Garbled sound through headphone jack
I'm trying this again since for some reason my original post was marked as spam and removed after I provided all relevant details about the affected TV. Aside from that, I also have more information ...
Forum Discussion
Hello -- I have a 6-month old Roku TV (Model 43R4A5R). The output from the built-in headphone jack on the back of the TV has stopped working. My mother was listening through her Sony wireless headphones this morning, and when she came back after lunch, there was no sound through the headphones. I plugged another set of headphones into the jack, and did not hear sound through them either. I do get sound from the headphone output on the remote, but that is not a good long-term solution. My mother is hearing-impaired, and uses her Sony headphones for many hours each day.
I tried unplugging the TV for a few seconds (but maybe not long enough for a full power cycle); also turning the TV off and on several times; plugging and unplugging the headphone cable multiple times, etc.
Is there any other trick or setting that I might try, before concluding that there's a hardware issue? Maybe a Factory Reset? Thanks!
Same exact thing happened to my dad today; headphones were working from 1 to 4:30. After shutting the device off and returning at 5, no sound came out of the jack.
It's a 9-month-old 3-Series.
Are you sure you're using headphone jack? Some Roku tv's have two 3.5mm jacks, one is for headphones the other AV-in jack.
🤦‍♂️ Although the jack did stop working for some unknown reason, when I unplugged and replugged the 3.5mm to try to "reset" things, I must've started to plug it back into the AV jack during testing on the TV and on other devices.
Plugging it into the headphone jack returned the audio to the headphones—thanks!
Before Tivoburkee fixed my issue, I was researching possible fixes, so here are what I came up with:
- First, see if just unplugging the 3.5mm connector and plugging it back in (making sure to plug it into the headphone jack—it's black on our device—and not the AV jack—it's yellow on ours—if your TV has both).
- If the 3.5mm jack is still the issue, I believe the only other option is the Optical (Audio) port; it's the weird one that has a square-with-a-rounded-side shape. The following two wireless headphones have that type of connection:
- Insignia from Best Buy (Insignia™ RF Wireless Over-the-Ear Headphones Black NS-HAWHP2bestbuy.com)
- Sennheiser from Amazon (and others, like B&H Photo Video) (https://www.amazon.com/Sennheiser-RS-175-Wireless-Headphone/dp/B00SLUI5SA/ref=sr_1_3?crid=U6O1KCT2GY7J&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.JO42cS-oegU-_zdo6GSQZfLva4f2jE3ys0TbT3PgQk7LNXmkaVs78kT4axmz5njTGKMTzlafYJUELsLCNy89djOSkFNVq8Ka6xtMbAByiPJ0K4n_5greNUYU4E-loqhzzZo1y0U311eCBho5u5q-jbyEFP-hYz3XumJKHo81XxqKemZRNfXP5Lo4Iogp5pJc0P6xRpljQAdEx6zcgk73rLCia7p-gCxvI1ZHQbMN-uU.mZspQqbAAxxTETzjhLCj8CUgqS0FeCTxikKhNMks0B0&dib_tag=se&keywords=sennheiser%2B175&qid=1727103147&sprefix=sennheiser%2B175%2Caps%2C241&sr=8-3&ufe=app_do%3Aamzn1.fos.1740e8b9-be2d-46a4-a376-9d8efb903409&th=1)
- There's a 195 model as well, but it's about $40 more.
- If you have a mobile device with a 3.5mm jack (you'll likely need an older device; the most recent Apple device that still has one is the iPad 9, I believe), you can also download the Roku app to your device.
- Open the app and pair it to your TV.
- Plug in the 3.5mm plug into the mobile's jack.
- Go to the Remote tab.
- Tap the Headphones circle to enter Headphone Mode.
Hopefully, it's just a case of unplug and replug to reset the connection, but if not, maybe one of the other two options will work for you. The mobile app is obviously the cheaper option, but it's not as wireless as one would like—you still have to connect the headphone transmitter to a phone or tablet—but you can still move around unattached to anything.
