Q: Robotic Static Sounds USB Headset

There is still no Solution for 10.8.2.

I have the exact same Problem with my new Tritton Ax 720+..

Using Teamspeak 3 and the Robotic Voice starts every 20-30 Minutes.

I was not having this problem with my Logitech USB headset on my old 2008 Macbook Pro with Lion but now that I have bought a new Macbook Pro with Mountain Lion, this has suddenly become a huge issue. I was so happy to have found a relatively cheap headset and would not like to have to shell out more because of this issue.

Also, personally I have only had people complain when using Mumble and Ventrilo, not when using Skype. But I haven't tried iChat yet either.

Yep, this issue is one of those that will take ten or more years to be fixed as not everybody is affected and Apple already knows about the bug due to several bug reports but is not doing much apparently.

In the mean time, this is my solution:

- Logitech Stereo Headset H230

- http://www.amazon.com/Logitech-981-000018-Stereo-Headset-H230/dp/B000OAHOVO/ref= sr_1_6?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1349061882&sr=1-6&keywords=logitech+headset

and one of these for new Macs:

- StarTech.com MUYHSMFF 3.5mm 4-Pin to 2x 3-Pin 3.5mm Headset Splitter Adapter - M/F

- http://www.amazon.com/StarTech-com-MUYHSMFF-Headset-Splitter-Adapter/dp/B004SP0W AQ/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1349061581&sr=8-2&keywords=4pin+3.5+to+splitter

Apple doesn't tell anyone that the headphone plug since mid 2009 I guess is a 4 pin, or per say the same as an iPhone. With the adapter, I simply use that Logitech on my iMac and it is PERFECT. I love it.

If you don't, you can have any 3.5mm heaphone + mic to work with it.

I hope it helps.

Seems like the 10.7.5 upgrade fixed this. I downloaded the 10.5 kext's on Lion but they would not load. I left them there, made sure the permissions and ownerships were correct, did a fix permissions on the main disk by booting in the root partition and then rebooting and  updating to the latest 10.7.5 . The Info.plist shows the version of the driver as

        <string>AppleUSBAudio</string>

        <key>CFBundleGetInfoString</key>

       <string>2.9.0f5, Copyright Apple Inc. 2000-2012</string>

After almost 2 years. finally

Smarty, you're saying that the old .5 kexts work again?

Hi Fakeh, No the 10.5 (Leopard) kext would not even load on my Lion (10.7.4). I updated the system yesterday to 10.7.5 and it fixed the problem. I was listening to audio the whole day and also recorded and skyped with colleagues. Before i had updated the system i had left the non working 10.5.x kext in the /System/Library/Extensions directory. Made sure to chown -R root:wheel the kext directory. Made sure all directorys were 755 perms and all files were 644. I also booted into rescue and ran disk repair and repair permissions on the disk.

Here is the size and md5sum of my 10.7.5 driver

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel   672K Aug 23 16:31 Contents/MacOS/AppleUSBAudio

5a46c3862e1f59b33c33c93dd22ac838  AppleUSBAudio

Here is a diff of the Info.plist file of the current 10.7.5 kext and the 10.7.4 one that i had.  (+ is newer - is older)

@@ -3,13 +3,13 @@

<plist version="1.0">

<dict>

@@ -19,25 +19,25 @@

@@ -103,19 +103,21 @@

@@ -128,7 +130,7 @@

I haven't tested my headset Logitech ClearChat 530 i believe on my 10.8.2 retina. Will test it tomm and see if it works.

Sorry to say but this is not the case in 10.8.2. The AppleUSBAudio.kext has indeed been updated for Mountain Lion as well, bringing us to version 2.9.0f6, but the problem is still very much present. But I guess it's good that Apple are at least working on it.

I checked my headset recording  using quicktime on my retina 10.8.2 with 2.9.0ft kext and its working fine.

