Microphone too quiet on HP ZBook 15u G2

[karlfole]

Both the internal Mic, and an external mic connected via the 3.5mm produce too little audio to be useful in online conferencing. The external microphone is much worse than the internal one.

I've read many threads regarding low microphone levels that people have experienced since upgrading to Windows 10 using Realtek audio hardware.

My laptop is unuseable for video conferencing since the upgrade. I know it's not the hardware as I can run Ubuntu 16.04 from a flash drive and the same headset\microphone works wonderfully.

I have tried many thing:

• Removed and reinstalled the hardware several times
• Reinstalled the latest HP driver v6.0.1.7564 several times
• Reinstalled the latest Realtek driver R2.79\v6.0.1.7541 (This also reverses the mic names)
• Adjusted the volume and boost lelvels to max - Some effect but high background noise
• Disabled sound adjustments on both mics
• Combined and separated the Mics from DTS advanced settings
• Make sure the mic isn't in listen mode for the speakers\headset
• Adjusted the single application settings

It seems so common for Windows 10, yet works fine in Windows 8 and earlier and Linux so it must be a driver issue. 

Is there a newer driver or fix out there? Please?

[karlfole]

I took another look at the available driver and found when I clicked on the Revision History tab, that there was a newer driver available:

http://h20564.www2.hp.com/hpsc/swd/public/detail?swItemId=ob_159697_1#tab-history

I've downloaded and installed this with no change. 

[KarlFoley]

The recent Windows update "Redstone" fixed this problem for me.

I'm currently running Windows 10 build 1607 14393.222 with no more mic issues.

[Andreas1974]

Hi Karl,

I've got a similar (perhaps the not same) problem on my HP ZBook 15 G2. Without noise cancellation turned on, the mics are not usable for professional work or good communication. The combined Microphone in / headphones out 3,5 mm port yields a thick waveform of "white noise" when recording silence with Audacity.(not a stright line, which you should expect and which I get when testing the same headphones/mic on another computer) .

Turning off the default "noise cancellation", I get similar noise from the internal mic as well.

It's not a noise from the room that the external mic picks up – I can see that, since I get the same waveform when connecting a "splitter" with the combined four sectioned 3,5 phono in the computer and the separated in/out hanging loose, not connected to anything. (Connecting just the splitter tricks the computer and Audacity (you may have to restart Audacity) to think there is an external mic attached.)

I get the same kind of thick waveform of white noise when testing the "arecord" command on Linux, booting up the computer with a Linux live USB distribution.

I also just had the opportunity to test recording on a zBook 17 G2, and it seems to behave the same. I believe there is a construction error on some of these G2 models.

I also found the problem described, exactly as I experience it, in an archived message here:  https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Notebooks-Archive-Read-Only/HP-Zbook-15-G2-horrible-line-in-noise/td-p...

Do you still have this computer, so that you could try this out with a recording in Audacity or similar software? Are you sure it's not a booster function that was turned on along with noise cancellation in realtechs software (or that was automatically turned on along with the update that you mentioned), so that you also have noise while talking  but that it fades out as soon as you don't speak?

For me Windows updates has nothing to do with the problematic mic in, since I get the same problem with Linux.