A somewhat easy and cheap fix for the 1520 sound problem.

As many of you know, many 1520s (including mine) produces static and interference from the cpu when its multiplier is underclocked to save power. You can put your computer's power profile under "high performance" to fix this problem, but it comes at the expense of battery life. However, when I was testing for the headphone sound, I stumbled upon a fairly easy and cheap fix that isn't too obstructive.

Basically, you just plug your headphones into a simple sound level attenuator to drown out the sound.

What is a sound level attenuator, you ask? Well, it's a good thing I have a camera, isn't it?



^ Not too obstructive, right?

These are the ones that came with my super.fi 5 pro IEMs, at least. They can come in different designs, such as such a straight, unflexible jack (like this - the one with the black casing) or even a large, amplifier-like thing (but we don't want those - they're expensive and much too big). Basically, what they do is add impedence in order to reduce volume to prevent a loud noise from blowing out your earphone drivers (which is why they mostly are used with in-ear phones, but they work just as well with headphones too!). They're usually used on airplanes because the volume level from the airplane jacks are usually difficult to control. Sure, it makes the volume lower, but if you're listening to your music at full volume with a pair of headphones on, you're either going to break the headphones or cause significant ear damage anyways.

What's their price? Relatively cheap. You could get some for about $10-15. Here's One.

I've tested this method with my Sennheiser HD485 headphones which have a 32ohm input impedence and my Ultimate Ears super.fi 5 pro IEMs which have 26 ohms of impedence.

With the Sennheisers, I can clearly hear static without the SLA, but with it, I cannot hear a thing. However, with the super.fi 5's, I can hear it with AND without the SLA, albeit the volume if the static is dramatically lower. But.. earphones (especially IEMs which isolate outside noise), do make it much easier to hear any interference, so I'd recommend against using them with any laptop/desktop anyways. So, basically, I've concluded that with headphones of maybe 28-30 ohms (maybe even less than that) or more of impedence, a SLA will be able to negate all of the volume coming out of the cpu static.

Now.. I've got to make a disclaimer. This works for me, but it will not necessarily work for you. I'm not responsible for any problems that may be caused, nor am I responsible for your $10 if this solution doesn't work. Hopefully it does, though, and you won't ever have to listen to that nasty cpu noise again! Oh, and +rep if this helps please!

 

This device must be some sort of voodoo magic. Snake oil I say!

I'll have to try this if I encounter the problem. I'm sure Radio Shack will carry something like this.

 

instead of spending 15 bucks on that, just get one of these, http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826106931

I can barely hear any distortion on those(if any) when I plug em in my 1520

 

Chaos, the problem is that some people have high quality headphones that they want to listen to. Also, you may not hear distortion not because of your headset but because your 1520 isn't faulty. Not all of the 1520s have this problem.