Wired microphone static in obs

Support Audio
1

Im on kde plasma and when i try to use a wired external microphone it makes a loud static its mostly on the left ear but its still on the right ear the static blocks all other noise im using a dell 7440 optiplex AIO and ive updated kde plasma

2

You will usually find more help providing details about your system via the output of

inxi -zv8

And paste it in a code block.

That said, I’ve fixed a lot of microphone/line-in problems directly through ALSA.

Finding your card number/ID:

alsactl info

And for me it’s:

alsamixer --card=2

From there you can use arrow keys to modify levels, F1 for help.

Gain will often introduce static, and you can modify left/right channels separately; if your chipset/driver supports it.

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3

I’m guessing because you haven’t supplied your system information (inxi -zv8). But you probably need to disable the snd_soc_avs module by blacklisting it. It affects quite a few Dell machines but I don’t recall it on an Optiplex. Either way you can undo it if it doesn’t work.

Create /etc/modprobe.d/disable_snd_soc_avs.conf with the contents being blacklist snd_soc_avs

Then reboot and test. If it doesn’t make any difference, just remove that file and reboot.

4

Optiplex 7440 AIO has a Realtek ALC3661 for onboard audio that has Headphone Mic and Headset Mic controls in ALSA to set microphone gain

HW probe of Dell 0X2MKR A00 (OptiPlex 7440 AIO) #3854592c00: amixer

Card sysdefault:0 'PCH'/'HDA Intel PCH at 0xf72c8000 irq 133'
  Mixer name	: 'Realtek ALC3661'
  Components	: 'HDA:10ec0668,102806c5,00100003 HDA:80862809,80860101,00100000'
  Controls      : 48
  Simple ctrls  : 16

Simple mixer control 'Headphone Mic',0
  Capabilities: pvolume pswitch cswitch cswitch-joined cswitch-exclusive
  Capture exclusive group: 0
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Capture channels: Mono
  Limits: Playback 0 - 31
  Mono: Capture [off]
  Front Left: Playback 0 [0%] [-34.50dB] [off]
  Front Right: Playback 0 [0%] [-34.50dB] [off]
Simple mixer control 'Headphone Mic Boost',0
  Capabilities: volume
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Limits: 0 - 3
  Front Left: 0 [0%] [0.00dB]
  Front Right: 0 [0%] [0.00dB]

Simple mixer control 'Headset Mic',0
  Capabilities: pvolume pswitch cswitch cswitch-joined cswitch-exclusive
  Capture exclusive group: 0
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Capture channels: Mono
  Limits: Playback 0 - 31
  Mono: Capture [off]
  Front Left: Playback 0 [0%] [-34.50dB] [off]
  Front Right: Playback 0 [0%] [-34.50dB] [off]
Simple mixer control 'Headset Mic Boost',0
  Capabilities: volume
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Limits: 0 - 3
  Front Left: 0 [0%] [0.00dB]
  Front Right: 0 [0%] [0.00dB]
Simple mixer control 'Internal Mic',0

To check or adjust microphone capture levels:

alsamixer --card=PCH --view=Capture

Onboard audio also has playback controls for Loopback Mixing (zero-latency monitoring) to headphones or headset (not recommended for speakers):

alsamixer --card=PCH --view=Playback

Simple mixer control 'Loopback Mixing',0
  Capabilities: enum
  Items: 'Disabled' 'Enabled'
  Item0: 'Disabled'

External microphones are usually monophonic. Different levels of noise in stereo channels suggest microphone may need a splitter/adaptor cable to use it with a headset or headphone jack
CTIA vs OMTP headphone jack standards - audiocurious,com

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