Benjamin Ritter
Member
- Jun 26, 2013
- 5
- 0
- 0
The short answer: You can't fix it.
The long answer: But you can understand why.
As we've been working on the audio engine for Sonic Beat, we have an intimate understanding of how Android's audio systems work. For the most part, it kinda sucks. Google is aware of this, however, and they have been taking great strides toward fixing audio latency in Android starting with Marshmallow. The rest is up to your manufacturer as follows.
B. Diddy noted some devices have access to AwesomePlayer. If you do, turn it on - it's great. Most of you will not have this option, as it appears to be a Samsung thing.
On that note, Samsung has been on top of things lately. Newer models running Marshmallow take advantage of Google's audio rework. Our testing shows the phones averaging 120ms between sound call and output.
For these phones and others like them, the guys at superpowered.com have been working on a sound engine with impressive results. Developers incorporating it see latencies around 40ms. Still not quite the 10ms of an iPhone, but within three frames of the sound call. Unfortunately, Superpowered lacks a lot of audio format support and so developer take-up may be tough. It's the singular reason we didn't use them when making Sonic Beat.
For the rest of us plebs, we're stuck with Android's original audio engine, even on Marshmallow. My beloved Moto X 2014 measures in at 240ms, which is more than enough to break lip sync when playing Youtube. More unfortunately, 99% of the population doesn't notice and doesn't care. There are worse devices than mine as well. Our Nexus 7 2013 measures in at a whopping 350ms audio latency.
You will only make your life worse by using bluetooth. Bluetooth adds between 100ms and 600ms of audio delay ON TOP of Android's native latency. Part of this is due to compression at the source, and a bigger part is decompression at the speaker. These devices are underpowered to save battery and employ massive audio buffers to keep things from crackling. Simply don't use bluetooth if perfect audio timing or quality are concerns.
The long answer: But you can understand why.
As we've been working on the audio engine for Sonic Beat, we have an intimate understanding of how Android's audio systems work. For the most part, it kinda sucks. Google is aware of this, however, and they have been taking great strides toward fixing audio latency in Android starting with Marshmallow. The rest is up to your manufacturer as follows.
B. Diddy noted some devices have access to AwesomePlayer. If you do, turn it on - it's great. Most of you will not have this option, as it appears to be a Samsung thing.
On that note, Samsung has been on top of things lately. Newer models running Marshmallow take advantage of Google's audio rework. Our testing shows the phones averaging 120ms between sound call and output.
For these phones and others like them, the guys at superpowered.com have been working on a sound engine with impressive results. Developers incorporating it see latencies around 40ms. Still not quite the 10ms of an iPhone, but within three frames of the sound call. Unfortunately, Superpowered lacks a lot of audio format support and so developer take-up may be tough. It's the singular reason we didn't use them when making Sonic Beat.
For the rest of us plebs, we're stuck with Android's original audio engine, even on Marshmallow. My beloved Moto X 2014 measures in at 240ms, which is more than enough to break lip sync when playing Youtube. More unfortunately, 99% of the population doesn't notice and doesn't care. There are worse devices than mine as well. Our Nexus 7 2013 measures in at a whopping 350ms audio latency.
You will only make your life worse by using bluetooth. Bluetooth adds between 100ms and 600ms of audio delay ON TOP of Android's native latency. Part of this is due to compression at the source, and a bigger part is decompression at the speaker. These devices are underpowered to save battery and employ massive audio buffers to keep things from crackling. Simply don't use bluetooth if perfect audio timing or quality are concerns.
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram