Poor microphone quality (mako)

Same here. Also on Mako but on r113 Utopic.

I can only add that it doesn't always seem to be equally bad. Sometimes its almost decent, sometimes people can't understand a word i say.

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

Changing to High because this does not impact RTM hardware

Can you try the latest image and see if you can still reproduce the issue? We're not yet applying filters, but the volume was adjusted, so I wonder if that would also affect this issue.

There seem to be a slight improvement, but most people I talk to still believe that the voice quality is really poor.

Removing rtm tag because this is not affecting the RTM hardware. Will investigate the mako specific issue still though.

That would be nice. Problem persists despite flashing my Nexus 4 to newest android (4.4.4) and then flashing to Ubuntu RTM channel.

I guess that Android applies some kind of filter to prevent the distortion somehow picked up by the mic. Sound gets worse if I speak in a louder voice and the output at the other end is apparantly very loud also. As Nexus 4 is still the main phone used for Ubuntu Touch, I believe the platform would benefit greatly if this issue could be solved sooner than later.

I have the same problem - the sound is completely distorted, other people hear a robotic voice and can't understand what I say.

 I also noticed that sometimes I can hear my own voice lingering in the speaker of the nexus 4.

I use ubuntu touch 14.10 r12 (RTM)

Looks like this is caused by the radio firmware for the mako. To check your version, and update it see https://lists.launchpad.net/ubuntu-phone/msg08514.html

I use Ubuntu Touch stable channel (#15) and I've this problem. I've also the last radio firmware for mako.

I solved this problem by configuring the alsamixer from the terminal.

Interesting, please share how to do it.

Yes, please do, also using Nexus 4. I've updated the radio firmware to baseband M9615A-CEFWMAZM-2.0.1701.03, but it has not made it better, Ubuntu Touch 15.04 (r20),

J

I use Ubuntu Touch 15.04 (r23) and I am having this problem. I am also using the last radio firmware for mako. You need a other phone when calling somebody.

What is the status for the fix for this bug? It has been assigned for some time but still a problem.

Actually, I went through the procedure in https://lists.launchpad.net/ubuntu-phone/msg08514.html even though it said I had all the right versions already. After flashing, I called someone and the volume was ok. I was going to play with alsamixer, but didn't end up having to.

$ system-image-cli -i
current build number: 109
device name: mako
channel: ubuntu-touch/rc-proposed/bq-aquaris.en
last update: 2015-09-11 12:10:05
version version: 109
version ubuntu: 20150911
version device: 20150911
version custom: mako-1.1

I just flashed to the latest radio image M9615A-CEFWMAZM-2.0.1701.07, but microphone quality is still bad. Does it need to be the image version from 4.4.2 to work correct ?

@henrik: I don't know-- I simply followed the instructions in https://lists.launchpad.net/ubuntu-phone/msg08514.html exactly and it worked. If it doesn't work for you, not sure why it does for me and why it worked for Ricardo in that thread. If it didn't work for me, I was going to explore the alsamixer settings-- perhaps you will need to do that....

My microphone does not work at all. (it worked on Windows, so I doubt it is the hardware)
I have to use n external one on my Lenovo B50-30.

This is a *deal killer* for me. I have been trying to move back to Ubuntu for well over a year but the same problem happens. I apoloize for not logging sooner the details. I confirm that there is bad sound quality, but in my case, I figured something else out that may solve some things here. I discovered that the speaker phone button nearly fixes it. Therefore, they are reversed! So, the microphone, in speakerphone mode is operating the way that it should in regular mode and vice versa. I confirmed by holding the phone far away from my face in regular mode and everyone can hear me quite well. Then, when i put it in speakerphone mode, no one can hear me. They all report that I'm impossibly quiet. So, it seems that in the case of my phone all that needs to happen to fix this is to put it the way it should. Swap the modes for the mic.

In addition to the above deal killer (i can't walk around town with all my calls on speakerphone mode!) the sound also isn't perfect as reported above.

LGE Nexus 4
Ubuntu 15.04 (OTA-A)
Ubuntu image part 20151118.2
armhf (20151118-205525)
Device image part 20150911
devide build description:
aosp_mako-userdebug 4.4.2 KOT49H
20150818-1500-0ubuntu3 test-keys
customization image part : 20151118.2

thanks guys

in addition to my comment 22 above,
1. the same phone was working perfectly with cyanogen mod on it one day before (mic)
2. with a headset plugged in it seems to work pretty good, further confirming my theory of 'swapped mapping of mic' above

Ubuntu 15.04 (r309)
Mako

Can confirm that this issue remains as described by wayne in comment 22.

In speaker phone mode during a call, the caller has trouble hearing me.
In regular phone call, the caller can hear TOO well.

i.e. Mic amplification is too high in normal mode (causing distortion when held close to mouth), and too low in speaker phone mode when held far away from mouth.

Bug still remains.....
I flashed some different radio images. With the latest image (LMY48T) mic quality seems to be a bit better, but still not good!
I also tried various channels of ubuntu touch, but it didn't had any effect on call quality.

I would really like to use ubuntu touch as my main device, but a smartphone with an non working phone function makes no sense to me! Hope this will be fixed soon...!?

