headphones on the 5720?

I have no hiss on my 5720. The only way to get rid of it is to use one of the external sound card solutions. i.e. pccard or USB.

I have no hiss - but I haven't installed the wireless LAN.
Search the forum: either the wireless or the irda is to blame for the hiss ...

I have no hiss on my 5710.

Zero Hiss on mine as well, so were 3 for 3 in this topic. The sound isn't half bad either [for a laptop]. But i immediatley purchased a audigy2 pcmcia card and now its beautiful ... the card almost has a similar silvery finish like the 5720.

I'm pretty sure you can remap the 3 audio ports [1 right side, 2 back] to whatever you want them to be using the software installed. From what i heard though, if you remap the headphoens [front channel] to be anything else, it will NOT deactivate built-in speakers when you use it. but i havent tested that so i could be wrong.

The IrDA only solves the squeeking noise, not the hiss.

Since maybe some people's ears have been damaged by earbuds, check this. When you plug headphones into the headphone jack, do you have to drop the volume really low?

The problem seems to be related to only the headphone jack being overamplified. It's like jacking up speaker volume but not increasing the source's output volume.

But I count as 2 because I've had two 5720s thus far and both had the exact same hiss/overamplification problem.

That is correct. Remapping any of the other three ports (through Realtek HD Audio Manager) to a headphone jack produces wonderful sound (for a built-in audio chip) with NO HISS, but doing so does not disable the internal speakers (which is also weird in itself). It is only the headphone jack that produces the hiss, which is unacceptable for any computer costing more than $1,000.

Sager has taken way to long to do anything about this issue. In hopes that it was just a fluke in the two 5720s that I've had thus far, and the many others that other people have reported, I'd like to try getting my notebook replaced again.

But the problem would seem to be fixable with a simple firmware patch. That is, if the overamplification is a result of something in the firmware.

Doc_Simple has also reported the same hiss in his reviews of the 5700 series.

I have a 9880... it has the hiss...

Is the 9880 a different motherboard from the 5700 series?

Well, they use the same Audio codec - Azalia Intel High Definition.

I have a 5320, and while I disabled the IrDA to get rid of the cricket noise (worked), the hiss remains. I will attempt to remap the headphone jack, thanks for posting info about that.

EDIT: I remapped the headphones to the microphone port, beautiful! Now to fix the speakers....

The hiss is very low in my opinion, i can only hear it when theres nothing playing in the background, cant hear it in a movie or in a game.

The headphone jack seems to be fairly loud anyways, so you usually have to turn the volume down and its nonexistant at that point.

I did notice one thing however, out of my two headphones... one has like a gold tipped plug in part, i know i paid more for the different kind of metal, and the other has a normal silver kind. The gold one seems to cancel out the little hiss noise, so i guess im trying to say i think the metal used in the plug can also make a difference.

But get a nice pair of headphones and the hiss is almost deafening. Even to the point of overpowering movies and games. I have to use some cheap earphones in order to minimize the hiss.

Here's a shot of HD Audio Manager:



And here is a shot of my volume settings required for the headphones to not be so loud. (Linked because it's a large image.)

But the hiss is still very loud even with all sound muted. The problem is hardware.

i tried out headphones with the 5720 and the hiss is there. when i play music the hiss takes a backseat since the music overpowers. My headphones were fairly basic sony's ... i can imagine an expensive set of cans amplifying the problem. The hiss is a hardware problem like DJD said, so who knows what sager will do. It really comes down to preference, i could live with the hiss if i didnt have my audigy2zs... its nowhere severe enough to force me to send it in for a repair or return it.

well my first try to rectify the situation was putting the software volume at like 1% and having my external speakers at 60% for my preferred volume.

then, i switched to 25% software volume, and 40% external speaker volume. The reduction of hiss was PHENOMENAL (sp?). the hiss is still there, but not noticeable at my desired volume. Just mess around until you find what you want... btw, i use altec a425 speakers.

I have the same problem on my Promedion (another Clevo m570a clone), I'm truely disappionted because I paid € 1850 for the thing and expected much from the High Definition chip.

This way you can't really listen to music on low volume because the hiss is to much present.

I just bought a NP5720-V and the sound quality is pretty bad. Way too much internal noise. To hear this, mute the audio (Fn+F3), now set the volume to 1, now plug in the headphones and listen. You'll heard hiss and chirps over and over. It's like this:

<hiss>...<chirp><chirp><chirp>...<hiss>...<repeat>

Must be some hardware design flaw since the audio circuit is already muted in Windows.

well , its not the best solution in the world but i got a Turtle Beach USB Audio ADvantage Micro. WIth this tiny dongle plugged in I hear ZERO hiss. $30 or so at Bestbuy, ect. I know its more money but at this point that 30 is like a drop in the ocean.

Plus it comes with a short extension cord which, when plugged into the back USB ports runs quite nicely away from the side USB ports, which has my wireless mouse transmitter plugged in. Mayhaps not the most elegant solution, but to date its the ONLY one that fully works.

I highly recommend, I have very rarely been so happy with a cheapo computer solution.

but its an external card right?

if your gunna spend money on an extra external card, why not splurdge a little bit and go for the audigy for real GOOD sound?

The chirping is fixable. Disable IrDA through Device Manager.

I'll mention this again here. I'm a public presenter, and I can't use my notebook for presentations because the hiss comes through the sound system. Very bad.