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XPS 13 - Audio quality bad after screen turns off
I have my power settings set to turn my screen off after 5 minutes of inactivity when I'm on battery power only. If I'm playing a podcast in an app, the screen will turn off (even though this is technically activity!), and then the audio quality gets really bad.
It's as if the sound quality has gone from CD quality to a really bad cassette tape quality, and sometimes the volume seems a little louder.
I can't figure out to fix this except by restarting, and then it'll be back to normal.
What's going on and how can I prevent this or fix it?
robert p
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October 29th, 2018 10:00
Hi dingbat12345,
Thanks for posting. Apologies that your system is not performing as expected.
From your description, it sounds like your power settings need to be adjusted. Here is a short video you may find helpful:
Power and Sleep Settings Windows 10
If the system is under warranty, please contact me privately. Be sure to include your personal information (name, address, telephone, email) and your computer's service tag number in your message. Thanks.
If there is no warranty, then you could contact our Out of Warranty team to get a quote for a paid service call -http://dell.to/1vnT6CQ
Saltgrass
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October 30th, 2018 08:00
Since you don't mention which version of the XPS 13 you have, many of there are Modern Standby systems. When the screen turns off, it goes into low power mode.
Such things as music can still play in some apps, like Groove Music or iTunes, but the Desktop is basically shut down.
dingbat12345
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October 30th, 2018 21:00
I have the XPS 13 9365 2-in-1, purchased new in 2017.
The podcast keeps playing, but the sound is affected. Even if I "wake it up" again it continues until the next restart.
Saltgrass
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October 31st, 2018 09:00
With what utility are you playing the podcasts?
Since I don't listen to podcasts, do you have one you suggest for me to check?
Does Groove music also have sound problems after coming back from the low power mode?
dingbat12345
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November 3rd, 2018 16:00
I've been using the Pocket Casts Win10 app, but I tried playing something in another app and still had the same issue until I restarted. That seems to suggest it's a system issue.
Saltgrass
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November 5th, 2018 06:00
I checked mine yesterday with a video stream from Apple. With the video, the system did no go into modern standby. If your podcasts are audio only, it should have.
The App you mention seems to be in Beta which means no way to diagnose the system using it. The audio stream during my video attempt, while on battery did contain static about every 30 seconds and did lag behind the video by several seconds.
Once connected to the charger, the static seemed to disappear. The audio caught up after being paused and sounded OK after that.
I am currently playing music with Groove and waiting for it to go into modern standby. About 20 seconds after that I will bring the display back you hitting the space bar to see how the music sounds. If I see any problems, I will post back. Otherwise, assume it sounded fine.
A couple of observations about the system. Intel has added a "Smart Sound" device. It appears that device has increased the battery drains while on modern standby. My system has gone from 1% per hour to 3% per hour.
The system is very irritating in that there is a constant delay (2 second) whenever you do almost anything, such as scroll a window or hear a system notification sound. Possibly, part of the system is being turned off to save battery and has to turn back on which takes that delay.
Otherwise, I haven't really noticed a problem with the system except where about a year ago a Windows update started keeping if from turning off or hibernating. That problem was taken care of but the fix may have had an effect of the basic operation.
dingbat12345
4 Posts
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November 10th, 2018 12:00
Could someone from Dell contact me? An agent sent me a message and said a service request was opened, but it looks like it was closed again. No explanation given.
Thanks.