Headphone controls?

[bungee28]

Re: Headphone controls? VOLUME CONTROLS

Hi folks, I just registered to post my experience here in hope that it will save someone else time and heartache (wish I had come across this post myself earlier).

I bought a HTC One as a gift for my wife who up till then was an iPhone user. Since it wasn't included in the box, she requested for a pair of headphones with volume control which she can also use to take calls. I thought "how difficult could that be?". As it turned out, VERY.

Long story short, after trying out many different pairs of earphones that were "designed for Android", the only pair that I found which had a working volume control (not a slider) on the earphones was HTC's own RC E240 pictured below. HTC doesn't make their earphones available for sale in my country (Singapore) and I had to resort to ordering them online. Even when I was shopping for a spare while in Taiwan, these earphones were very difficult to hunt down.

I think HTC is doing their users and their own company a tremendous disservice by (i) making earphones controls with such a proprietary standard that differs from many "Android compatible" earphones in the market, & (ii) not making their accessories more available for retail sale (the HTC rep literally pointed me to Expansys). Oh the positive side, the RC E240 don't look and sound half-bad. Nevertheless, I can't believe how painful it was for me to hunt down what I'd consider a rather standard accessory for a flagship phone. Good luck regaining lost market share, HTC!

 

[bungee28]

Also came across this XDA thread HTC One > One Accessories > List of headsets with working inline remote - on List of headsets with working inline remote **Updated (1 New Headset) 25/05/2013** - xda-developers which pretty much says the same thing.

Warning: if you're shopping for HTC RC E240 on eBay, there might be some fakes from China (always a risk when it comes to earphones shipped from China/Hong Kong) that may not have working volume controls. See xda-developers - View Single Post - List of headsets with working inline remote **Updated (1 New Headset) 25/05/2013**
The E240 pairs that I own don't say 'HTC' on the side like the ones pictured on the XDA post. I suspect the XDA poster bought these Original RC E240 Black Earphone With Volume FOR THE NEW HTC ONE HTC ONE MAX | eBay

 

[Dick Emery]

I now have both volume and track skip functions on my HTC One M7 using Android OMTP compatible earphones. I use Xiaomi Piston V2.1 earphones but it should work for any headset controls that work on Android. The only caveat is you must have a rooted phone!

In order to get it working you need to edit a file in system/usr/keylayout called generic.kl

You simply change the values of keys 163 and 165 from MEDIA_NEXT & MEDIA_PREVIOUS to VOLUME_UP & VOLUME_DOWN respectively (which way around depends on your headset so you may need to switch them after testing).

Save the file and reboot. Et voila! You should now have volume control on your HTC One using headset remote buttons!

If you want long press track skip as well when the display is off/locked you will also need the Xposed framework and the Sense module (Google it).

Again your phone must already be rooted for this to work. Sorry if your phone is not rooted and you don't want to. You are stuck with HTC's default button layout

 

[aaronlam]

This is brilliant and worked!

Here are directions (pulled from XDA) to edit Generic.kl if you need help... again... for rooted phones:

adb remount
adb pull /system/usr/keylayout/Generic.kl
This will copy the Generic.kl file to your current directory (you can see it in the command prompt, typically it is C:\Users\[Your Username]\
Browse to the file make a copy of the unedited version and save your backup somewhere and then edit Generic.kl in a txt editor (I like Notepad++)
I changed key 150 EXPLORER to say key 150 MENU, which makes the browser key open the menu instead of your web browser.
After you made your changes save it and then use the following ADB commands to push it back and set the permissions:
adb push Generic.kl /system/usr/keylayout/
adb shell
chmod 644 /system/usr/keylayout/Generic.kl
chown system.system /system/usr/keylayout/Generic.kl
exit
adb reboot

 

[Damien Payne]

This is very true.

I am one of the few who had an Apple, now have an s3.

I bought a pair of Sol Republic Jax for the iphone. volume rocker worked perfectly.

Traded up to my s3. Bass quality skyrocketed, but i lost my rocker function.

It's not the phone, its the buds. I have not been able to find a pair that works well with my S3.

If anyone can, please advert them here..

 

[takoda holeman]

i have a pair of brand new skullcandy crushers and they work well with any other device beside my htc one m8. its a problem with the phone because the htc earbuds that came with the phone dont control the music either and nor do my skullcandy earbuds

 

[Keeper_ab]

I now have both volume and track skip functions on my HTC One M7 using Android OMTP compatible earphones. I use Xiaomi Piston V2.1 earphones but it should work for any headset controls that work on Android. The only caveat is you must have a rooted phone!

In order to get it working you need to edit a file in system/usr/keylayout called generic.kl

You simply change the values of keys 163 and 165 from MEDIA_NEXT & MEDIA_PREVIOUS to VOLUME_UP & VOLUME_DOWN respectively (which way around depends on your headset so you may need to switch them after testing).

Save the file and reboot. Et voila! You should now have volume control on your HTC One using headset remote buttons!

If you want long press track skip as well when the display is off/locked you will also need the Xposed framework and the Sense module (Google it).

Again your phone must already be rooted for this to work. Sorry if your phone is not rooted and you don't want to. You are stuck with HTC's default button layout

I managed to fix the volume buttons but I do not know how to fix the center button to play / pause and double / triple tap to next / previus song. The center button works only search google to hold it. Thank you

 

[Keeper_ab]

Up!

 

[SomeChickUDontKnow]

Actually, I believe his complaint was that using the volume rocker on the phone while his Beats were plugged in doesn't work, which is a problem I've run into previously.

 

[Hoagie555]

I use a Samsung Galaxy core prime and poweramp! Controls work fine for me!

 

[Omkar781]

Here is a fix for Beats headphones that worked for me.

1. Use Poweramp app (you can download a trial in the app store). In general, I think that this app is great and it seems to produce better quality sound for some reason. You can also mess with the EQ settings if the phone's preset Beats mode isn't doing it for you.
2. Use Headset Button Controller app (again, you can download a trial first). In this app, target Poweramp as your music player. Now you should be able to press the center button of your Beats headphones once to pause/play, twice to skip forward, three times to go back, and four times to change the volume. This configuration is also customizable.

 

[Omkar781]

I m using skullcandy bluetooth headphones now how to configure that?