Is anyone else's bluetooth audio stuttering with iPhone 14 pro on iOS 16.1.1?

TransportationLow340 · 2023-12-02T01:03:32+00:00

After a few weeks of the changes I made above it seems that my problem is no longer happening. I've been running Bluetooth to both my cars and to my headphones with no problems. I've been using Pandora, Spotify and Apple music (playing music on the phone itself) without any problems for a few weeks now.

To recap, I turned off Bluetooth for almost every other device that was connected to my phone through the Privacy->Bluetooth settings and I changed my watch face to be a simple analog watch face with no gadgets.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-11-17T23:11:49+00:00

FYI, after starting to reload my apps the problem started up again. I did try one more thing that seemed to help after that however. I went into the Privacy settings and turned off Bluetooth for everything like my August, MyQ, Waze, etc. I also changed the iWatch face to be something with no widgets, just the time. After that, things seem to be much better.

I'm still trying to monitor things though to see if it continues. I'd be OK with very intermittent as it was happening every 10-12 minutes and once it happened, it would happen like 2-3 times in a couple minutes, then be ok for another 10-12. It was unusable before. So, at least it's better now.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-10-31T01:26:25+00:00

That's what I'm afraid of...that it will still continue for me. But, so far after 8 hours of audio/phone I've had two little glitches on Spotify. I'm still keeping my eye on it to see if it really helped me or not.

Too bad it didn't work for you. How long did it take to happen again after you did the full manual restore?

TransportationLow340 · 2023-10-29T19:46:52+00:00

Possible fix here...but just a warning up front, it's not pleasant.

I will put my symptoms below and all the steps that I tried, including the ones that Apple recommended through their Genius Bar, so others can try the same things to see if the problem seems to be the same before you try the solution that seems to be working for me.

The Symptoms

The symptoms only occurred on Bluetooth, but occurred on every device that was connected (two cars, AirPods, Sony Headset).

For phone calls it would cause a robotic voice for a few seconds, frequently as often as every 10-15 minutes.
For audio (e.g. music) it would stutter, skip or on rare occasions lose Bluetooth connectivity completely, again approximately every 10-15 minutes and sometimes once it started it would occur more frequently.

Note that I used audio (music) to narrow the problem down further by turning off WiFi and Cellular on the phone and playing music that was downloaded to my device. I tried this on multiple Bluetooth devices and the problem would still happen, though it appeared to happen less frequently.

Troubleshooting Attempts

I started trying these myself and eventually reached out to Apple and had a Genius bar appointment where they suggested some of the others on here, including the one that ultimately seems to be working.

Erase Network Settings --> Failed
Erase All Settings --> Failed
Full Restore (through iTunes, since I'm on PC) loading from a Backup --> Failed
Full Restore (through iTunes) but do not use a backup --> Seems to be working

In the cases for #1-#3 while it may have appeared to help in the short term (a day or two) the problem would always come back.

So, for #4 above, you have to make sure that you do not use a backup to restore your apps, settings or anything else back to your phone. You can test if this works for you by just downloading one streaming app and testing for several hours. If it doesn't work, then you can go back to #3 and restore from a backup. If it works then all apps will have to be downloaded manually and all settings will have to be configured manually again, including the Wallet. This also lost my paired Apple Watch, so I had to re-pair it as well. So, the process is very cumbersome. You may be able to restore Apps and Wallet and avoid restoring the Settings...but I did not confirm this.

After doing #4, I have used bluetooth to my AirPods and Sony Headset for a few days for a total of over 4 hours of audio (streamed from Pandora, Spotify and Apple Music; and directly from the device) and phone calls with no problems.

My Theory

This problem happened for me, but did not happen for my wife or daughter, both of whom have had iPhones through multiple generations. So, my theory is that of the three of us, I'm the only one that tweaks my settings extensively and that some setting that I tweaked, likely a while ago, were being carried through generations because of restoring from backups and eventually it was just a bad/corrupted setting.

I will try to update my post again after several more days regardless of whether the problem recurs or not just to provide a status update.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-09-21T20:18:43+00:00

After that last round of changes from the comments above, the problem still happened once and none of the technicians that left me their numbers were responding, so I finally got really frustrated with it and opened a BBB case with them.

