Bluetooth Issues

[bartek17]

Anybody else is having issues with Bluetooth?

I am on my second LG Marquee. The first phone had a broken speakerphone. This one has intermittent issues with Bluetooth. When I make or receive a call, sometimes the others persons voice sounds digitized/scrambled and you can't make out what they are saying. This issue disappears but later comes back after a soft reset.

I have tried different Bluetooth headsets with the same outcome so I am confident the phone is defective. The phone was factory reset few times, which did not solve the problem either.

I took the phone to the Sprint store but they could not reproduce the problem. Since the issue is intermittent, I asked them to test it again when I was there. They could not find a problem with the phone after second inspection when I was there.

Thank you for any help.

 

[plonko]

Hello Bartek17,

Is there any correlation between locations where you have the majority of problems?

Your problem sounds like packet loss, which *may* mean interference. Remember, Bluetooth operates in the same 2.4 GHz band as the majority of wireless consumer goods. So if you're in a "noisy" environment (condo complex, lots of wireless routers, phones, etc), your headset may find it impossible to find a clear channel.

Another possibility - It could simply be the Sprint network. When you are having the problems you noted, have you turned off Bluetooth while in the same call and gone back to talking on the handset? I know I occasionally have similar problems on Sprint on my Touch Pro2 even when I'm not using Bluetooth. In short, I love their cheap grandfathered plans, but their service sucks.

Otherwise, if you've eliminated the above, I agree it sounds like a sensitivity problem with the Bluetooth transceiver in the phone. It may get better from handset to handset, or it may be a marginal antenna design. All of these thin phones made some questionable design trade offs (ie. iPhone4's antenna-gate, or the Galaxy S horrific GPS performance). It wouldn't surprise me if LG compromised robust Bluetooth performance in exchange for form factor.

But it's all pure conjecture since I don't have one in my hand. My wife's Marquee will arrive next week. I'll let you know whether we experience anything out of ordinary once we've used it for a week.

 

[bartek17]

Thank you for your response, Plonko.

There is no correlation between where I am and the problem. It happens as well as when I am driving and while I am parked. The spot where I frequently park and use my phone on Bluetooth has the same frequency of occurrence as any other places. The issue very often disappears after soft resetting the phone. Once I am driving and on a phone call I can hear the distortion until hanging up. It appears that only high pitched sounds are distorted but that might be just my feeling.

When I switch from Bluetooth to speakerphone/earpiece, the voice is clear. When I switch back to Bluetooth, I hear the distortion again so it is definitely not network problem.

After reading to your post, I switched Wi-Fi off on my phone and I will keep it off to see if that is the culprit. Hopefully thanks to your input, we will come closer to resolving it.

P.S. I was using the Touch Pro 2 myself for over a year before switching to the Marquee. It was a good solid phone but the web experience of Marquee is much better. Hopefully the bugs on this phone will get worked out and it will be a solid replacement of the TP2.

After playing with this phone and realizing that is both thinner and lighter than my wife's iPhone I also felt a little skeptical about the phones durability and reliability. But only time will tell.

 

[bartek17]

Just an update: The issue is still there with Wi-Fi off.

Now I don't know what to do. Hopefully LG will come up with some firmware update as I feel it's a software issue since calls sound good after a soft reset and voice over Bluetooth starts to crackle/"digitalize" after a while.

 

[dishe]

Interesting, I made a bluetooth call in my car today and it sounded fine, as did A2DP music streaming. But I haven't had enough time to thoroughly test yet.

 

[plonko]

I haven't been able to replicate the bluetooth failure yet, With admittedly very limited usage, I haven't experienced the symptoms Bartek reported. I'll keep playing with it.

 

[AkumaX]

I've been using my BT making calls + A2DP audio streaming for the past few weeks, and haven't had any problems. It sounds like your issues may be caused by being in a bad service area.

 

[dishe]

Oh, I have noticed that Sprint's network has been having some "kinks" worked out (I blame the new iPhone users abusing our towers and bandwidth- heh).

Every now and then I would get a call that sounded very digital that performed poorly, sometimes I had to hang up and try again. I thought it was because I'm using Google Voice, but it turns out native calls on the network are doing it too.

