Weird iPhone audio/headphone jack problem - Need Help

[jersey10]

Yesterday, I dropped my iPhone 3G on concrete, causing some big cracks in the glass. For at least the first few hours, however, everything still seemed to be working fine. Now, however, I have been experiencing a weird audio problem that seems to be limited to the headphone jack. Specifically, whenever I try to listen to anything via headphones, only the background audio can be heard - no dialogue on TV shows and no lead vocals on music. Everything sounds fine when played via the iPhone's speaker. I have tried several different video/audio sources and several different pairs of headphones, so it definitely seems that the problem is with the headphone jack.

It must have happened as a result of the drop, but I can't understand why it would have worked fine for several hours afterwards. The only other thing that has occurred with my iPhone recently is I had to do a restore a few days ago (prior to the fall), but I believe audio was working fine after that. And, again, audio sounds fine when played via the iPhone's speaker.

Anyone know what could be causing this problem and how to solve it?

 

[RandomGuy26]

Hardware

It most certainly is a hardware issue.. a connection weakened by the fall must have gone off..

this happens to me sometimes when i connect my headphone jack to an input jack in external speakers using a faulty cable..

i have to insert the cable several times to get a good connection and hear all of audio, rather than only the background..

mind you this doesn't happen with the same speakers when i use a Good connector cable

 

[jersey10]

I suspect you're right. Thanks for responding. If anyone on these problems has suffered a similar problem and can tell me how much it cost them to get fixed, that would be very helpful.

 

[Mr J]

I had this problem, but after a bit of Googling came up with the solution. No insurance claim, no service required! Just a paperclip. God, I love geeks.

http://mike.meessen.biz/blog/?p=140

To summarise:

The weird sound through the headphone jack is caused by the plug not being fully inserted. To quote Mike: "Right and left channels cancel each other out and the only thing left is the difference between them, which is usually some weird reverb’ish sound. Lead vocals are usually gone when that happens and the phase is totally screwed."

If you get a light and look carefully down into the jack socket, you may well find what I did: a load of dust and pocket fluff that had been building up over many months. I used a paperclip to carefully scoop this out and hey presto! No more weird sounds! It works fine again.

Never thought I'd say this, but thank goodness it took my insurance company half an hour to pick up the phone yesterday, or I'd have already sent phone off to be replaced!

 

[Mattj0127]

Great advice re paper clip. I was on a train and couldn't even get the headphone jack to go in the socket. I read this thread and used the plastic toothpick on my Swiss Army knife to get loads of pocket fluff out of the socket. It now works fine!