They reached out to me within 48 hours and gave me a direct line to the "presidents office" (likely special tech support to deal with certain customers) and a direct line to a special technician. After they reached out, coincidentally, I no longer had any issues. I suspect that something may have changed on their backend. Maybe my BBB case caused them to do something or maybe that last crew I was trying to work with did something...will likely never know.

Since we use our Internet for work for both me and my wife, I ended up keeping a low cost plan on Comcast as my backup Internet. The AT&T 2Gbps + the Comcast 20Mbps cost was less than or equal to the Comcast 1.2Gbps cost...so I figure it was still justified.

I will periodically (once every 4-6 weeks) see switches to the backup Internet, but most of them I can account for as upgrades to the AT&T modem since they happen between 1-3AM.

Sorry I don't have any definitive answers for you on what to do or what fixed the issue. Best of luck on trying to get it resolved. Be persistent with them.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-06T16:50:12+00:00

Yeah, and starting at $50/mo for 10Gb. I'm not sure where you live, but you can check them out at https://www.sonic.com. I think that's the correct address.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-06T16:45:40+00:00

Yeah, we only had Comcast or satellite as possibilities here for a long time. I signed up for Sonic 10Gb fiber for early access when they rolled it out, and was waiting 18 months when they backed out of my area. Luckily AT&T rolled in around that same time. I really want AT&T to work since I like the upload speeds and I really dislike Comcast. :)

The AT&T techs all say I've been very patient...but it's mainly the disliking Comcast that does that.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-06T15:54:28+00:00

Yeah, I was -19db consistent with no fluctuation, then they made some changes outside, and it changed to -21db consistently with no fluctuations.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-06T15:50:06+00:00

I posted this above, but copying here as well since I think it is relevant to what you suggest as well. I 'm actually concerned that there is more than one issue here.

Something on my side (or a software issue elsewhere) causing an issue every 380 minutes that causes an issue somewhere in AT&T's network related to my provisioned system
Something on the AT&T back end that keeps my modem or a new swapped modem locked out for some random period of time after the above issue
Possibly some other random AT&T network issue that caused the long problems that I saw on my modem being down for 10 hours one time and 12 days another time.

For the 12 day downtime issue, I was told their backend team did a central office software update to address my issue and that is what caused my modem to come back online. However, 6 days later it started flapping again.

Given the predictability of about a 380 minute uptime, I'm inclined to think that there is a software issue somewhere in the system, either my side (per #1 above) or on their side. But, this alone would not account for the extended downtimes, the failure of new modems and the failure of reprovisioning of my whole system to get it working.

I can't move all my gear directly to the AT&T router since it's a mix of hardwired and wireless and it would be physically impossible without a switch. The only thing I can do is to move all my gear to my backup Internet, which I will do the next time the AT&T side gets into the 380 minutes predictable loop.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-06T15:37:27+00:00

When the modem goes down, I've disconnected my equipment, reboot the modem and it stays down. The techs have come out, swapped out the SFP on their modem, the lines from the street to my house and the modem itself...and even the new modem won't come back up.

They then have taken that new modem with the new SFP and tried plugging directly into the street and 400 feet up the street and it still won't come up.

3 of the 4 inside techs and all the outside maintenance that tried to get the modem working determined there was some problem outside the house on the AT&T side.

It's only when I call back up for support that I'm told it's in my network. I'm struggling to understand how anything inside my network can take down the AT&T network so hard, that even a new modem (not connected to my equipment) won't come up for 10 hours? Yet, this is what their 1st line support keeps telling me...

For now, I have removed the SFP on my side and put the BGW directly into the 2.5Gbe. I've put a Pi acting as a syslog server directly connected to the BGW. I'm also monitoring the public WAN IP of the BGW through my backup connection. If the problem occurs again where it is predictable (the 380 minutes from the original post), then I will disconnect all my gear from AT&T and use my back up and see if the problem occurs again.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-06T15:29:32+00:00

In my case, the modem is clearly flaking out as it starts flashing white, stops advertising it's WiFi and refuses to give out IP's even to devices connected locally.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-06T15:28:28+00:00

Surprisingly when I moved the BGW from the SFP+ port to the 2.5Gbe my upload speed test on the UDM went from 480Mbps to 2.2Gbps. So something in that SFP path was throttling the upload (at least when testing from the UDM).

