Help 2 Ongoing Issues: Play Music Skips, Auto Brightness Visibly Adjusts

dhbuckley · Mar 21, 2013

RMHD, stock, latest ota last night installed successfully. Waited to see if these would go away but they didn't. Both issues are occurring right now, as I post this.

1. Play Music skips/drops. This is on device music, not streaming. Nothing I know to do has fixed this and it makes me insane.

2. Auto brightness visibly changes the brightness of the display in an annoying, distracting way. At least I can turn it off, unlike the music. And, no, lightflow did not fix it.

Thanks for any help.

Droid well, all.

David

tatootie67 · Mar 21, 2013

What music app are you using?

The auto brightness seems like it's doing what it should but it shouldn't be annoying. It's suppose to change depending on ambient light levels.

dhbuckley · Mar 21, 2013

Thanks for responding.

Using stock Play Music app bundled with RMHD. Someone suggested winamp?

Brightness changes are just jumpy, change without any change in ambient conditions.

Want to go Spotify premium for mobile music but not if it is skippy/droppy....

skinien · Mar 22, 2013

Autobrightness seems to be too dim for me. Even when I'm outside on a sunny day, brightness won't go to max. I chose to just turn off auto brightness and use a brightness toggle widget.

Otherwise, try selecting "Display power saver" in the Display Settings.

I think this setting enables/disables dimming the screen if the sensor realizes it's darker than it actually is. Essentially, if you turn on your screen in a bright area and then walk into a dark area, it won't dim the screen. This is should prevent the "jumpiness" that you're experiencing.

Xelios · Mar 23, 2013

By skipping, ya mean when you power the device on there's a buzzing/slight pause, or when you get a message or some notification, there's a slight pause?

If so, it seems to be a device problem. My old RMHD did it a lot, best way I found to alleviate it was using GoneMAD or PlayerPro, and adjusting the DSP processing thread priority to maximum, or increasing the music buffer size. I don't believe Play Music has those options though.

My replacement RMHD does NOT do this though, and I didn't even have to adjust any settings.

tatootie67 · Mar 23, 2013

I had a skipping music problem when I used power amp. It ended up being the gain setting and I couldn't seem to get it right. I don't think the play music app has that though. I now use player pro too, with no issues

dhbuckley · Mar 28, 2013

The "skipping" is simply the music momentarily dropping out, either simply stops playing for an instant or fades and then resumes. Completely ruins listening for me even if just a few times per song. I will try your suggestions and see if it improves. Xelios, may I ask why /how you went about obtaining your replacement RMHD? Many thanks.

David

jeduncan14083 · Apr 29, 2013

I have the EXACT same issue. Doesn't matter if I am streaming, or if it's on device music. Also, it happens regardless of what app I use to playback music on. I've tried both Winamp and Google Play music. It basically acts as if the phone is (for a split second) disconnected from the audio output (this happens on both the aux jack and over bluetooth).

Occasionally it will just pause/stop the music altogether.

This has me irritated enough to wish I would have just gotten the GS3, even if it is a little bloatier.

jtc303 · May 6, 2013

Xelios said:
By skipping, ya mean when you power the device on there's a buzzing/slight pause, or when you get a message or some notification, there's a slight pause?

If so, it seems to be a device problem. My old RMHD did it a lot, best way I found to alleviate it was using GoneMAD or PlayerPro, and adjusting the DSP processing thread priority to maximum, or increasing the music buffer size. I don't believe Play Music has those options though.

My replacement RMHD does NOT do this though, and I didn't even have to adjust any settings.

yep...I use playerpro and this issue was bugging the hell out of me but since i activated the dsp, no issues...highly recommended for any playerpro users, or any other music apps with this option.

|[JTC MaxxHD]|

Methos1979 · May 6, 2013

I mostly only have the music problem when streaming (Rhapsody) over bluetooth. With PlayerPro or Poweramp playing music on my phone not much. One thing I have noticed seems to make it worse is when the Bluetooth speaker is in close proximity to a computer monitor. Seems to be some sort of interference from it. It does get old. I usually just switch to one of the above apps.

As for the Auto brightness - yes, that sucks and I find it also drains battery more than it should. I have found a great little widget for controlling screen brightness is called Brightness Level Disc. Great control, easy to use and the levels they came up with are perfect. the lowest level (like 23%) is good in all but the brightest daylight and really saves battery. Try it. It's in the Play store for free.

eagle7 · May 8, 2013

I have the same skipping music problem. Sometimes it doesn't happen for a while, sometimes it's really bad.

Same problems with brightness too. My solution was to set the screen to 100% with a smart action that reduces the brightness to 50% in the evening.

Methos1979 · May 8, 2013

For a while I was running a Tasker program that I set up to automatically brighten certain apps when they launch and then return to the preset brightness when they exit. Note that it will not work with Auto brightness though.

I find when I get a lot of 'skipping' music, cleaning out the cache and/or a reboot fixes things. Also, sometimes the Bluetooth connection and get a little hinky and a hard reset of the Bluetooth device (in my case a Bose Soundlink) will help.

