. You can help this by getting a shorter headphone cable, reducing the transmit power of your mouse or getting a better shielded headphone cable. However considering what you say below

I've also noticed that when I restart my rig, the sound goes away until windows starts up. I've also noticed that if I move the connector to a different one of my audio jacks (I have 6, 2 inputs, 1 line out for 2 channel headphones and speakers, and 3 for surround sound), the sound goes away.

I'm running onboard sound, but I have an old 5.1 PCI sound card that I could throw in here. If not to solve the hiss, do you think it'd yield better audio quality?

I'd say that your onboard sound is crap and using your PCI sound card would be a good idea.

 

[sinkoman]

Do you have a wireless mouse? If so it sounds like its interfering with the sound signal. You can help this by getting a shorter headphone cable, reducing the transmit power of your mouse or getting a better shielded headphone cable. However considering what you say below


I'd say that your onboard sound is crap and using your PCI sound card would be a good idea.

I used to use an MX1000, but I got the G5 (which is a wired mouse) same day as the headphones. I do have that old MX1000 sitting on a chair behind me right now, but it's off, and the reciever is unplugged.

I'll give that a shot though

 

[3ssence]

Have you got the sound level in the volume control panel set to maximum ? Just a thought, as i find that if you have the volume low in windows and need to compensate by turning up in-line volume on a set of headphones, then you tend to introduce a level of background noise. Ofc this is only of any relevance if those headphones have an in-line volume control.

 

[Link]

I had an issue that was similar to the one you describe some time ago. Beleive it or not, it was the PSU causing it, as when I replaced it the problem disappeared. Never did figure out what the hell was with that.

 

[Shasta]

Throw some garlic at it, before it rises and sucks your blood. Works on anything that hisses when it is not supposed to be alive.

Or, make sure your mouse AND speaker / headphone wires are well away from any power cables, and more importantly, your monitor cable that goes to your graphics card. Worked for me when I had the same problem.



And try making sure your headphones are plugged in properly, and your power cord is too. You need to make sure it is all earthed properly. Any electrical things going nearby (TV, fan etc) will affect it also. Nearby pretty much means "in your house".

 

[Operational]

Yea anything electrical could be causing it - I'd try that PCI sound card before you start replacing PSU and whatnot.

 

[sinkoman]

Ok, I installed that old soundcard I had.

It's a SoundBlaster Live 5.1

It fixed the hiss, but I can't tell if it made the audio quality worse, better, or if i'm just being mentally concious of the change.

My initial impression is worse, and too bassy. If this is so, any ideas on how to fix this?

 

[Operational]

As a rule of thumb onboard sound sucks so odds are you are better off with the Soundblaster.
If you have Creative's drivers installed (as opposed to the windows default ones) there should be a bunch of utilities you can use to adjust the output.
http://creative.com/support/

 

[sinkoman]

As a rule of thumb onboard sound sucks so odds are you are better off with the Soundblaster.
If you have Creative's drivers installed (as opposed to the windows default ones) there should be a bunch of utilities you can use to adjust the output.
http://creative.com/support/

My friend told me to tweak around with the Equilizer settings, and i'm pretty pleased with how they're sounding now.

Allot cleaner than the onboard. Less muddy, and I can actually pick out instruments with my ears now. I can also hear things like the slight clicks when a guitarist switches notes