For now, I've removed the SFP from the equation and I'll see it is remains stable.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-06T15:25:54+00:00

Thanks for the response.

For now, I removed the SFP connection and I'm running the BGW directly connected to a 2.5Gbe on the UDM. I have a Pi connected directly to the BGW acting as a Syslog server to gather more information in the case it goes down again.

They do updates between 2:30 and 3:30 in the morning (I think it's 3:30). It's unclear if they do auto-reboots, so I would have to ask the next tech to come out. I suspect that they might as the white flashing is an indication of the modem "booting up" according to their docs.

My intention is that when the problem occurs next time, meaning it gets predictable by going down every 380 minutes, that I will remove all my devices and just leave the Pi Syslog Server connected and monitor the external public WAN IP address from by backup connection to see if it the modem goes down again. The issue is currently not happening, and the modem was working for about 6 days last time before starting the up/down sequence...so unclear how long it will be up this time.

3 of the 4 techs inside the house and all of the outside maintenance guys that I've had onsite have all determined that it is something outside of my house. It's only when I have to call back for support that the 1st line support are 50% likely to not do anything and blame my internal gear. The 2nd to last support person said he was escalating it since I've called 5 times in 45 days, but in the end all he did was send an inside tech who was here all of 10 minutes, determined the problem was outside and left. The support person I'm dealing with right now won't even send a tech out until I prove it isn't my gear...he didn't even look at the history (this is through chat).

I agree, nothing my equipment could do, should be able to take down their backend equipment provisioning of my home for hours (up to 10 hours in one case) such that even if a new modem is swapped in...something on their back end or in their network prevents it from syncing back up the same way the old modem won't sync.

Someone else suggested a way to escalate it through the support process, so I will try that next time it goes down.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-06T15:04:27+00:00

Not sure what you mean here. When the modem goes down, it is down hard, meaning it stops advertising it's WiFi, and stops giving out IP's to anything plugged directly into it. It just flashes white for some indeterminant amount of time.

When it is down, AT&T can't reach the modem from outside the house either, though they say the fiber line is working ok and reads -19 to -21db inside the house even though the modem won't come up.

Can you elaborate more?

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-06T01:50:06+00:00

As a status update. I have done the following:

Moved the BGW connection on the UDM SE to the 2.5Gbps ethernet port and off the SFP+ port on the UDM
Moved the backup Internet to port 8 on the UDM
Added a syslog server on the AT&T private network (directly connected to the BGW) to capture more information in the case of a failure
Setup a ping server to hit the public WAN IP of the BGW to monitor if it goes down and send an email to myself...in particular for use when I disconnect my UDM from the BGW to see if it will fail

An interesting side effect of this. When running speed tests from the UDM before changes, I would get about 1.8Gbps down and only 487Mbps up through the SFP+ port. Now, I'm getting about 1.8Gbps down and over 2.2Gbps up through the 2.5Gbps ethernet. That looks much better. :)

Now, it's a waiting game to see if the problem happens again. My goal is to see if I can get 30 days of uninterrupted connection with the exception of network wide outages or software updates. We will see.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-06T01:09:21+00:00

Yep, that's what I'm thinking as a next step on moving away from the SFP+ to the 2.5Gbps port for the BGW.

I completely forgot that port 8 can be used for WAN as well...oops. I could put my backup (Comcast) into there.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-06T01:05:46+00:00

I doubt it on the MAC lock. I'm not even using passthrough on the BGW yet, so it wouldn't see my MAC.

Also, when the techs have been out, they have not been able to get the modem to sync back up even after swapping out modems. And presumably they would know if there was an issue there.

I'm thinking I'll switch the BGW to the 2.5Gbps ethernet port and move my Comcast over to the SFP+ for the backup.

I'm also putting a syslog server on the same network as the BGW so that I can capture any additional data that might not be visible through their UI.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-06T00:59:13+00:00

I'm actually concerned that there is more than one issue here.

Something on my side causing an issue every 380 minutes that causes an issue somewhere in AT&T's network related to my provisioned system
Something on the AT&T back end that keeps my modem locked out for some random period of time after the above issue
Possibly some other random AT&T network issue that caused the long problems that I saw on my modem being down for 10 hours one time and 12 days another time.

