Hardware GBA speaker noise fixed!

[malheur]

hello.

i have 2 GBA and one of them have weirdly loud speaker noise.

it is low frequency noise, and weirdly its loud regardless volume! even i turn volume completely off, it's still there and static. loudness of the noise doesn't louder when i turn volume higher.

same when using earphones.

this time i don't know why causes the problem, but here's my fix :

(picture from Ozito)

see right side above the volume.

there is AMP AGB IR3R60N sound amplifier chip which very little known.

using some wire, put a medium size capacitor (i used spare 16V 100uF) to second left leg(description below) and gnd.

about the leg, AMP AGB has 18 legs(9 of each side), but mother board has 20 leg holders(10 of each). since chip aligned right side, first holding point doesn't soldered anything(NC) and second point soldered first leg of sound chip. that's the one. i recommend solder the leg(2nd) with NC(1st) together. it will be easier and hold the wire firmly.

now it doesn't have any noise even i put my ear to speaker. even quieter than normal one.

if you bother noise, try this.

FYI : AMP AGB also used on GBA SP too, so if you have same problem with SP, it will be works either.

 

[slaphappygamer]

Cool find. I had a similar problem where I had background humming through the headphones only and at about mid-level volume. I ended up turning the volume almost all the way up (on the console) and using headphones with an inline volume control to level it out. You seem to have the better fix, I'm just not good at soldering.

 

[rs1n]

I notice some low-sounding buzzes when I use headphones. This looks pretty much like a low-pass filter for the sound chip. I will have try this on my GBA to see if it helps.

 

[Le_Gogh]

Just thought I'd report in that I attempted this on my 32 pin GBA and it worked like a charm. I don't believe the issue was there before I did the backlight mod, so assume this is a side effect of the mod?

Anyway, thanks a lot for working this out! It works great and took me all of 5 minutes to do.

 

[ltsheppard]

Does this also work with a 220uF capacitor?

 

[malheur]

Does this also work with a 220uF capacitor?

usually they say large capacitancy capacitor absorb low frequency noise, and small capacitancy capacitor absorb high frequency noise. so, if you use large capacitor for high freq noise, it will be not working well i guess.

though, i believe in this case, it will works.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

hello.

i have 2 GBA and one of them have weirdly loud speaker noise.

it is low frequency noise, and weirdly its loud regardless volume! even i turn volume completely off, it's still there and static. loudness of the noise doesn't louder when i turn volume higher.

same when using earphones.

this time i don't know why causes the problem, but here's my fix :

View attachment 69803
(picture from Ozito)

see right side above the volume.

View attachment 69802

there is AMP AGB IR3R60N sound amplifier chip which very little known.

using some wire, put a medium size capacitor (i used spare 16V 100uF) to second left leg(description below) and gnd.

about the leg, AMP AGB has 18 legs(9 of each side), but mother board has 20 leg holders(10 of each). since chip aligned right side, first holding point doesn't soldered anything(NC) and second point soldered first leg of sound chip. that's the one. i recommend solder the leg(2nd) with NC(1st) together. it will be easier and hold the wire firmly.

now it doesn't have any noise even i put my ear to speaker. even quieter than normal one.

if you bother noise, try this.

FYI : AMP AGB also used on GBA SP too, so if you have same problem with SP, it will be works either.

I have a similar problem with my GBA SP, maybe it's the same? I don't think I'll be arsed to try this fix though, plus I don't trust my soldering skills. I never use my GBAs anyway.

 

[ltsheppard]

I guess I'll just get a 100uF one.

On another note, do any of you guys know if the GBA SP speakers are any better than the original ones? I've got a spare one lying around, but I can't really test them side by side.

 

[malheur]

do any of you guys know if the GBA SP speakers are any better than the original ones?

actually the original one is the best one. there are few other compatible speakers, but none of them have loud enough volume and total audio quality. i said "total" audio quality because GBA is using poor audio processor, so if you use very nice speaker with that poor processor, it makes worse(you can try with high-end earphone). original speaker emits only needed frequency and absorb others, so in whole package-wise, it's best.

but if you really want to try, there is extra amplifier doughter board and speaker. like GBAmp3. but it's not getting a lot better with speaker quality(though volume will be louder). usually they say it's good for source-wise for using gameboy as musical instrument.

 

[ltsheppard]

Good, thanks for responding so quickly!

 

[geyser]

Can confirm that 220uF/16V capacitor works fine and now absorbs all noise coming.
After gbaMP3 installation noise become monster hiss, now it appears only at MAX volume, so its OK

 

[Peeteris]

So, I soldered 16V 100uF capacitor as showed in image.
Noise is greatly reduced, but still there.
There's a thing, though - when I power on my GBA, startup jingle is distorted, if I turn console off and on instantly, jingle is clear. could this be because of bad capacitor? As if it needs to collect energy to work properly. I can ignore this, as distortion is apparent only when system boots up and fades out gradually.

There's the other thing - I think max volume is decreased after this mod. Could this be true?
Is there a way to increase the volume of my GBA?

 

[Peeteris]

So, I uploaded a video to show off how loud is my GBA and that strange distortion on first boot-up jingle, but not on the second.
Maybe that's normal, I don't know so I am asking here for help. For me it doesn't look and sound like to be normal as volume is always turned to the max when I play my GBA.

 

[malheur]

There's a thing, though & There's the other thing

so far i can't tell volume difference with mod or not by my bear ears, but may theres difference by measuring equipments.

as far i check and assume, cause of the odd audio noise is dry up capacitors. so i think the mod effects could be a little different by how bad original capacitors are.

about the volume, actually you can mod louder. since some time passed so i barely remember, but C39(or 38?) resistor affects the volume. higher ohm does louder volume and lower ohm does quieter. or the other way...? it has some flaw though.

 

[Stremon]

That's seems a very good fix!
I have the same humming problem since I backlight modded my GBA, but I don't have any old capacitor around.
From your tests and experience, which capacitancy should I pick when buying one?
Seems like some people are using 100uF and other 220uF?

 

[malheur]

From your tests and experience, which capacitancy should I pick when buying one?

usually they say large capacitancy capacitor absorb low frequency noise, and small capacitancy capacitor absorb high frequency noise.

i tried 100 and works good, but i think either 100 and 220 works similarly. since condition of each GBA may different, i suggest buy several ones between 50~1000 and try them. its very cheap. also if you put multipul capacitors in parallel, both capacitors absorb different noise depend different capacitency.

 

[Stremon]

i tried 100 and works good, but i think either 100 and 220 works similarly. since condition of each GBA may different, i suggest buy several ones between 50~1000 and try them. its very cheap. also if you put multipul capacitors in parallel, both capacitors absorb different noise depend different capacitency.

Thank you for your help, I will buy a pack of different capacitors and test that
Also I guess every capacitor should be for 16V right?

 

[malheur]

every capacitor should be for 16V right?

actually i forgot to check working volt age of that chip... i think its not necessary that high voltage. high volt with high capacitor makes capacitor size big. i think 16v 220uF is the biggest size for closing the housing properly. for sure, using 16v ~220uF, and 6.3v 470uF~ will works.

 

[RemixDeluxe]

A better mod would be finding a better quality speaker than the built in one. I'd be interested to know if better quality speakers exist, if it doesnt cost much to replace I'd try it out.

 

[Peeteris]

A better mod would be finding a better quality speaker than the built in one. I'd be interested to know if better quality speakers exist, if it doesnt cost much to replace I'd try it out.

Original speaker is the best one you can get, believe me.