I’ve been happily using my Bluebuds X Bluetooth Headphones for the past 6 months without problem between my Windows 7 laptop and Sony Xperia Sola but after updating to Windows 8 this peace has ended in cracking and hissing reminiscent of low quality internet radio.
To resolve this and bring back full A2DP high quality Bluetooth streaming try the following:
- Open Devices and Printers from Hardware and Sound within the Control Panel
- Expand the Bluetooth headphone listed under Devices by double clicking it
- Switch to the Services tab within the Properties dialog
- Turn off Hands-free Telephony and click OK
Screenshots
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- Your problem starts when the voice Bluetooth component is activated.
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- Open the Control Panel > Hardware and Sound > Devices and Printers screen.
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- Right click the BlueBuds X Bluetooth device.
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- Switch to the Services tab of the BlueBuds X Properties screen.
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- Untick the Hands-free Telephony to ensure stereo Bluetooth bliss.
Re-connect to your Bluetooth headphones and play a song from your Windows 8 machine, fingers crossed the hissing is gone! I’ll be updating to APT-X shortly which will do away with reliance on Bluetooth for audio but Bluetooth will still be required for track changes, etc. Hope this helps!
Update: This same fix works for Windows 8.1 and now Windows 10 😀
Would there be a similar solution for Win11? I haven’t managed to track down a matching Options panel.
ooooooo thanks god i was so disappointed because of no help .. but finally i fix this shit sound quality prob …. THANKSSSS ALOTTTTTT VISSER
Perfect hint, THANKS!
2023 and this is still a problem with a Sony Bluetooth speaker. I had already printed out a return label when I found this! Tha ks!
Finally! Something that works! Thanks!
Also works in Wondows 11 🙂
Just to round out some of the “Mic doesn’t work” stuff
If you just want Music/Audio and you don’t need the mic the above works
If your issue with the device isn’t the low quality audio, but the fact you can kind of hear yourself, you need to find a way to turn off “Side Tone”. I’ve got a pair of Audiotechnica’s that have this problem. When I connect them to the config app they provide (not on PC) I can turn off “Side Tone” and this setting is “saved” on the headset. Meaning when I go back to my Laptop they’re at this middle ground, where the audio is only okay, but I can’t hear myself anymore, which is fine
Hope that helps
Another Fix for when “un-checking telephony” does not work:
Restart/enable bluetooth services per instructions pasted below. Hope this helps!
AVCTP service ( this is the service I missed and my Sony BT headphones work like normal BT headphones now)
Prior to this last fix before I gave up, I also updated Windows to the latest 20h2 update and installed/reinstalled BT and realtek audio drivers MANY times.
Enable Bluetooth Support service on your Windows 10
The Bluetooth Support Service on your Windows 10 PC may have stopped working or been disabled. If that is the case on your device, follow the steps below to address the concern:
Launch RUN box by pressing Windows key and R key.
Type in Services.msc and press ENTER
From the Services window, locate the Bluetooth support services
Double click on it to open it.
Under the General tab, choose Manual for the Start-up Type and click on START under Service Status.
Click on Apply and then OK.
https://thetechwired.com/how-to-connect-bluetooth-headphones-to-pc-windows-10/
Thanks Michael , You Legend !!!! Thanks a lot , I ordered my headphones from amazon and was gonna return it and then i saw this post from you . IT WORKS THANK YOU SO MUCH
YOU DID IT YOU SOLVED MY MYSTERY!!!
Thanks a ton. You are a genius.
Brilliant – this needs to be plastered all over the internet. Even on Windows support forums they bang on about drivers & what not instead of just saying check this solution.
🙁 in device manager it still shows triangle! icon when i uncheck telephony. Been trying to research if there is a GPO in our domain blocking this.
now the microphone doesn’t work…
same here…
Same issue this side! Any solutions that you found?
Thats the point bluetooth doesnt have high bandwith so it can only deliver high quality audio or poor quality and ur mic
I get perfectly fine audio and decent mic quality. I’ve even had game audio or music playing while my mic was active with no noticeable drop in in quality. I had to reinstall windows and now I have the issue.
did the suggested solution but no sounds coming out from the bluetooth speaker. the speaker worked fine when paired with mobile devices. any suggestion how can i solve this? thanks
you did the thing. thank you
Hey everyone,
I followed the steps and still having a weird issue. My headphone seems disconnected…
https://imgur.com/a/52299Ci
Any idea?
Many thanks,
Viktor
Hello
Thanx a lot
I came from here https://www.dell.com/community/Laptops-General/XPS-13-2015-Bluetooth-sound-quality-is-awful/td-p/4594587#.W2wFBq4h0nc.telegram
RE: XPS 13 (2015) – Bluetooth sound quality is awful
I’m on dell xps 15 and when I connected my phone to Dell mobile and paired Airpods over the Bluetooth simultaneously I start having that issue with Airpods. And your fix helped me! Thanx a lot!
Hi,
A better solution is to disable your internal pc or laptop microphone, for me this solved the sound quality issue and I can still use my headset for conference calls
Regards
Wim
This worked. Thank!