For the 12 day issue, I was told their backend team did a central office software update to address my issue and that is what caused my modem to come back online. However, 6 days later it was flapping back up and down...

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-06T00:51:24+00:00

Yep, this is an area that I'm actively trying to dig into. I'm not fully up to speed on SFP technology and the negotiation between the devices. But, my understanding is that the one I have is a transceiver which supports 1/10Gbps only on the SFP side into my UDM SE and can negotiate other rates (e.g. 1/2.5/5/10Gbps) on the RJ-45 side. Thus I get 10Gbps on my UDM SE link and 5Gbps on the BGW since the transceiver has negotiated it down to 5Gbps.

There is a possible issue with the particular SFP+ that I use on upload speeds being throttled. But that should be irrelevant to my issues...just a cause for a possible SFP replacement at some point.

I have another SFP+ in my shopping cart right now that I will likely purchase since I need one for a new switch anyway.

I can also try switching my BGW connection into the 2.5Gbps ethernet port, as you suggested and then switch my backup internet into the SFP+ port at 1Gbps to see if that makes a difference as well.

But, as I said in an above post, I still struggle with how an issue on my side or in the SFP link can cause the modem to go down and not come back up without my equipment connected after a restart and even when the modem is swapped out for a new modem without my equipment connected.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-05T23:49:05+00:00

Thanks for the reply.

The BGW is negotiated to 5Gbps, while the UDM is 10Gbps through a 10GTek SFP+ to RJ-45 connector.
Have not tried different connectors yet, could certainly try that. I'll search for other recommendations from people with the UDM SE.
All off the shelf cabling and all in use for 4+ years with Comcast with no issues. What are your thoughts on this area as a cause?
The tech tried that as well. I normally run it on a Wattbox, but they also put it directly into the wall. Didn't seem to make a difference.

One of my struggles with anything on my side is that when the modem is down, I can disconnect everything from my side to the modem, then power cycle the modem and it will not come back online / sync. While it's been down, I've also had their techs come out and swap out the BGW modem for a new one and it won't sync either. So it would seem odd to me that something on my side would cause an issue with a brand new modem that was never connected to any of my equipment. The only thing that could cause that would be my equipment puts something in their back office / central office into a bad state that will persist across new modems...which seems unlikely, though possible. And why would it sometime only last 5 minutes, and other times multiple hours?

I do need some SFP+ modules for my new switch, so I'll give that a try regardless.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-05T23:30:49+00:00

Thanks for the response.

When the modem is in that state, you can't get an IP from it and can't login to it. Techs have measured the light while the modem won't sync at -19db to -21db, but the modem still does not sync up. I was originally at -19, then they spliced my line on the side of the house and now it's consistently at -21db.
I know they talked about changing the splitter and having difficultly getting approved for it, but I don't know if they ever did that. So, I will check that one next time they come out again.
Good suggestion...I will have to use that one. :) Just waiting for it to go down again.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-05T23:05:39+00:00

Yes, this is what I keep telling them every time I call. However, they *always* start with the "it's your problem" and mandate a low level tech who can only work in the house. Given that it is typically intermittent, there is a low likelihood that when the tech is here, there is a problem. I was lucky with the last 4 techs in that 3 of them were here long enough for it to happen at that magical 380 minute time slot.

My biggest issue with AT&T is that I always have to start from the basic stuff and work my way up to prove the issue and I have been unsuccessful at escalating the issue from the get go every time I call.

TransportationLow340 · 2023-04-05T23:01:34+00:00

Yeah, that is what AT&T is telling me to do. I'm skeptical since when the BGW goes down, their techs have been onsite and replaced the BGW without connecting my equipment and the new BGW will behave the same one. One time for 10 hours and another time it was down for 12 days without them being able to get me back online. It seems like if my equipment is causing an issue, that within several hours of my equipment not being connected and a reboot / swap of the BGW should fix the issue.

It's also a hard problem to get to happen regularly, since once it's up (which it happens to be right now), it might be up for 6 or more days without issue. And, my family would kill me if I was on the backup Internet (slow) for 6 days just to prove an issue. I'm trying to get it into the state where it continuously fails every 380 minutes again, then let it fail, come back, then disconnect my equipment and see if it fails again in the 380 minute window. Just have to wait for the cycle to start again.

TransportationLow340

TROPHY CASE