Bluetooth Headset volume too low (only in arch)

Question

I connected a pair of AirPods to everything I could. Android, OSX, Linux Mint, Arch LInux. It sounds great on all of them, but when connected under Arch, I can get get less than half the volume even if I max all volumes I can find. It's strange that Mint gets the volume right. I switched to Linux Mint for a while for this exact reason. But I prefer Arch. It's smoother and faster. Pacman is another easy to use tool. However, I searched for all and any solutions to bluetooth volume, but none worked. Volume on wired headphones and laptop's speakers is loud and clear. Problem only exists in bluetooth device that relies on source to set volume. If the device has own volume buttons, then I can pump up the volume all the way.

From Gnome Sound Settings I tried going over 100%, but the sound is distorted.

I tried alsamixer and pavucontrol. All volumes are maxed, but I only get Intel card and PulseAudio. should I also have a bluetooth volume?

I also found PulseAudio/Troubleshooting - Volume adjustment does not work properly which mentioned the volume cap of 65536. Since sound is clear, I believe this volume limit is the source of my problem. But even if I try to increase the volume as mentioned there, I cannot get past the upper limit of 65536.

$ amixer set Master 12345+
Simple mixer control 'Master',0
  Capabilities: pvolume pswitch pswitch-joined
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Limits: Playback 0 - 65536
  Mono:
  Front Left: Playback 65536 [100%] [on]
  Front Right: Playback 65536 [100%] [on]

Debugging Bad dB Information of ALSA Drivers describes the same problem, but I could not get any information using this tool.

I believe there should be a way to set a config per bluetooth device and set the lower and upper limits. Alternative, maybe setting the volume to dB instead of absolute value might help, but disabling flat-volumes in /etc/pulse/daemon.conf did nothing.

The only comparison I was able to make against LinuxMint is that Mint sets dB instead of absolute value. (I have a live USB so I can boot any time in Mint)

Any suggestion is welcome.

Solution 1

VMG's answer is subtly wrong; it will technically work, but it will disable all other plugins than a2dp, meaning bluetooth keyboards/mice/gamepads/etc will stop working, when the only plugin causing issues seems to be one called avrcp.

Edit

/lib/systemd/system/bluetooth.service

and change

ExecStart=/usr/lib/bluetooth/bluetoothd

to

ExecStart=/usr/lib/bluetooth/bluetoothd --noplugin=avrcp

and run

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl restart bluetooth

Solution 2

Removing AVRCP did not work for me with my WF-1000XM3. What worked was in fact the opposite. I used AVRCP to send volume up commands directly. I used D-Bus to interact with BlueZ following this answer.

In my case the full command was:

dbus-send --print-reply --system --dest=org.bluez /org/bluez/hci0/dev_<mac_address_of_headphones> org.bluez.MediaControl1.VolumeUp

Solution 3

I figured it out a fix for the Sony WF-1000XM3 that might potentially work with other devices: The Sony WF-1000XM3 have an internal volume setting. Windows, Android, and iOS are all apparently smart enough to manipulate this automagically. Not the case with Manjaro/Arch and apparently other Linux distros.

The workaround is simple: Connect your headphones to your phone and launch the official Sony Headphones Connect App for it, then move the volume slider all the way to the right to max it out. Then reconnect them your linux PC. Be careful not to deafen yourself, turn system volume down a bit.

YMMV, but this could likely work with other headphones as well, so it is definitely worth sharing.

edit: I found an even better workaround. Same idea, but you can change the internal volume of the Sonys by remapping the touch functions on the headphones themselves (as opposed to aformentioned workaround, which requires grabbing your phone and unpairing and repairing). The ability to control volume via touching the headphones was a feature enabled at some point after the headphones first debuted. See here for instructions: https://www.sony.com/electronics/support/wireless-headphones-bluetooth-headphones/wf-1000xm3/articles/00230635

Another user reported: Also, the same is working for AirPods Pro connected to an Ubuntu distro AND Windows. For some reason, AirPods connected to ubuntu have low volume. I tried to apply suggestion for Sony but connected the AirPods on a Windows and increased volume to a maximum. Then I switched to ubuntu, remove and pair AirPods and checked volume. It was fixed, loud and clear! Linux Mint 20.

Solution 4

My fix on kubuntu:

sudo nano /lib/systemd/system/bluetooth.service

Change

ExecStart=/usr/lib/bluetooth/bluetoothd

to

ExecStart=/usr/lib/bluetooth/bluetoothd --plugin=a2dp

then

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl restart bluetooth

The effect should be immediate!

