I just got an iPad Air today and love it, but the speaker is kind of bothering me. I don't know if this is true for every iPad Air but at times the speaker quality is horrible. I am not picky with my devices and I am happy with everything else but the speakers just sound horrible. It sounds fine when I put my hand over it or when I press it up against something but otherwise it just sounds terrible. I don't even know how to describe it but it just seems to be at higher volumes. Has anyone else had any speaker issues? If so, if you exchanged it did you get one with better speaker quality?
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iPad iPad Air Speaker
- Thread starter anp77
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They are tiny speaks in a tiny housing that don't face the user. Out of the 3 generations of iPads that I've owned, none of them had speaker quality worth writing home about.
Agreed. It's always been an issue. They fire away from the user and aren't that good on top of that. My friends android phone at work is 10x better for sound than my Air and I always wonder WTF?
It just sounds like the sound has trouble coming out of the iPad and gets stuck in the metal, it's surprisingly bad. I would expect a little better speaker quality from such an expensive device, my mom has a Kindle Fire HD and the speakers are better on that! I can live with it but I'll probably have to buy some external speakers for when I don't want to use headphones.
They aren't as good as most laptop speakers, but compared to the other iPads I've owned - iPad and iPad 3 - they are way better.
The speakers on my Air sound remarkably better when listening in portrait mode. When I turn the iPad to landscape mode it is almost like they are muffled. I guess "I'm not holding it right". 
Seriously though the speakers on mine are decent and I have no complaints.
Seriously though the speakers on mine are decent and I have no complaints.So now I have played with it more and when the speaker is pushed up against clothing it sounds better than when it's not. But when the iPad flipped over and I'm not holding it it sounds really good. I'm not sure what it is but when I hold it the sound quality is just horrible. I guess I'll just have to use headphones if I am holding it or an external speaker. Everything else about the Air is amazing!
The one thing I really don't like about the ipad air over my nexus 7 is the speaker. It is really that bad. No stereo separation what so ever. The 2nd gen nexus really had much better sound. I had zero complaints (no, there was no clipping or distortion at lower level, just doesn't happen).
There is no reason why Apple can't put a second speaker on top near the camera. In landscape mode it would sound so much better. When you hold the n7 a certain way the sound is actually crisper and seemingly more amplified as your cupping the speakers.
There is no reason why Apple can't put a second speaker on top near the camera. In landscape mode it would sound so much better. When you hold the n7 a certain way the sound is actually crisper and seemingly more amplified as your cupping the speakers.
Not that it's a cheap solution whatsoever, but I hate the sound coming out of all my mobile electronics (iPhone 4S, GS4, iPad, etc). So if I'm going to listen to something for a longer period of time, like watch a long video or listen to music, I'll connect one of them to my Jambox speaker. Sounds a lot better than the built-in speakers on those devices.