V-Moda Crossfade II Wireless Audio is Distorted or Intermittent

When you're listening to music with your V-Moda Crossfade II Wireless, does the audio suddenly start crackling, cutting out, or just sounds off? Use this troubleshooting guide to help diagnose why.

Bluetooth is convenient but it does not love competition. If you are in a room full of other wireless devices, or if your phone is in another room, the connection can become unstable and the audio quality drops with it. This is probably the most common cause of wireless crackling and dropouts.

• Move closer to your phone or computer and see if things improve.
• Turn off Bluetooth on any nearby devices you are not actively using.
• Go into your device's Bluetooth settings, forget the headphones, and pair them again from scratch.

The Crossfade II Wireless is rated for about 10 meters of range. Past that point you are likely to run into trouble, especially through walls.

If you are plugged in with a cable and the audio sounds crackly or keeps cutting out on one side, the 3.5mm jack is usually the first thing to check. Lint and dust get packed in there over time, especially if you keep your headphones in a bag, and eventually they start messing with the connection.

• Clean the jack gently with a dry cotton swab or one with a small amount of isopropyl alcohol on it.
• Try a quick burst of compressed air to clear out anything loose inside.
• Plug in a different cable to figure out whether the problem is the cable or the jack itself.

Be careful not to use anything metallic to dig around in there. It is very easy to damage the contacts and make things a lot worse.

A low battery can actually cause audio problems before the headphones die completely. When the battery gets critically low, the wireless signal gets shaky and the audio starts to break up as a result. It is easy to overlook this one if you are not paying attention to the battery level.

• Charge the headphones fully and then test the audio again.
• Keep an eye out for a single red flash on the indicator light. That is the headphones letting you know they are nearly empty.

You should be getting around 14 hours per charge on these. If they are running out much sooner than that, the battery may have worn down and need to be replaced [see our replacement guide].

Cables go through a lot of wear and tear. They get yanked at the connector, stuffed into bags, and bent at odd angles over and over. Eventually the wires inside start to break down even if the outside looks fine. Some cheaper third party cables also do not work properly with the headphone's built in remote, which can introduce noise or cause one channel to drop.

• Look closely at both ends of the cable, especially right where it meets the connector, for any fraying or kinking.
• If you still have the original V-Moda SpeakEasy cable, swap it in and see if the problem goes away.
• A basic 3-pole TRS cable without a remote is a good way to test whether the remote circuitry is causing the issue.

If you have worked through everything above and the audio still sounds distorted no matter what you connect to, the speaker driver inside the headphone may be damaged. This can happen gradually from listening at very high volumes for long periods, or suddenly from a drop or impact.

• Turn the volume down low and check if the distortion is still there. A damaged driver will sound bad even at low volumes.
• Try the headphones with a few different devices to make sure the problem is not coming from the source.