LGE Nexus 4 (mako)
Ubuntu 15.04 (r372)
Ubuntu image part 20160220
armhf (20160220-020304)
Device image part 20160107-1211
devide build description:
aosp_mako-userdebug 4.4.2 KOT49H
20160107-1211-0ubuntu4 test-keys
customization image part : 20160220

I also have this issue on my Nexus 4:

LGE Nexus 4 (mako)
OTA-9.1
Ubuntu image part: 20160217.1
Ubuntu 15.04 - armhf (20160217-111536)
device image part: 20160112
device build description:
aosp_mako-userdebug 4.4.2 KOT49H
20160107-1211-0ubuntu4 test-keys
Custom image part: 20160217.1

Is there a workaround other than holding my phone to my mouth while using speaker phone?

I tried updating the modem firmware as explained at https://lists.launchpad.net/ubuntu-phone/msg08514.html, but no apparent change. I, too, previously had the more recent radio image M9615A-CEFWMAZM-2.0.1701.07 until I flashed the m9615a-cefwmazm-2.0.1700.98 image. I'd be willing to play around with alsa-mixer settings, but I don't know how to do it on the phone at this point.

I don't know if this will help anyone else arrive at a solution, but I observed alsamixer while switching back and forth between non-speaker phone mode and speaker phone mode in a phone call. While switching the mode I watched capture "devices" (not sure of the correct term) DEC4 and DEC6 change gain amounts as follows:

non-speaker phone mode
DEC4 at 68%, dB gain: 0.84
DEC6 at 80%, dB gain: 0.99

speaker phone mode
DEC4 at 70%, dB gain: 0.87
DEC6 at 68%, dB gain: 0.84

I'm learning about this on the fly because I'd like a solution, so I have no idea what to do next but maybe someone else does.

This problem has been just resolved in Sailfish OS. When looking for a solution of a microphone problems with mako, I stumbled on this bugreport and would like to contribute back. I hope that the same solution would work for Ubuntu.

In Sailfish, the wrong microphone was loaded during the phonecalls. If Ubuntu comes with the logcat, it can be checked as described in http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=65898089&postcount=441 . In short, we were getting the microphone without any noise cancelling.

The reason for selection of wrong microphone was in a bug in libhybris. Namely, any property with long name in build.prop was not loaded correctly due to the wrong checking of the property name length. It was fixed by

https://github.com/libhybris/libhybris/pull/313

After this patch, the microphone is loaded correctly and sounds as it is in Android. I am sure that this fix would work with all modems. I am personally using the latest one.

Hopefully, that would resolve the bug in Ubuntu as well.

Someone knows the necessary settings in alsamixer or amixer?

I flashed bootloader-mako-makoz30d.img and radio-mako-m9615a-cefwmazm-2.0.1700.98.img, buy the problem persist.

I upgraded to the RC version and this version if you have noticed a better audio on the microphone, I can hold conversations without problems.

I use mako With OTA-11-rc.

Hi, I'm testing the patch ringius linked in comment #31 since Jun 23 without regressions and looks like mic is working fine now on my Nexus 4 (my friends reported a robot-like voice). morphis (thank you man!) included that patch in the new libhybris version (0.1.0+git20151016+6d424c9-0ubuntu18) which will be pushed to our devices with OTA-13.

Bootloader version: makoz30f
Baseband version: m9615a-cefwmazm-2.0.1701.07

And of course I would like to thank you rinigus for pointing that issue (and patch) out, you saved my day few weeks ago! ;) Thank you so much!!!

Happy to help! I hope you could push it to users as early as possible - it makes such a difference to have a phone that you could use as a phone :)

It would be great if you could push the libhybris patch together with ota12 next week. Or otherwise show us a way to push the patch manually. I don't want to wait some more month for a bugfix.

same here on my Nexus 4:

During a call logcat shows that "handset-mic" is in use:

"D/audio_hw_primary( 2380): select_devices: out_snd_device(1: handset) in_snd_device(15: handset-mic)

I wonder if Mic-Quality gets better when "voice-dmic-ef" gets chosen after the patch gets once applied.
(.. got sadly no idea how to do this by my own)

Some of the People im phoning with don't even understand a word cause of the bad mic quality. For others it's not that bad but still not good also...

AFAIK (I'm a user) hybris is a core lib and a lot of effort is required to test it before a release to prevent regressions in all areas (take a look at libhybris test plan on wiki).
mako is a reference device for developers, IMHO no one expects you to use it daily, this issue is minor compared to others which affect supported devices and a new release requires too much time.
Patch will be included in OTA-13 because it was pushed together with Android 6.0 support required by a new device (so a new release was already planned).

So when is OTA 13 sheduled for?

This landed with 0.1.0+git20151016+6d424c9-0ubuntu18 in the overlay ppa. Can't say if that went out with OTA 12 or will come with OTA 13.

It wasnt in OTA 12. I checked the OTA 13 milestone and couldnt find it liste there. How can we get it into the next OTA?

@K1773R: It does not have to be in the milestone list to land. The package is already part of the overlay ppa and in rc-proposed so it will be automatically land with OTA 13.

Confirmed. its much better now!

Thanks a lot guys - perfect clear microphone quality now !