A119 chirping noise

[kyledyr]

Hello all-

Recently purchased an A119V2 from OCD Tronic. Noticed a weird chirping/pulsing sound while recording audio. Currently on firmware V3.3 but certain it was there on 2.6 as well.

I found a few other threads with some workarounds ranging from turning on the startup sounds to taking apart the camera to move the speaker....?

https://dashcamtalk.com/forum/threads/a119-gps-buzz-each-second.25690/

https://dashcamtalk.com/forum/threads/pulsing-audio-issue-with-gps-mount.29518

I can confirm that having startup sounds turned on OR navigating a menu with "button beeps" on OR pressing the "lock" button will make the chirping noise go away, until the camera reboots. Here are two videos I recorded that show the sound before and after the camera makes a "beep" via button press.

Before Button Press (Camera has not beeped before recording):

After Button Press (Camera has beeped at least once before recording):

There has to be a better workaround than turning on startup sounds, because I'm not a huge fan of the loud startup laser sound effect. Hopefully this is something that can be fixed via firmware.

 

[Zardoz66]

just wondering if you ever did a reset on the unit...

 

[Dashmellow]

I have experienced this intermittent buzzing/chirping noise on occasions with several different cameras. It is always related to voltage/current in one way or another. I've seen this happen if the camera is not receiving quite enough current from the power supply. It happened to me with a camera that was on a 15 foot USB cable which was not allowing enough current for that particular camera at that length with that gauge of wire (28AWG).

Also, some power supplies can cause what is called a "ripple current". The most common meaning of ripple in electrical science is the small unwanted residual periodic variation of the direct current (DC) output of a power supply. The ripple frequency and its harmonics are within the audio band and will therefore be audible on equipment such as radio receivers, equipment for playing recordings and professional studio equipment. One of the power banks I own will always cause a ripple current pulsating buzzing noise on video recordings if I just plug in a camera to the bank and it powers up automatically. One the other hand, if I go to the trouble of first pressing the power button on the power bank there is no ripple current noise. Apparently, it engages a filtering circuit.

Another source of a pulsating buzzing sound can be the particular memory card you are using. This can happen on any camera. For example, for the Mobius action camera in the troubleshooting section of the Owners Manual it says this:

Q. There is a distinctive buzzing or clicking noise when videos are played back
A. Only use quality micro SD cards with a class rating of 4 or above. Low quality cards can draw excessive current which may result in electrical noise in the recording.

So, try a different memory card first and then try a different power supply. (The power supply might be OK but there could be some current limiting issue with the cable. - also check the contacts, plugs and mini-USB port on the camera.)