I am attaching permissions and md5 of the files i have if that helps

drwxr-xr-x  7 root  wheel  238 Sep 24 16:37 Contents

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  4033 Aug 25 00:58 Info.plist

drwxr-xr-x  3 root  wheel   102 Sep 24 16:37 MacOS

drwxr-xr-x  3 root  wheel   102 Jun 24 23:07 Resources

drwxr-xr-x  6 root  wheel   204 Sep 24 16:37 _CodeSignature

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel   466 Aug 25 00:58 version.plist

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel   159 Aug 25 00:58 CodeDirectory

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel    80 Jun 24 23:07 CodeRequirements

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  2104 Aug 25 00:58 CodeResources

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  4064 Aug 25 00:58 CodeSignature

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  159 Aug 25 00:58 AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/_CodeSignature/CodeDirectory

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  80 Jun 24 23:07 AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/_CodeSignature/CodeRequirements

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  2104 Aug 25 00:58 AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/_CodeSignature/CodeResources

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  4064 Aug 25 00:58 AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/_CodeSignature/CodeSignature

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  4033 Aug 25 00:58 AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/Info.plist

-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel  338936 Sep 18 19:18 AppleUSBAudio

-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel  338936 Sep 18 19:18 AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/MacOS/AppleUSBAudio

drwxr-xr-x  3 root  wheel  102 Jul 21 19:19 English.lproj

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  73 Jun 24 23:07 InfoPlist.strings

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  73 Jun 24 23:07 AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/Resources/English.lproj/InfoPlist.strings

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  466 Aug 25 00:58 AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/version.plist

=====

MD5

======

MD5 (AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/_CodeSignature/CodeDirectory) = 6efcd3d75fb19686edd3e507e8ec3540

MD5 (AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/_CodeSignature/CodeRequirements) = f753651d2c79ec1619b7ea1ee57dc031

MD5 (AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/_CodeSignature/CodeResources) = 38e08edc2e9788851d0a61c4e459f5ba

MD5 (AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/_CodeSignature/CodeSignature) = 44205dbb1047b46de5234c6ff3ec2b36

MD5 (AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/Info.plist) = 662b76af792c5e441e7d25f4bfd9b957

MD5 (AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/MacOS/AppleUSBAudio) = ec9646206d1f06964313a956720e75b0

MD5 (AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/Resources/English.lproj/InfoPlist.strings) = ad6d8e110a0ece6940972d730af09934

MD5 (AppleUSBAudio.kext/Contents/version.plist) = 207b0b449f4bf47e63e921bdf8767beb

I'm running 10.7.5 now, and the problem still occured in skype after more than an hour and a half.  Longer than the 'usual' 45 minutes or so, but still present in some form.  But I'm happy if it just doubles the time between occurances...

Are you using the same USB headset on both computers?

Done all the disk utility magic I can think off, and it's still not working. I haven't done a MD5 and permissions check yet though, how did you do yours? I guess it's done in terminal but I'm not that used to working with it.

Done a lot of testing and trying back and forth, and can't quite safely say, that whatever they did in the lastest update, while working for some, does not fix it for all. This is kinda as it's always been, rather hard to pinpoint - works for some, but not for others. Like its been for me, with my old USB headset I had no problems, but with my new one, it's very much present, and not going away.

As a follow-up question, since this seems to depend a bit on your setup, maybe we should try to list whatever setups we are using.

I'm currently using a Steelseries Siberia USB soundcard - and it has problems.

I used to use a Logitech Arena USB headset - and it worked.

I wouldn't mind buying a different USB soundcard, as long as I knew it solved the problem. Like Creative Soundblaster X-Fi - is there anyone using it and having problems?

I've previously used a Logitech H330 USB headset, robotic sound was very much present. Running Snow Leopard 10.6.8 on a 2009 15" MacBook Pro. Sound turned almost instantly robotic.

Also tested same headset on 10.6.8 on a 2011 13" MacBook Pro, took about 20-30 minutes to turn robotic.

So, I've been testing a Logitech G330 on my 2009 MBP for a few days now, and so far it hasn't gone robotic!

Still using 10.6.8, haven't updated anything. The G330 has two 3,5mm jacks, but comes with an USB adapter.

Tested in Skype, longest conversation without robotic noise was about 3 hours.

Keeping my fingers crossed that it won't break on me.