Fixing A Zoom Issue For PC

[Randy Stein]

I use the application Zoom almost daily for teaching and a weekly session. I recently purchased a new laptop, a Dell PC. When I met with students the next day after setting up my computer but none of them could hear my EC. Same with my mates on our weekly jam session. 

I contacted Zoom tech support and they had me download the most recent version of Zoom but the problem persisted. No one on the receiving end could hear my EC or if they did it was garbled yet they could clearly hear my voice when speaking. 

Enter Geek Squad Tech Support. Here is what they did to fix the problem:

 

1. Go to Settings>Sound>More Sound Settings>Communications. Set "When Windows detects communications activity" to "Do nothing".

It appears to be set to "Reduce the volume of other sounds by 80%" by default.

 

2.Go to Settings>System>Sound>Input>Microphone. Set "Audio Enhancements" to Off. The default is "Device default effects".

 

Hope this helps anyone experiencing the same issue

[David Barnert]

Yeah, Zoom tends to assume that anything that isn’t speech is noise and tries to squelch it. That’s useful if the dog won’t stop barking or a noisy truck goes by outside, but it doesn’t do much for music.

[wschruba]

There is an option that I was using extensively during covid for "use original sound".  As noted above, Zoom really does not like any kind of musical input.  It took a week of struggles with voice lessons to figure that out in it's entirety.

 

I've not used Zoom for music for a couple of years now, thankfully, but I believe that option is front-and-center on phones/tablets, and I imagine it's close to it on a desktop, too.

[Randy Stein]

There seems to be some confusion to my posting.

Zoom works fine if you have it set properly for musicians. 

The issue I mention are Windows audio settings that impede a musical instrument being heard. 

Edited January 6 by Randy Stein

[David Barnert]

6 hours ago, Randy Stein said:

There seems to be some confusion to my posting.

Zoom works fine if you have it set properly for musicians.

 

Yes, I think we all (in this thread, anyway) realize that, but many don’t and it is not the default setting. It must be purposefully reset.

[David Barnert]

Of course, the other problem with Zoom and music is that attempts to play (or sing, or recite the pledge of allegiance, etc.) at the same time are scuttled by the small but frustratingly noticeable fraction of a second delay (latency) between when a note is played at one end and when it is heard at the other end. There are software packages that minimize latency (JamKazam, Jamulus, etc.), but Zoom is not one of them.