PreSonus Forums

Hello,

I just purchased the Audiobox USB 96. This thing is picking up radio signals around my place like crazy.

When I plug in my headphones, I can faintly here a radio station. When I plug in my guitar cable, it is so loud and clear that it is totally unusable. It's as if I'm sitting in my car listening to this radio station.

I took my entire setup back to the store to troubleshoot and everything worked just fine there. They sold me a power strip with EMI/RFI filtering in hopes it would help. It did not - still listening to the radio clear as day through this thing.

Can anyone provide any insights here? This has been pretty frustrating.

RF noise usually is a result of bad cables. Check all your cables and test with new ones. Since your unit was good outside of your home, it's most likely your cables.

I wish it was that easy. I've tested with 3 different cables, all brand-new. The cable we successfully tested with at the store was the same that I'm having issues with at home.

Is your cable modem or router close to your audio box?


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sangamc wroteIs your cable modem or router close to your audio box?


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Not right beside it by any means but I do live in a small studio so it's tough to get a lot of distance. It's probably max like 25 feet away at all times.

I had the same issue with my audio box for years. I could clearly hear a radio station all the time. Even moved to a new town during this period and the problem followed.

It ended up being my cable modem. Moved it to another room and the problem went away. Tried moving it back to be sure and the problem returned with the cable modem in the same room.

This can also be caused by lack of grounding. Try grounding the sleeve of the guitar jack to start with. Run the ground wire along the usb cable to avoid ground loops. You can experiment with other input sleeves/ground pins to find the one that gives best results.

sangamc wroteI had the same issue with my audio box for years. I could clearly hear a radio station all the time. Even moved to a new town during this period and the problem followed.

It ended up being my cable modem. Moved it to another room and the problem went away. Tried moving it back to be sure and the problem returned with the cable modem in the same room.

Thanks for taking the time. I literally just took my setup to the stairwell in my building, nothing around and...same problem.

SwitchBack wroteThis can also be caused by lack of grounding. Try grounding the sleeve of the guitar jack to start with. Run the ground wire along the usb cable to avoid ground loops. You can experiment with other input sleeves/ground pins to find the one that gives best results.

I'm a complete layman...could you expand a bit on how to ground the sleeve and avoiding ground loops?

Shielding is way more effective when it is connected to ground. Simply run a copper wire between the barrel of your instrument input jack (or pin 1 of a xlr mic input) and the ground terminal of a wall socket. When there isn’t a grounded wall socket available then metal piping for tap water or central heating can be an alternative. Before making any permanent connections you can MacGyver a connection to test if it’s effective.

You get a ground loop when a unit’s ground wires and power leads are not bundled together. Space between the wires works as an antenna which can cause RF noise issues. Wrapping the ground wire and the USB cable or taping them together should avoid this problem.

When you use a laptop then the laptop (or its power supply) can be the source of the RF noise too. So you can also try if grounding the laptop case makes the noise go away.

SwitchBack wrote Simply run a copper wire between the barrel of your instrument input jack (or pin 1 of a xlr mic input) and the ground terminal of a wall socket.

Not sure if giving this piece of advice to a layman is a great idea. If he(or someone with same issues, like me) doesn't know which "hole" is the ground.... well..

..notice he hasn't replied since...