# Improve the headphone sound quality?



## busterbrown77 (Aug 31, 2011)

Hey everyone.

So, obviously love this phone. _Almost _everything is awesome. My only gripe with it, is the sound quality, which is a issue because i listen to music on it ALOT. For example. The effects in the music app work ok, but the 3d effect makes it sound like alien music  and 'bass boost' should be called 'bass wrecker'. It removes all the low end, and adds a sort of odd mid-bass which just sounds terrible. In general, it's still not anywhere near the improvement DSP Manager makes. Now, the only reason it bugs me so much, is because i'm coming from a DSP Manager'd thunderbolt which just destroys my nexus, and i'm running a pair of HD598s (any audiophiles in here? XD) with it which just highlights the weirdness of the sound. I've tried some equalizers from the market, and none seem to work. I know that a market EQ wont effect the gmusic app so i tried with übermusic and they still didn't have an effect on my phone, but did on a friends Gnex >









So is there a way to just make it better? I'm currently on stock 4.0.2, in fear of tripping the secure element, but I am curious about cm9 because cm7 sounded best on the tbolt. If any other rom has a big improvement, i'm sure one flash won't hurt right?







Also, does dsp manager even work? is it on any roms?

Thanks a ton.


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## darkpark (Jul 24, 2011)

try volume+ (plus). it is an app in the market that has some additional features plus what dsp manager already has. additionally, may I recommend PowerAmp for music playback? It has its own equalizer plus supports flac and other lossless audio formats. 
as for headphones, i have only tried listening to my sennheiser cx4000 and my klipsch S4. i had no complaints. 
although, it is not as clean sounding as my zune HD.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


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## busterbrown77 (Aug 31, 2011)

darkpark said:


> try volume+ (plus). it is an app in the market that has some additional features plus what dsp manager already has. additionally, may I recommend PowerAmp for music playback? It has its own equalizer plus supports flac and other lossless audio formats.
> as for headphones, i have only tried listening to my sennheiser cx4000 and my klipsch S4. i had no complaints.
> although, it is not as clean sounding as my zune HD.
> 
> Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


Yea, for some reason, Volume+ has no effect on my phone. I've used it before on my tbolt, and tried it to fix low speaker volume. Nothing. As for poweramp, I used it a while back, but not on my nexus. I can give it a shot. Just wish i could get DSP Manager :/


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## times_infinity (Aug 6, 2011)

You could use one of the CM9 builds. Any CM build should have DSP Manager.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using RootzWiki


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## ForwardTwo (Dec 20, 2011)

Are you sure Volume+ isn't working? It works perfectly on my phone @ 4.0.3.

I do agree that the sound quality on this phone is sub par, but V+ fixed it for me. It was just too soft, with a volume boost and slight boosts in the highs, it sounded crystal clear. I'm listening to it on my ATH M50's and the volume boost made it sound great.


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## cantcurecancer (Jul 30, 2011)

Volume+ has no effect on my phone either...if anything it makes the volume quieter


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## busterbrown77 (Aug 31, 2011)

cantcurecancer said:


> Volume+ has no effect on my phone either...if anything it makes the volume quieter


Ive seen this before with a couple eqs on the market. Yes volume+ does nothing. Doesnt even make it quiter. Its apparently some glitch with 4.0.2 as alot of people on droid life had issues getting V+ to work when trying to raise speaker volume.


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## busterbrown77 (Aug 31, 2011)

times_infinity said:


> You could use one of the CM9 builds. Any CM build should have DSP Manager.
> 
> Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using RootzWiki


O.O OMG

but.. but... jfsksjb does wallet still work in cm9?


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## busterbrown77 (Aug 31, 2011)

ForwardTwo said:


> Are you sure Volume+ isn't working? It works perfectly on my phone @ 4.0.3.
> 
> I do agree that the sound quality on this phone is sub par, but V+ fixed it for me. It was just too soft, with a volume boost and slight boosts in the highs, it sounded crystal clear. I'm listening to it on my ATH M50's and the volume boost made it sound great.


Just curious, what version of v+ are you using?


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## deaffob (Aug 16, 2011)

I'm using dsp manager already. In order to use other sound effect managers for your Google Music, you have to go into sound -> sound effects and choose which dsp manager you'd like to use.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


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## busterbrown77 (Aug 31, 2011)

deaffob said:


> I'm using dsp manager already. In order to use other sound effect managers for your Google Music, you have to go into sound -> sound effects and choose which dsp manager you'd like to use.
> 
> Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


What rom?


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## kevcube (Jul 25, 2011)

busterbrown77 said:


> O.O OMG
> 
> but.. but... jfsksjb does wallet still work in cm9?


Let's be honest here, have you ever ACTUALLY used wallet as more than a novelty?

But from what I can tell, wallet works on CM9

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


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## busterbrown77 (Aug 31, 2011)

kevcube said:


> Let's be honest here, have you ever ACTUALLY used wallet as more than a novelty?
> 
> But from what I can tell, wallet works on CM9
> 
> Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


It's funny you say that, but yes.

Best Buy = Check
Petco = Check
Whole Foods = Check
CVS = Check
Could use it for gas, but dont.
McDonalds once or twice

Paypass is actually quite common here. I actually use it a fair amount. Sure i could go without, but when i can use it, you bet i will. The look on cashiers faces is just hysterical.


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## blaineevans (Jul 11, 2011)

What about Pandora for car stereo purposes? Any tips on something to improve the quality?

Obviously I've eq'd the deck and amp itself, and via CD (and to an extent FM), it's right where I want it. Lots of bass, just enough mid/high to keep it decent. But through Pandora, I lose about 1/4 of the bass output, and I can't get it to come back/even out.

I'm admittedly a basshead, so maybe I just expect too much.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


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## prometheus (Jul 29, 2011)

Supercurio has a gnex. He is working on voodoo sound support. Give it some time.


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## busterbrown77 (Aug 31, 2011)

blaineevans said:


> What about Pandora for car stereo purposes? Any tips on something to improve the quality?
> 
> Obviously I've eq'd the deck and amp itself, and via CD (and to an extent FM), it's right where I want it. Lots of bass, just enough mid/high to keep it decent. But through Pandora, I lose about 1/4 of the bass output, and I can't get it to come back/even out.
> 
> ...


I can be too sometimes. Thats somewhat why i miss DSP Manager. Have your tried enabling high quality audio in pandoras settings? I dont typically use pandora for quality, but i never have an issue with it considering its streaming.


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## pbj420 (Aug 24, 2011)

This is how I got volume+ to stick on my phone. Download it, then set it up like u want. Then go into settings, sound and enable it. Then freeze Music FX which is a system app, with TB or any other app which u can freeze system apps with. Music FX might force close once but other than that no problems with using headphones, speaker, or in-call with any app. Been ruining that since the day I got my nexus.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Xparent Cyan Tapatalk


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## blaineevans (Jul 11, 2011)

busterbrown77 said:


> I can be too sometimes. Thats somewhat why i miss DSP Manager. Have your tried enabling high quality audio in pandoras settings? I dont typically use pandora for quality, but i never have an issue with it considering its streaming.


I haven't tbh, seems silly, guess I should have.

Obviously it's streaming and if there's nothing I can do, then that's okay. But, I dislike downloading/buying music (not that I don't want to support the artist, purely out of laziness). So Pandora is a great option.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


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## busterbrown77 (Aug 31, 2011)

blaineevans said:


> I haven't tbh, seems silly, guess I should have.
> 
> Obviously it's streaming and if there's nothing I can do, then that's okay. But, I dislike downloading/buying music (not that I don't want to support the artist, purely out of laziness). So Pandora is a great option.
> 
> Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


That could be your issue. I always instantly enable that on a new phone. Makes a pretty big difference on some songs. As for streaming, well that doesn't mean it will be bad. I am currently running all my music through gmusic, none of it is on my phone. Sounds fine to me, unless there is a loss of quality and i havent noticed, which If so tell me lol. Ive been debating just copying it all to my phone, just havent got around to it tbh.


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## busterbrown77 (Aug 31, 2011)

pbj420 said:


> This is how I got volume+ to stick on my phone. Download it, then set it up like u want. Then go into settings, sound and enable it. Then freeze Music FX which is a system app, with TB or any other app which u can freeze system apps with. Music FX might force close once but other than that no problems with using headphones, speaker, or in-call with any app. Been ruining that since the day I got my nexus.
> 
> Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Xparent Cyan Tapatalk


Never even thought of that, and sure enough, it did start working. But it still just isn't the same :/
Ill probably be flashing cm9 soon, any opinions on how stable it is? I've found 4.9 quite stable but dont want to trade that for better sound quality.


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## blaineevans (Jul 11, 2011)

busterbrown77 said:


> That could be your issue. I always instantly enable that on a new phone. Makes a pretty big difference on some songs. As for streaming, well that doesn't mean it will be bad. I am currently running all my music through gmusic, none of it is on my phone. Sounds fine to me, unless there is a loss of quality and i havent noticed, which If so tell me lol. Ive been debating just copying it all to my phone, just havent got around to it tbh.


Yeah I'll give it a go tomorrow. Like I said, obviously should have already, when I went into Pandora settings I was looking for some sort of EQ setup and apparently grazed right over that option.

Oblivious, I am.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


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## pbj420 (Aug 24, 2011)

This is what I have headset set to.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Xparent Cyan Tapatalk


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## pbj420 (Aug 24, 2011)

This is speaker

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Xparent Cyan Tapatalk


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## xRogerxC (Nov 27, 2011)

busterbrown77 said:


> Never even thought of that, and sure enough, it did start working. But it still just isn't the same :/
> Ill probably be flashing cm9 soon, any opinions on how stable it is? I've found 4.9 quite stable but dont want to trade that for better sound quality.


The CM9 Kang ROM by winner00 is stable as can be. Give it a try.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk


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## ForwardTwo (Dec 20, 2011)

busterbrown77 said:


> Just curious, what version of v+ are you using?


I'm running v1.8.0.5, straight from his site.

Like I said though, this is on 4.0.3, are you running a 4.0.2 ROM?


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## Zerostar13 (Sep 25, 2011)

i love poweramp because it come pretty close to winamp on the pc when it comes to customizing EQs and such. i _would _use gmusic to access my online collection, but the lack of a customizable EQ kills it. the 3d effect in poweramp (i think its called "stereo x") works pretty well without destroying the music...


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## quarterinchkilla (Sep 28, 2011)

Zerostar13 said:


> i love poweramp because it come pretty close to winamp on the pc when it comes to customizing EQs and such. i _would _use gmusic to access my online collection, but the lack of a customizable EQ kills it. the 3d effect in poweramp (i think its called "stereo x") works pretty well without destroying the music...


+1 on poweramp love it


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