Solution 5

For me on Ubuntu 18.04, neither --noplugin=avrcp nor --plugin=a2dp worked to get my AirPods working at full volume. I found that there was a DBus property at /org/bluez/hci0/dev_<MAC here>/fd0 that allowed setting the volume via AVRCP, but it doesn't work by default for whatever reason. I changed the source code within bluez as shown below to get it to work:

profiles/audio/transport.c

static gboolean volume_exists(const GDBusPropertyTable *property, void *data)
{
    struct media_transport *transport = data;
    struct a2dp_transport *a2dp = transport->data;

    return TRUE; // <-- Always return true to allow Volume to be set
}

After rebuilding and installing bluez and reinstalling pulseaudio-module-bluetooth, you should be able to connect to your AirPods or any other AVRCP-controllable device and issue the following command to set the volume.

dbus-send --print-reply --system --dest=org.bluez /org/bluez/hci0/dev_<mac address>/fd0 org.freedesktop.DBus.Properties.Set string:org.bluez.MediaTransport1 string:Volume variant:uint16:###

### should be replaced by a volume from 0 to 127

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Comments

[excalibur]

Wow, this is instant and very effective. This means there is a need to configure bluetooth device.

[azmeuk]

Neither mort or VMG answer worked for me. Sound with an up-to-date archlinux and a Sony WH-1000XM3 is still quite low, even at the maximum volume the system proposes.

[tester]

I've never been so happy about being completely deafened by this working! This 100% will solve your bluetooth headphone low-volume problems, so prepare yourself! haha

[Alexandre Bourlier]

Didn't work for me

[Alexandre Bourlier]

Hi, Thank for sharing this. I have the same headphones but no /org/ folder. I'm not sure where to look for, find / -name bluez didn't bring anything relevant. Any suggestion?

[beetix]

The path is not a file path but a D-Bus path. There is a Gnome debugging app called D-Feet that lets you inspect D-Bus interfaces. You should be able find the right object path. There is a good chance that it will match the one I found so you could just replace the mac address as a first try. Replace ":" with "_", for example: "dev_01_AB_23_CD_45_EF"

[DanY]

More people need to upvote this answer! Stumbled around the interwebs for an hour with no luck, and then this worked perfectly. I'm on "stock" Ubuntu 19.10.

[Marc.2377]

Note that it is preferable to use sudo systemctl edit bluetooth as opposed to editing the unit file directly.

[Marc.2377]

This worked for me, thanks! Any chance it can also be made to work for the bluetooth microphone (over the HSP profile)? I looked over the available methods with D-Feet but there doesn't appear to be one.

[Grilled Chipolatas]

For those that tried mort's answer with no success, I personally had to unpair and repair my aptx audio device.

[Gerhard Burger]

Funny enough, VMGs answer worked for me while this one didn't

[Kassem]

The only solution that worked for me!

[hexnet]

I'm running Ubuntu 18.04 and running this followed by re-pairing my headset worked perfectly!

[mbirth]

I've reported this issue on: github.com/bluez/bluez/issues/17

[BANJOSA]

Had the same issue with my WH-CH510, alsamixer showed volume at max but sound was too low on the headphones. While with the volume at 100% tried to increase the volume in the headphones physical buttons and it worked. in my case this was all it needed to solve the issue.

[Mohamed Farouk]

I have sony WH-1000XM3 your answer fixed my problem thanks bro

[Konrad]

Wow, that worked! :) I have WH-1000XM2 and used touch panel to increase the volume. Thanks @BassGod!

[user2852263]

This worked for me as well, though it took quite a few tries to get it right! Running the command just once only increased the volume a tiny bit, I had to run it many times to get the volume really high. I think you really need d-feet to figure out if the last part is 'Control.VolumeUp' or 'MediaControl.VolumeUp' or something else, and d-feet will also tell you what other commands are available. The command that worked for me is: dbus-send --print-reply --system --dest=org.bluez /org/bluez/hci0/dev_4C_87_5D_CE_82_6A org.bluez.MediaControl1.VolumeUp

[Brandon Bertelsen]

Talk about going from 0-100 real quick!

[Tanel Tammik]

worked with my wh-100xm3 headphones on manjaro. i wonder if there's a way to adjust the volume without using the android phone and sony connect app.

[BassGod]

@TanelTammik Yes, there is, you can use the touch controls, see the "edit" section of my post above

[Admin]

wow, I can't believe I didn't think of using the sound up/down buttons on the headphones itself up to this point (I have ATH-M50XBT2). It does increase the internal sound level of the headphones. No distortion either. Thanks!