Zoom audio - one year on ...!!

[Dave2002]

I guess many of us have now got used to Zoom meetings, though I suspect that most of us at still putting up with poor quality audio. Often the effort of getting these things to work is a barrier, and once we're over it we don't try to make improvements.

We just tried some simple tests with a laptop and an iPad to see what quality adjustments might be possible. The answer seems to be that there are limited options on iPads, but there are a few better options on the desktop or laptop under MacOS. It is really important not to have devices which can give audio feedback - which might mean using headphones or making sure that the devices which give any audible output are in different rooms, and also making sure that only the devices which are really needed to be active are muted.

There is little we can do about the audio quality of other users' devices. The only other thing I think we can do for audio is to use a better microphone at our end.

I have noticed that sometimes other people doing Youtube or Zoom onine meetings don't have particularly good quality audio - and it does make a difference IMO. A year ago it probably didn't matter too much, but as the lockdown conditions may not be relaxed in the near future maybe we do need to pay more attention to sound - and perhaps also video - for online meetings.

Are there any tips which others have found for getting better audio quality in Zoom meetings?

[johncorrigan]

I guess many of us have now got used to Zoom meetings, though I suspect that most of us at still putting up with poor quality audio. Often the effort of getting these things to work is a barrier, and once we're over it we don't try to make improvements.

We just tried some simple tests with a laptop and an iPad to see what quality adjustments might be possible. The answer seems to be that there are limited options on iPads, but there are a few better options on the desktop or laptop under MacOS. It is really important not to have devices which can give audio feedback - which might mean using headphones or making sure that the devices which give any audible output are in different rooms, and also making sure that only the devices which are really needed to be active are muted.

There is little we can do about the audio quality of other users' devices. The only other thing I think we can do for audio is to use a better microphone at our end.

I have noticed that sometimes other people doing Youtube or Zoom onine meetings don't have particularly good quality audio - and it does make a difference IMO. A year ago it probably didn't matter too much, but as the lockdown conditions may not be relaxed in the near future maybe we do need to pay more attention to sound - and perhaps also video - for online meetings.

Are there any tips which others have found for getting better audio quality in Zoom meetings?

I'd start by saying that although zoom is better than nothing, it's not a lot better. As some of us have learned from years of inhabiting the for3 pages, it takes a long time to build relations online, and it remains the same on zoom. I'm fine with colleagues that I have known for a number of years, but I would not like to be someone starting a new job and having to rely on MS Teams (that's what we use) to build relationships with new colleagues.

But that's not what you asked, Dave. I like having a head set - it certainly improves the sound quality, and others say that it improves the sound that they hear (as long as you're not coughing, spluttering etc). I had to do interviews last week for the first time - the internet quality was intermittent and often I found it very difficult to concentrate. In a face-to-face situation you send signals to the interviewee...and to fellow interviewers, but it is much more difficult to send those signals on zoom...I found myself straying to a red squirrel on the feeders outside the window...not very professional. Anyway, I was reminded of the RD Laing quote: ' “The power of interpersonal encounters comes not only from the ‘attunement’ of people to each other – but also from being in tune with ‘a healing spiritual field’ – always there – in us and between us”. Zoom and its associates can often get in the way of it...it's no panacea, no matter how useful it is as a tool, in my opinion.

[BBMmk2]

One year! It feels like ot too. Ok with a brief respite around last August.

[richardfinegold]

I hate Zoom, but yes, there are some advantages. Tuesday mornings I work from home calling patients, and the afternoon is my half day off during the week. Once a month on Tuesday we have a group meeting which in my case I would have to troop 20 miles to participate in. It's much preferable to sit at my desk, get it out of the way and then do my calls. Our participation isn't valued, anyway; basically administration wants to tell us stuff and doesn't much care about feedback. And since it's audio for the most part, with video being reserved for the Power Point presentation, I can play chess on my phone for most of it and stare at the screen when I feel like it.
Zoom sound quality is bad, and when I really do care about hearing all the audio I use Bluetooth Audio to my headphones, and that also allows one to get up and move around without carrying the laptop

[Dave2002]

I hate Zoom, but yes, there are some advantages.

Zoom sound quality is bad, and when I really do care about hearing all the audio I use Bluetooth Audio to my headphones, and that also allows one to get up and move around without carrying the laptop

We are involved with several groups which use Zoom for various purposes. There have been some excellent lactures/talks from Denman College - done by Zoom, so now we know more about some of the geography and history of London, as well as the WWI and WWII and even a little about the Crusades. For speech the quality is usually just about adequate, but for large groups there are nearly always some problems - people not turning off their microphones, and the system goes glitchy.

We also try to co-ordinate some group activity, and have done presentations, and also tried to host Zoom meetings. Fortunately we have always practised beforehand, but even then things go wrong. Trying to pass screens over between a host and a co-host can be problematic, and I'm afraid on one occasion when we had practised and checked things out in advance it didn't quite work, and participants may have heard some very "blue" language as we tried to get things up and running.

I always try to completely clear my desktop beforehand - or at least of anything which might cause a problem if seen by others. It is very easy for privacy leaks to occur if documents are left open as screens or desktops are visible. Also notifications which might come in during a session could also be a nuisance.

Today we are trying to run a session and someone wants to play a violin. I don't think it's going to work well - but hopefully the talk will not include too much music. The audio quality which we were able to achieve last night in our trials was abysmal. There are settings which improve this on some devices, but the audio settings on some are pretty much fixed (e.g. tablets). We think that turning off the automatic gain on the microphones helps, and running with low levels of noise cancellation - but we can only do that on desktop machines.

Asking everyone who doesn't need it to mute microphones and turn off video does seem to help too.

Zoom is better than nothing ....

[Beresford]

An external mic helps a lot. And in Audio settings > advanced there are some things you can set to improve music. Don't disengage the echo suppression though (may not apply if you have a headset). And if you have a co-host they can mute late joiners etc who have not muted themselves. It's good to test all these beforehand, with eg someone in another room who can report back. A bell sound can get completely mangled, less so if you fiddle with the audio settings, and have everyone else muted.

[mikealdren]

My wife has been teaching the violin over zoom and found that a better camera and stereo mic help from our end but, sadly not at the other end. A decent amp and speakers make a lot of difference too.

The real challenge is teaching parents (online) to tune violins......

[Ein Heldenleben]

My wife has been teaching the violin over zoom and found that a better camera and stereo mic help from our end but, sadly not at the other end. A decent amp and speakers make a lot of difference too.

The real challenge is teaching parents (online) to tune violins......

A £50 -£100 gaming mic will improve matters no end . Also get a Mike stand and a spit guard / pop shield. The Mike’s on computers are useless . If you use headphones that will avoid any colouration before the noise gate kicks in ...

[Dave2002]

I'd start by saying that although zoom is better than nothing, it's not a lot better. As some of us have learned from years of inhabiting the for3 pages, it takes a long time to build relations online, and it remains the same on zoom. I'm fine with colleagues that I have known for a number of years, but I would not like to be someone starting a new job and having to rely on MS Teams (that's what we use) to build relationships with new colleagues.

But that's not what you asked, Dave. I like having a head set - it certainly improves the sound quality, and others say that it improves the sound that they hear (as long as you're not coughing, spluttering etc). I had to do interviews last week for the first time - the internet quality was intermittent and often I found it very difficult to concentrate. In a face-to-face situation you send signals to the interviewee...and to fellow interviewers, but it is much more difficult to send those signals on zoom...I found myself straying to a red squirrel on the feeders outside the window...not very professional. Anyway, I was reminded of the RD Laing quote: ' “The power of interpersonal encounters comes not only from the ‘attunement’ of people to each other – but also from being in tune with ‘a healing spiritual field’ – always there – in us and between us”. Zoom and its associates can often get in the way of it...it's no panacea, no matter how useful it is as a tool, in my opinion.

Pesky things, squirrels. We used to get cross with the grey ones eating all the nuts, even if we put barriers in the way of the bird feeders. We don't, AFAIK, have any red ones round here, though there are probably some a mile or two up the road.

Distractions can happen even in face to face situations, but I suppose that most of us would try not to make that obvious if we were in a room with others.

As you say, headphones or a headset can be helpful, but then one has to get used to watching people with "balloons" over their ears. Also might be a good idea to turn the video off, otherwise people might be able see every thing you do which you wouldn't normally do in a professional situation.

Zoom is actually quite good for some things, and many groups have noticed this. It does permit a much wider area of talent and expertise to be exploited - for example some camera clubs having meetings with experts from the other end of the UK, or even Europe or maybe even as far flung afield as the USA.

Re audio, it doesn't look as though tablet users can do too much to control the audio, but desktop users should probably turn off the automatic microphone levels, and set only a low level of background removal - as mentioned before - as otherwise the Zoom system will try to adjust everything and the sound will go in and out all over the place. Another problem with instruments is that they are likely to be louder than voices, so input overload distortion is quite likely to occur, though there is nothing the end users can do about that. The presenter has to be aware that there can be a problem, and perhaps adjust by stepping back from the microphone.

[Dave2002]

Yesterday's Zoom event went OK - and as has been noted, there wasn't much we could do about the presenter's end. It was OK - though at times the violin was too close to whatever mic was being used leading to input overload. Fortunately we were able to mitigate that, and asked the player to move back a bit.

Now I'm wondering if we should buy one or two new mics for our own computers, and I was wondering about these two:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Blue-Microp...TUQ/ref=sr_1_3 Blue Snowball

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Marantz-Pro...67W/ref=sr_1_2 Marantz MPM1000U

The USB Marantz might need a table top stand to be comparable with the Snowball. Despite Amazon's probably not accurate enough description, I think these both have a cardioid sensitivity pattern. If anyone else has good recommendations for affordable (up to around £50) microphones for use with Zoom or similar online meetings that could be helpful. Ideally a plug and play USB model. I do have XLR mics, but then I have to use yet another external audio interface, and since space is limited and we don't want anything too complicated as others might also use it for online meeting purposes.

[Dave2002]

I found some specifications for the two mics mentioned in post 10.

At first I thought that the Marantz looked better - with a better (flatter) frequency response, and a more precisely focused polar diagram. The Snowball seemed to have a bump in the frequency response, and tailed off quite quickly at the bottom end.

You can see the claimed response for the Snowball here - https://s3.amazonaws.com/cd.bluemic....all/manual.pdf

However, note that there are three settings for the Snowball, and the frequency response curves are different - and also the proportion of back sounds which are picked up - depending on the three settings. The bumps in the frequency response may be fairly benign for speech, and indeed it's possible that voices might work better with some bumps in the response - depending where those are - of course.

A similar data sheet is available for the Marantz - see https://manualzz.com/doc/54207850/ma...for-daw-record...

This does not look switchable for different modes of operation - though generally reports suggest it is very good at the price.
There are more expensive microphones available from both manufacturers - which probably are better, but for the specific application mentioned, these two do seem to fit the price criteria.

[other more expensive models include - Blue Yeti, Marantz MPM2000U]

It is possible that the Snowball really is better for speech under the conditions of online comms. My suspicion is that the Marantz might be better for music - (which over a Zoom link is likely to be highly compromised - though there are workarounds), while also being pretty good for speech - so which would give better results could very well depend on the exact usage requirements.

Both the Snowball and the MPM1000 may have problems due to the stands used/provided - which are simple, but may require a degree of isolation (rubber mat?) if placed on a desk in front of a computer screen.

[Dave2002]

Looks like I missed something - there are two Snowball models. The "basic" Snowball has the three position switch setting - and costs more - maybe around £70.
The Snowball ICE model is around £50 and doesn't have the switched options - maybe around £50.

Here is the manual for the ICE model - https://s3.amazonaws.com/cd.bluemic....ckStart-EN.pdf

This shows a bump in the FR at around 1kHz, so might be fine for speech.