"Original Sound" sounds terrible - help

[davecipriani]

HI everyone,

I am a guitar teacher that has used Zoom for a little over 3 years, i started using it about a month or 2 before the pandemic after using Skype for almost 10 years.  I was very excited at first to use it, it had better functionality than skype with the ability to record and send things through chat.

The last year has been SUPER disappointing.  The sound quality has gone DONE significantly. I notice regularly at "busy times" - around 5 or 6 PM - that alot of noise - a hissing/whooshing noise - will start, which i can briefly silence by one of us muting our mic, but will come back shortly.

Just as, if not MORE annoying; I always send an email to my new students showing them how to set up the app for Music, first setting the Zoom optimized audio to LOW background noise suppression, then also enabling them to toggle between that and "Original Sound."

What is happening now is having to choose between which problem i want to deal with.  If it doesn't have "original sound" toggled on for them, about 60% of the time it will filter their guitar playing so that i can't hear it, defeating the purpose of doing online lessons.

If they DO toggle "Original Sound" to ON, i will be able to hear them clearly BUT i will hear myself echoed LOUDLY back, which is quite disruptive for me for talking or playing.   This is a recent thing in the last 6-12 months or so.  

So either way it stinks. I have actually used Facetime instead a few times lately, with significantly better sound quality without having to fuss with settings.  

I will miss the chat window & ability to record, but if i can't get this problem solved, i am going to cancel my zoom account as it just costs money & headache.  Any suggestions?

[RN]

Hi @davecipriani welcome to the community! Just need to ask a couple of questions to further do some research on your issue! Are you by chance running MacOS 13+? And do you mind sharing the Zoom version you are currently running as well? 

[davecipriani]

I am running OS  Monterey 12.5.1. and zoom 5.13.11