Thanks very much for the sharing, this worked for me. Dell XPS13, used to have cracking sound in my Bose earphone QC35II.
Yes it fix’s the audio quality when you disable telephony, but I use my mic and the mic no longer works for voice. So if you want good sound quality voice calls or want to use it with a voip app like Teamspeak over bluetooth, then this fix is as good as a chocolate fireguard
have you found a way to get both
Brilliant fix.
You’re very welcome Ion, I’ve added screenshots to help others 🙂
Did not work for me 🙁
Bose Sound Link II AE
A big Thank You !
Thank you!!!
Thank you very much!!
It works
I struggled with this problem for long time. Finally, it’s works!!!(windows 10)
And now I can enjoy with my headphone again 🙂
Thank you very much.
It works, thanks. I’ve been keeping disconnecting and re-connecting hopelessly and in 1/20 times it would connect. Now it works 100%.
Just register to say how much I appreciate this post. Thank you !!
Thank u soo much
Thank you, you just fixed a 2 years old problem ! (I had ressorted to using a bt dongle).
This fix does not work with the LG HBS750 and Windows 10. Tinny, muffled sound, completely unusable. 🙁
You are the mother fucking man !!!! . I struggled with this problem since I bought my new computer . its really amazing how no one from Microsoft or dell knew how to fix this . I have xps 13 and USB BL dongle was not an option as I have only two.
Bose AE 2 Wireless
XPS 13 DELL
Same XPS 13 9350 problem. Thanks god we have this guide! 😀
also chipping for praise. been round and round the internet for a few hours and here is the simple solution to my problem:
my bluetooth device switched to “channel 1: 8000Hz (telephone quality)”, now back to normal.
Thanks so much, this made such a difference! I was about to return my headphones!
worked perfectly thanks a ton
THANK YOU SO MUCH! IT’S WORK VERY WELL !!!!
Terrific solution! Quick and simple. Still working after all these years.
Thank you very much.
YOU DA REAL MVP 😀 this worked for my latency/delay issue!
First attempt and this WORKED!
THANK YOU!!!
It’s a shame they are doing this, but you nailed it!
Hey, a big THANK YOU from Italy, solved my issue and prevented me to buy a new BT usb key. I thought my pc wasn’t compatible with A2DP and, instead, it was just a setting to change 🙂
You are incredible!
This works for windows 10 Pro with a Sol republic shadow Bluetooth headset!
Thankyou!!
thank you, worked perfectly
I can’t fucking believe thism, worked as miracle.
Thank you
Worked like you said (I’m running windows 10).
thank you !! sooo much,finally i can use my bt headset with my laptop i had all but given up on it after buying two different ones and both suffered from inexplicable lag,stutter and cut offs.
I have headphones with mic and if I turn off this then i canot use my mic 🙁 if I wanna use mic then my headphones are gone :/
Wonter, unfortunately you cannot have both using Bluetooth as by disabling telephony we can allocate all bandwidth to audio quality.
And yet it works on every smartphone on the planet exactly this way. Interesting that its just not possible on a PC
Thank you, thank you, thank you! Just connected my Bose Soundlink headphones and was feeling pretty disappointed. Then I found this!
awwww YEAAAHHHH!!! Worked like a charm!
Thanks for the suggestion. Was scratching my head over my Bose bluetooth headphones
THANKS!
OMG!! I CAN FINALLY ENJOY MUSIC AGAIN! I thought my cheap headphones’ speakers blew out.
A quick shortcut for this is right-click on the speaker icon in you taskbar and choose playback devices.
@Heathz, I don’t think there’s a work around for this. I believe (someone correct me if I’m wrong) that Bluetooth has two channels available. If you’re in hands free mode, you get one for mic and one for audio (hence the bad audio quality), if you choose audio playback mode, then both channels are used for audio, giving you better quality (but no mic). You may be able to get higher quality bluetooth headsets that have more channels available…
Perfect and simple fix, thank you.
When I do the steps you said I can hear perfectly but the mic stop working.
If I open the Sound Properties, when i’m at the Playback tab I can hear perfectly but the mic stops… if I change to the recording tab I stop listen and the mic starts work!
Is there another workaround for this?
Merci beaucoup!
It really worked! Thanks a lot!
i´m using windows 8.1 and Tracks Air of Sol Republic
Thanks a lot buddy!! It worked for me..
Another thanks!!! Worked for me!
WOOT WOOT!!!!! thanks i’ve been looking for driver updates, firmware updates, anything to fix this. i would have never suspect that it was cause by a OS bug
this didnt work for me. is there any to fix this problem?
Thanks for your help, it worked! Microsoft should care and fix important bugs like this.
This fixed the problem! Thanks so much!
I love you! Thank you! worked great…
Just wanted to say THANK YOU!
Thank you very much!! I was so frustated with my new headphones I thought there was something wrong with them, I was really close to go to store and ask for a change or something. Really Thank you very much great post easy to follow directions. keep up the good work!
Thank you very much, works great. Had a lot of troubles with bluesoleil crapware.
Thank you very much! Worked great!
OMG — finally a workaround! I had hoped that Windows 8.1 would fix this, but it didn’t. Your solution is the one that works. w00t!