Maybe you are confusing that with bluetooth performance?


Here's an easy test: Initiate a call on the handset. Determine that the voice quality is good (or bad), then turn on the headset and see if there is any difference. Or vice versa- next time the problem shows up, hit the blutooth button on the phone (transfers call to handset) and see if it still exists on the actual call.

 

[bartek17]

Oh, I have noticed that Sprint's network has been having some "kinks" worked out (I blame the new iPhone users abusing our towers and bandwidth- heh).

Every now and then I would get a call that sounded very digital that performed poorly, sometimes I had to hang up and try again. I thought it was because I'm using Google Voice, but it turns out native calls on the network are doing it too.

Maybe you are confusing that with bluetooth performance?


Here's an easy test: Initiate a call on the handset. Determine that the voice quality is good (or bad), then turn on the headset and see if there is any difference. Or vice versa- next time the problem shows up, hit the blutooth button on the phone (transfers call to handset) and see if it still exists on the actual call.

I have done that and said it in my previous post:

When I switch from Bluetooth to speakerphone/earpiece, the voice is clear. When I switch back to Bluetooth, I hear the distortion again so it is definitely not network problem.

 

[nosajsam]

Which bluetooth headsets have you tried that have reproduced the problem??

I use a plantronics voyager pro plus & jabra cruser2 (in the car)
My wife uses a Samsung WEP490

we have had no bluetooth problems or issues

 

[AkumaX]

Which bluetooth headsets have you tried that have reproduced the problem??

I use a plantronics voyager pro plus & jabra cruser2 (in the car)
My wife uses a Samsung WEP490

we have had no bluetooth problems or issues

I have a Samsung WEP870. It actually does A2DP Stereo -> Mono, if you are using it in 1-ear mode. It also comes w/ a special dongle that you attach to the BT headset which "outputs" to a pair of L/R earphones so you can listen to A2DP stereo. However I prefer listening to music w/ 1 ear so I just wear the BT and everyone just thinks I'm a crazy person

 

[bartek17]

Which bluetooth headsets have you tried that have reproduced the problem??

I use a plantronics voyager pro plus & jabra cruser2 (in the car)
My wife uses a Samsung WEP490

we have had no bluetooth problems or issues

I have Parrot CK3100 car kit in my car installed. I also tried my friends Jabra and my old Anycom HS-790 headsets with same intermittent sound issues (sounds like digitalization). All of those headsets were used with different phones before with no issues.

Maybe it's just the Bluetooth chip in my phone that is defective. I would not surprised about low quality control of the Marquee since my first one had broken speakerphone. It was crackling at beginning of each sound transmission. It would feel like Nextel's chirp but louder and actually crackling instead of chirping.

 

[mbwdoran]

Bartek17: I'm having the same digitalization issue with my Marquee. I've tried to unpair and repair. But it's still there. I'm using a Plantronics 850.

Any luck resolving? Or did you just take it back for a new one?

 

[farfromuman]

I also had the digitizing distortion on my oem Infiniti bt a a few times, even the phone ringer made crazy static noise while connected to the bt. Some times it would not even connect to the car. A reboot fixes this so I setup Tasker to reboot it daily and it has greatly reduced these occurrences. This is one buggy phone.

Sent from my A500 using Tapatalk

 

[bartek17]

Bartek17: I'm having the same digitalization issue with my Marquee. I've tried to unpair and repair. But it's still there. I'm using a Plantronics 850.

Any luck resolving? Or did you just take it back for a new one?

I took it back to Sprint store but "they found nothing wrong with it". I told them it's a intermediate issue and the tech came out and tested the phone with me and of course it sounded fine then. They told me they could do nothing about it.

The next day I called Sprint support and they couldn't approve exchange since i exchanged it once before because of crackling in speakerphone. The rep was very rude and saying that "they have better testing techniques in the Store than you and I" after I questioned the testing done at the store. That statement made me very irritated and asked to be switched to the cancellation department. Since I am after 14 days, they told me, I would be responsible for termination fees. I simply hang up.

So I am stuck with the same issue and limit use of Bluetooth to minimum. Hopefully next firmware update will take care of it.