Hi guys I've searched the forums already to no avail, so I'm sorry if this has been discussed before.

I've got my little Sennheiser RS-120's hooked to my PC. How I use it is.... I plug them into my PC Speakers headphone jack (The Speakers are Klipsch Pro Media 2.1) and I've noticed unless the volume is at a certain level there will be a hiss in the headphones that gets louder and louder the quieter the scene is. if it's a scene with some noise there is no hiss (I know it's not just the noise covering up the hiss because if the scene or song goes silent suddenly, there is no hiss in the headphones.. if that silence should go on for more then 20 seconds... this hiss starts to creep in)

For instance I watched an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer called 'The Body' and it has no music and very little talking. Well, listening with my cans it sounds perfectly quiet until it gets to a point when there is very little noise and then the hiss starts to creep in and get louder. If there is a sudden noise on the show even for a second, this hiss goes away only to ramp back up the longer there is very little noise going on. And from what I can tell no matter how loud I have the source volume turned up the hiss will appear if it's too quiet. But to be fair if the source volume is too low there is a constant hiss whether there is a lot of noise or not.

Is there anything I can do to fix this? Is it a problem with plugging them into my PC speakers (Klipsch Pro Media 2.1)? Is it just a headphone glitch? Would the RS-130's be better?

Thanks for any help you guys can give...

[stevelup]

Try plugging them straight into your PC first to eliminate your speakers.

Steve

[Spiderkid]

I agree with steve. Or you could just get a simple headphone splitter and have both the speakers and the headphones plugged in at the same time (but obviously turn the speakers off when you use the headphones).

I've got the RS 130's and I've noticed that I get a hiss sometimes, but I've discovered that this normally happens when I've got the source volume relatively low and the headphone volume high. So once they're plugged directly in to your computer make sure your computer volume is turned up fairly high, and your headphone volume is low. This might help to eliminate the hiss..

Thanks guys I will try plugging into the computer directly to see if there is a difference and if there is I'll have to figure something out as for my set up that is not going to be practicle for me.

I've discovered that this normally happens when I've got the source volume relatively low and the headphone volume high.

Thanks, but as I mention in my original post that isn't really the problem.

[cribeiro]

Originally Posted by Hawkboy

Thanks, but as I mention in my original post that isn't really the problem.

It could be
I have two possible scenarios:

1. The emitter has an amplifier built-in, and it adjusts the signal automatically. If the input signal is too high as to produce clipping, it will be reduced, maybe even too much, so that you end up turning it louder on the headset. When there is no sound, at some point the adjustment goes back to normal, and then you hear the inherent hiss because the volume in your headset is too high.

2. Eventually, it also happens the other way around, when the signal is too low.

In any case, I would adjust the volume so that this automatic adjustment does not happen, and such that the volume in the headset is as low as possible.

I am not sure if this can help you, but what you describe sounds really like the automatic gain adjustment of the emitter set kicking in.

[Ambient Fish]

I have a pair of RS 130s and they are almost silent with low or no signal situations, I agree with Cribeiro's suggested cause and solution, if that does not sort out the hiss then you may have a faulty pair and could ask your vendor for a replacement set. Good luck

Originally Posted by cribeiro

It could be
I would adjust the volume so that this automatic adjustment does not happen, and such that the volume in the headset is as low as possible

That would make sense and was the first thing I tried to do when I tried fixing this problem. I tried every combination of high and low volumes that you could imagine while always having the head phones turned as low as possible and the hiss would still creep in when there was a lack of sound.

And I agree it sounds like it should be the problem you explained above, but low or high and everything in between from the source still gets me this hiss that will appear in a quiet scene. And I have to stress it isn't always there and I just notice it when it's quiet the headphones are hiss less if there is fairly regular sound .. even if it goes silent for 5 seconds it is hissless. It only starts after about 20 seconds of silence and continually gets louder until there is a noise to make it kick out. So that leads me to suspect Cribeiro is right. But for some reason I can't find the magic volumes to make it stop...and believe me guys I've tried EVERY combo of highs and lows you can think of f...or months!

Anyhow most of that is now moot as I went directly from my soundcard into my speakers (As suggetsed earlier) and the problem is gone completely so it was something between the Klipsch speakers and the headphones.

Now I've split the headphones and speakers direct from the PC BUT now I have to figure out how to get my Xbox into the headphone mix so I can use my headphones with that as well without crawling on my hands and knees to plug the xbox into the headphones. (I've got the Xbox pluged into my Klipsch speakers now and it sounds great!)

Any Ideas?

Thanks for everybodies help here so far ... you guys are all awesome!

[Paatos]

Hello everyone, just thought to chip in as I've been battling with the same problem... actually I even changed my amplifier to see if I could get rid of the creeping hiss.

My problem was actually worse as the hiss began to be really audible if there was a gap of 2-3 seconds in the play or even when a song got too quiet - apparently the transmitter tried to compensate and started cranking up the hiss. I also juggled through with all possible combinations of high and low volumes to no avail.

The only thing that actually worked was to move the transmitter as high as possible and away from all things electronic. Now the hiss is a lot quiteter and comes on after some 30 secs of silence.

I dunno, but it could be some outside interference between the headphones & transmitter causing at least a part of the problem. I was thinking that the line between me & the transmitter went over a wlan receiver when the hiss was at its worst