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Audio issues using external devices with Google Meet

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  • Last reply by owen16

owen16
owen16
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I use Google Meet multiple times a day for work meetings. After switching to Firefox from Chrome recently, I have noticed some persistent issues to do with audio from devices external to my laptop. I have a USB external microphone, a USB sound card that powers external speakers, and wired headphones that I use through the laptop's headphone jack. In macOS my default audio input is the external mic, and default output is the wired headphones.

The first issue that I noticed when using Firefox in meetings was that people reported an echoing effect on my audio. Audio from everyone else sounded fine to me. Changing my microphone source in Meet or in macOS did not seem to help, nor did disabling echo canceling in Meet. What did help was disconnecting the USB microphone completely. The impression that I got was that Meet was taking audio from both the USB mic and laptop mic at the same time, even though only the USB mic was selected. This has happened every time I used Meet.

The second issue that I noticed just happened for the first time today. (Note: I now have my USB mic unplugged until I can resolve the mic issue.) In macOS I had my wired headphones set as the audio output device. I joined a meeting, and I was hearing the meeting audio in my headphones and the external speakers (USB sound card) at the same time.

I've used Meet with Chrome for the last few years and never had this type of issue.

Something I have noticed that may be relevant is, when I open Meet in Chrome and go to the Meet settings, it shows my USB sound card and wired headphones as audio input/output options that I can select, in addition to the built-in laptop speakers. But when I open Meet in Firefox, the settings only show the USB sound card and laptop speakers for output - they don't show my wired headphones. FWIW, media.setsink.enabled is set to "true" already - I saw this mentioned as a solution in a similar question from 2022.

Is there anything I can check, or debugging data I can capture when this issue happens, which would help figure out the root cause?

I use Google Meet multiple times a day for work meetings. After switching to Firefox from Chrome recently, I have noticed some persistent issues to do with audio from devices external to my laptop. I have a USB external microphone, a USB sound card that powers external speakers, and wired headphones that I use through the laptop's headphone jack. In macOS my default audio input is the external mic, and default output is the wired headphones. The first issue that I noticed when using Firefox in meetings was that people reported an echoing effect on my audio. Audio from everyone else sounded fine to me. Changing my microphone source in Meet or in macOS did not seem to help, nor did disabling echo canceling in Meet. What did help was disconnecting the USB microphone completely. The impression that I got was that Meet was taking audio from both the USB mic and laptop mic at the same time, even though only the USB mic was selected. This has happened every time I used Meet. The second issue that I noticed just happened for the first time today. (Note: I now have my USB mic unplugged until I can resolve the mic issue.) In macOS I had my wired headphones set as the audio output device. I joined a meeting, and I was hearing the meeting audio in my headphones and the external speakers (USB sound card) at the same time. I've used Meet with Chrome for the last few years and never had this type of issue. Something I have noticed that may be relevant is, when I open Meet in Chrome and go to the Meet settings, it shows my USB sound card and wired headphones as audio input/output options that I can select, in addition to the built-in laptop speakers. But when I open Meet in Firefox, the settings only show the USB sound card and laptop speakers for output - they don't show my wired headphones. FWIW, media.setsink.enabled is set to "true" already - I saw this mentioned as a solution in a similar question from 2022. Is there anything I can check, or debugging data I can capture when this issue happens, which would help figure out the root cause?

All Replies (2)

owen16
owen16 Question owner
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I have upgraded from macOS 11 to 12, 13, and 14. I used each version for a few days before upgrading again. At each stage, I had the same audio issues with Firefox and Meet. The main issue continues to be that if I have an external mic plugged in, when using Meet people report that my audio starts out normally, and then after a minute or two they start hearing everything from me twice. As soon as I change the Meet audio settings to use the built-in mic instead of the external mic, the issue stops.

owen16
owen16 Question owner
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I filed a bug about this, and it was closed as a duplicate of https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1849108. This bug is fixed in version 123 which will be out in February, so hopefully that will fix my issue.