SMWAS · May 17, 2013

I am having the same issues. The random auto-dimming (an, no, I do not have "automatic brightness" checked) is annoying, but it isn't really that big of a deal to me.

The "skipping", however, is a huge deal. I cannot believe anyone at Motorola or Verizon would think it is acceptable to have this problem. It is not a rare occurrence. It is like I am listening to a first generation CD-Walkman driving on a road with potholes every eighth of a mile.

I got PlayerPro and downloaded and enabled the DSP pack and increased the buffer size, but that didn't fix the problem. Anyone else have any suggestions?

SeanInColumbus · May 24, 2013

I have the same skipping issues and I've tried all the suggestions. I have my entire music collection on my phone and I rely heavily on it.

Quote frankly, this issue makes me want to flush the unit down the toilet! I've tested all my friends' GS3 devices and the music plays flawlessly! Hell, my old BlackBerry plays my music flawlessly!

Shame on Motorola for putting out such malfunctioning crap. This thing takes a full 8 seconds to initiate a phone call when I press a direct dial icon!!

Should have gone with the GS3 but I am stuck with this laggy musicless POS...

hansangb · May 24, 2013

Wow...that long to dial? Something is wrong with your phone. The music skipping, I have that too. But that long to dial out? Do you have any apps that interfere with the dialing? Maybe it's an app that you don't know about that's causing it. It doesn't seem to be too common.

SeanInColumbus · May 24, 2013

Nope. No dialing apps nor apps that have anything remotely related to dialing.

McIrish2 · Jun 11, 2013

I'm glad I'm not alone on the music skipping issue. That's the worst bug that I've had. It drives me crazy! I have a 1 hour drive to work each morning and always listen to music. It makes me want to just sit in silence. I wish there was a fix. I've tried many players and always run into the same issue. maybe I get a different phone? Maybe a GS4? I love the RMHD but the audio glitches are too much lately.

PDXsasquatch · Nov 22, 2013

Bringing this thread back as I still haven't found a solution for mine. I'm running 4.1.2 and it hasn't changed with this update. All music playing through Bluetooth skips. Soundcloud (4G streaming), Google Play Music (mp3's on midroSD), Winamp Pro (mp3's), etc. I have tried all players, all types of sounds. I've also tried on 4 different Bluetooth devices (Griffin car aux adapter, brand new Sony home receiver, sony bluetooth headphones, and a logitec bluetooth speaker thing. All have the same results. I've tried closing all other running apps, resetting the phone, nothing.
Anyone have a fix that works for this?

PowrDroid · Nov 22, 2013

PDXsasquatch said:
Bringing this thread back as I still haven't found a solution for mine. I'm running 4.1.2 and it hasn't changed with this update. All music playing through Bluetooth skips. Soundcloud (4G streaming), Google Play Music (mp3's on midroSD), Winamp Pro (mp3's), etc. I have tried all players, all types of sounds. I've also tried on 4 different Bluetooth devices (Griffin car aux adapter, brand new Sony home receiver, sony bluetooth headphones, and a logitec bluetooth speaker thing. All have the same results. I've tried closing all other running apps, resetting the phone, nothing.
Anyone have a fix that works for this?

I had the music skipping problem. It might be more accurate to describe it as split-second pauses or split second muting while playing the music. I tried a bunch of stuff including different players. I was able to fix my problem by doing a simulated battery pull. This is a specific sequence of holding down the volume and power buttons (Google it.) Did this back in July and have had no problems since.

SMWAS · Nov 26, 2013

However one wants to describe it, it is still beyond bad.

If it is really bad, I can do a simulated battery pull, and that sometimes helps for a while, but that has always been nothing but a temporary fix for me. Eventually, it will creep up again, with varying degrees of frequency.

Some people first posted about this problem a long time ago. For the vast majority of those who complained early on and got replacements, the replacements did not have this issue. For those who tried getting a replacement later on, it did not solve the problem, which makes me believe that was a very common reason people got replacements early on, and now the vast majority of refurbished units which a user will be sent as a replacement probably has this issue, so you are out of luck. Unfortunately, given that the first new (as opposed to refurbished) replacement phones solved this issue, and no updates have solved it, I think it is quite evident it is a hardware issue with many of our phones.

PathToEternity · Nov 28, 2013

Same problem here, and been thinking about posting about it, so glad to see someone necro'd this thread.

Happens to me both in Pandora and Play (both streaming and downloaded music).

I'd describe the problem as short pauses, not mutes though as muting would seem to imply the music is continuing to play without being audible, and this is the music halting altogether.

I have wondered if it's a memory issue.

Dabrador · Jan 2, 2014

Glad I found this thread. I'm having the same problem with my music. Like others, my problem happens in Google Play Music. It happens when streaming, on-device music, WiFi, 4G...all the time.

My current RMHD is a replacement. The one I had before did not have this problem. I had to return that one for another issue. Now I have this replacement and this music problem is maddening.

Like others have said, it's making me not want to listen to any music.

I guess my only solution is to try another replacement phone...

Help 2 Ongoing Issues: Play Music Skips, Auto Brightness Visibly Adjusts

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