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WiFi interfering with Bluetooth Audio

CS20

Lurker
Jan 27, 2019
1
0
Hello,

I already posted this issue on the Lenovo forum, but wanted to see if I would have better luck here. I have an Android Moto G4, and have recently begun experiencing issues with its Bluetooth function. Although I’m not sure when this started happening, it has been a problem for at least three months now; and has been affecting my dad’s Moto G4 as well.

Whenever I use Bluetooth speakers or headphones, they work normally for a period, and then begin to cut out as soon as my phone connects to Wi-Fi. While the song or video continues to play, it almost sounds like a digital equivalent of a hiccup, or short skips in the sound (it sounds a little like an audio cable being jostled). If I try to ignore the issue, it slowly becomes worse.

To fix the problem, I have tried the following:
-putting my phone in and out of airplane mode
-clearing the cache and data in the Bluetooth Share app settings
-turning Bluetooth on and off
-removing and reconnecting all of my saved Bluetooth devices
-Doing a full factory reset
-Resetting all network settings

Although I never use my phone with more than one device at a single time, I have noticed that once this problem starts happening, switching to a different devices doesn’t solve the issue. I have also ruled out the distance between my phone and Bluetooth device, as I mainly experience this problem when they are only 1-3 feet apart.

The only solution that I have found to work so far is turning off my Wi-Fi connection altogether.  Running on data does not seem to create any interference with the Bluetooth.

A few days ago, I researched Bluetooth and Wi-Fi interferrence issues; and discovered that since Bluetooth relies on transmitting data over the 2.4 GHz channel, there can sometimes be transmission issues when using the same channel for Wi-Fi.  Sure enough, I found that my phone automatically switched back and fourth between 5 and 2.4 GHz, depending on how good the signal was, and it seemed that the hiccups went away when I was using 5 GHz.  We have Xfinity for our Wi-Fi, and after searching the network settings on their website, I was not able to find a way to turn off a channel or give it a unique SSID (I was really hoping to have a way to more adequately test my theory).  Despite this, my dad also noticed the correlation on his phone, and we were happy to have apparently solved the problem. 

Two days ago however, my dad noticed that the 'hiccups' were back, but that he was still on the 5 GHz channel.  When I checked my phone, I had the same situation.  I even installed a Wi-Fi monitoring app to verify that my phone was in fact on the 5 GHz channel (I wish there was some way to manually switch between 2.4 and 5 GHz, but the option seems to be missing in my version of Android's advanced settings).  At this point, I am a little disappointed that the problem persists, and would like to keep working at it until it is solved.  If anyone has any suggestions, they would be greatly appreciated!  Please let me know if you need any further info.
 

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