New MBA headphone minijack quality

[MacBook08]

I know what you concern about the macbook air. I also have the exact concern on choosing my new laptop. I can clearly tell you the headphone jack of the new macbook air is dead silent all the time. I had a macbook pro 13 mid 2010 base model just before I bought the air. I used it for 3 months and the headphone jack was silent when no sound output from the laptop. It had the very very low level of white noise in the background once I played any song or sound output from the laptop. And I could even hear the white noise suddenly stop seconds after the sound output was stopped. Which means the noise didn't start and stop at the moment the sound output came out. The noise actually start before the sound output come out from the headphone and stop some seconds after the sound output stop. This is disappointing when happen on macbook pro.

To conclude what I just said: the macbook air's headphone jack is like those in iphones or ipod(dead silent at the time).
In the other hand, the macbook pro 13 still have the flaw on the headphone jack noise control.

Awesome! Thanks for the info!

 

[digger]

I have a similar problem. I have a 13" MB. 10.4.11, 2 GHx Intel Core 2 Duo, 2004. I've replaced the mini jack/motherboard one time under warranty because the jack quit. It's worked find for several years. Now I'm starting to get static from the built in speakers and when using the jack to external speakers. The static isn't constant; it only happens when the music level spikes (crescendo, a heavy rhythm, etc). Since I'm getting it on both speakers and the mini jack, is my sound card dying? Or is there another problem?

Thanks

 

[Dsync]

I run my MBP through multiple PRO audio rigs every week... usually no issues. But try running on battery and see what happens. Often times, the ground wire will cause a hissing sound.

 

[digger]

I tried running on the battery and it still does the same. Thanks anyway. Any other suggestions?

 

[Jodles]

I have the same issue with my 13" macbook late 2008 (first gen alubook). It varies a lot on which headphones I use though. I can't rank them by memory, but I've heard it on the stock Apple iPhone buds, some Sennheiser buds, Denon AH-D650 and Sennheiser HD600.

The port is dead silent if you haven't used anything making sound for a while (OS X turns the port off or something). But once I play something, and then stop it, I can clearly hear buzzing for some time (both while playing and after - until the port is turned off again). (edit: same thing as mbairdennis described)

The DAC (digital to analog converter) in most computers are quite cheap and of surprisingly bad quality. I decided to buy an USB DAC (the Apogee One), which bypasses the internal one and gives a very clean signal. There are plenty of tiny dacs on the market. Check out Head-fi.org, you can find most of them discussed there.

 

[Zen0Jin]

I know what you concern about the macbook air. I also have the exact concern on choosing my new laptop. I can clearly tell you the headphone jack of the new macbook air is dead silent all the time. I had a macbook pro 13 mid 2010 base model just before I bought the air. I used it for 3 months and the headphone jack was silent when no sound output from the laptop. It had the very very low level of white noise in the background once I played any song or sound output from the laptop. And I could even hear the white noise suddenly stop seconds after the sound output was stopped. Which means the noise didn't start and stop at the moment the sound output came out. The noise actually start before the sound output come out from the headphone and stop some seconds after the sound output stop. This is disappointing when happen on macbook pro.

To conclude what I just said: the macbook air's headphone jack is like those in iphones or ipod(dead silent at the time).
In the other hand, the macbook pro 13 still have the flaw on the headphone jack noise control.

My top of the line new 13" Air has horrendous high pitched hiss in the headphones.

I might go to an Apple store and check them all out to see if this is a widespread issue or if it warrants a replacement.