Faulty headphone jack on new laptop?

Manxman_in_exile

I bought a new laptop a couple of weeks ago after I drowned my ten year old Toshiba with a bottle of beer in the New Year (see earlier thread - I couldn't get the Tosh back working properly).

It's mainly used for watching TV catch-up, web surfing, and fairly uncomplicated Excel 'sheets and Word documents.  It's not used for work or for gaming and has no special requirements except for a large screen to watch catch-up and reasonable sound reproduction.  (I say "reasonable" as I'm partially deaf - too many punk concerts in the 70s so hi-fi sound would be wasted on me).

I bought a Dell Inspiron 15 3000(?) instore from JL.  I know it's not an all singing all dancing laptop and I'm sure there are cheaper ones and better spec ones out there, but that's not the point - it suits my purposes perfectly and I'm more than happy with it - except for one very little niggle...

That is that when I plug headphones in, it doesn't always seem to recognise that they are there, or rather sound doesn't always come through the 'phones but continues through the laptop speakers.  To fix it, I need to unplug and replug again.  

Funny thing is, when I do plug them in, I get a pop-up window headed MaxxAudioPro which tells me I've plugged something into the headphone jack and asking me if headphones or earbuds etc, so the laptop is recognising something is there, but the sound doesn't always connect.

It's definitely not a problem all the time - maybe happens one time in ten and replugging fixes it everytime.

My question is:  is this something I should be worrying about, and perhaps rejecting within 30 days, or am I overthinking it and worrying about nothing?  It's like a car with an intermittent fault.  If it's not present all the time, how do you establish there's a fault?

Just to clarify, unless the view is that this is a definite fault that I should definitely reject for, I don't particularly want the hassle of rejecting it - I think I'd prefer to see if it gets worse.  I hate buying laptops (one of the reasons the Tosh lasted over ten years and it took me about four months to replace it after it drowned) at the best of times, and I don't want the hassle of arguing if it is or is not faulty.

Any advice?

EDIT:  One thing I haven't done yet is test other headphones and earphones (we have a few sets) to check whether it's the headphones I've been using or the jack on the laptop.  I'll do that this evening.

pbartlett

Double-check the socket - on my Dell laptop it is a combined headphone /microphone socket and as such you may not be able plug headphones in - see what your user manual says about the combi jack.

If this is the case you may need to buy a 3-ring adapter that plugs into the laptop socket and you plug your headphones into that

You can also, of course, use usb headphones.

J_B

One random thing happened to my niece recently, her camera wouldn't work properly and it was actually present twice in Device Manager. She removed it and it reinstalled itself just fine.

If that fails, could you maybe get a cheap USB to 3.5mm converter and use that?

Manxman_in_exile

No.  Unless I've misunderstood you(?) the headphones plug in OK physically and the laptop recognises that headphones have been plugged in - it's an ordinary headphone jack.  It's just that sometimes the headphones don't pick up the audio.  So it's an intermittent fault.  Does that make sense?  

But thanks for the suggestion about usb headphones - I hadn't thought of that.  (I don't have any but I think I'd prefer to get some rather than have the hassle of rejecting etc.)

Cheers.

Neil_Jones

Manxman_in_exile said:

No.  Unless I've misunderstood you(?) the headphones plug in OK physically and the laptop recognises that headphones have been plugged in - it's an ordinary headphone jack.  It's just that sometimes the headphones don't pick up the audio.  So it's an intermittent fault.  Does that make sense?  

But thanks for the suggestion about usb headphones - I hadn't thought of that.  (I don't have any but I think I'd prefer to get some rather than have the hassle of rejecting etc.)

Cheers.

Update the sound driver from Dell's website.

Manxman_in_exile

Neil_Jones said:

Manxman_in_exile said:

No.  Unless I've misunderstood you(?) the headphones plug in OK physically and the laptop recognises that headphones have been plugged in - it's an ordinary headphone jack.  It's just that sometimes the headphones don't pick up the audio.  So it's an intermittent fault.  Does that make sense?  

But thanks for the suggestion about usb headphones - I hadn't thought of that.  (I don't have any but I think I'd prefer to get some rather than have the hassle of rejecting etc.)

Cheers.

Update the sound driver from Dell's website.

Would that be a possible cause of an intermittent fault?

Thanks

Neil_Jones

Manxman_in_exile said:

Neil_Jones said:

Manxman_in_exile said:

No.  Unless I've misunderstood you(?) the headphones plug in OK physically and the laptop recognises that headphones have been plugged in - it's an ordinary headphone jack.  It's just that sometimes the headphones don't pick up the audio.  So it's an intermittent fault.  Does that make sense?  

But thanks for the suggestion about usb headphones - I hadn't thought of that.  (I don't have any but I think I'd prefer to get some rather than have the hassle of rejecting etc.)

Cheers.

Update the sound driver from Dell's website.

Would that be a possible cause of an intermittent fault?

Thanks

Yes.  seen it myself, plugged a set of headphones in and it played through both the laptop and the headphones.  Update the driver.  Problem sorted.

System is probably using a generic driver that plays sound, but doesn't quite "get" how to handle headphones.  Updating the driver doesn't hurt anything, if it works it works, if it doesn't, no harm done.

Manxman_in_exile

Right - thanks.  I'll try that as well tonight or tomorrow.  And I'll try to get a usb 'phones adapter too

I've only had this for just over two weeks; it's replacing a ten year old laptop running Windows 7 and I've only used IE and Firefox before.  So getting Windows 10 and Edge and checking all the sound (and spelling!) settings is quite an eyeopener, and useful

Manxman_in_exile

Thanks all.  That makes me much happier.

I'll update the drivers and get a 3.5mm to USB adapter as well.  Neither would have crossed my mind!

pbartlett

if you feel like splashing out you could get a dragonfly red usb adapter it has its own dac and will be far superior to the one in the laptop

Manxman_in_exile

I might do that - even though I don't know what you are talking about!

Me posting this question on here has opened up a whole new world of excitement and discovery as I familiarise myself with the new toy - and the anticipation of purchasing more new toys!   I do actually feel much happier 

Thanks again!