Windows 10: Unable to set Bluetooth earphones as stereo

Hello. I'm having an issue with my bluetooth earphones. The sound is very bad, its choppy, stuttering etc. I've done some research and it seems like the issue is that the earphones are connected and working as the "Hands-Free", which is the mode you need to use when using the earphones + mic. However the sound is awful in this mode and I need to set the stereo mode to be as default. Unfortunately im unable to do that because when I attempt to connect my earphones via stereo nothing happens. I am also unable to set the stereo mode as default because its greyed out... I've tried pretty much

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Why does Spotify take control of my Bluetooth earphones' stereo output?

I own Bluetooth earphones, which I have paired with my Windows 10 laptop.

I can happily listen to audio from various different sources, until I play music through Spotify. Once I do, Spotify seems to completely hijack the stereo output device. If I pause the music and attempt to listen to another source (such as YouTube), I can no longer hear the audio playback despite seeing the amplitude bar move in the Windows sound settings. However, if I resume the Spotify music whilst the other sound source is still outputting, I can hear the other sound in the background of Spotify's output. Without restarting the earphones, I have found two ways of restoring the ability for other applications to output sound:

• If I right click on the earphones' Hands-Free device in the Windows playback device list and select "Test", I briefly hear the test output via the Hands-Free device and then suddenly the stereo output from the non-Spotify application continues.
  
• If I close Spotify whilst music is playing (and so the other app's audio can be heard in the background), the audio from the non-Spotify application can be heard again. However, if I close it whilst Spotify is paused, the non-Spotify audio does not resume.
  

I've found a hotfix in which disabling "Show desktop overlay when using media keys" from the Spotify settings prevents this issue from occuring, but what is causing this strange behaviour?

Note: I've disabled the ability for applications to take exclusive control of both the "Stereo" and "Hands-Free" playback devices for my earphones, to no avail.

 

Bluetooth Earphones Issue

Hello,

Thank you for writing to Microsoft Community Forums.

Glad to know that you were able to fix the issue. We truly appreciate for the details and, time and effort that you have taken to work on this issue.

However, there could be an issue with the drivers on the computer, where the drivers are getting conflicted and not recognizing the Bluetooth device properly and you are unable to hear the audio as it was supposed to, we will look into this for you.

• Could you please try using the Bluetooth device with a different computer and check if it works?
  

Please unplug the wired headphones and connect only the Bluetooth earphones and check if that makes any difference.

Please follow the below mentioned methods and check if it helps.

Method 1:

As you are unable to see the Bluetooth headphones after pairing to the computer, I suggest you to run the Bluetooth troubleshooter from the settings. Follow the steps below:

• Press Windows logo key + I, to open
  Settings.
  
• Select Update & Security.
  
• Click Troubleshoot and run the Bluetooth troubleshooting.
  

If the issue still persists, please follow method 2.

Method 2: update drivers.

The Bluetooth drivers could be out dated, hence un-pair the device from setting and update the Bluetooth drivers and check if that helps. Please refer the article

Update drives in Windows 10, expand Bluetooth device and follow the instruction from the above article.

Hope it helps.

Regards,

Noor Azam S

Microsoft Community – Moderator

 

Bluetooth earphones are suddenly disconnecting when Wi-Fi is on


I have a strange issue that's suddenly developed. I purchased a pair of bluetooth Philips earphones last month and I was able to use them with my Lenovo laptop shortly after with no issues.

The only issue was that I had to keep on removing the device and repairing to connect. The 'Connect' icon in the Action Centre doesn't work. That was a minor issue; however now my earphones are unable to work with the laptop unless I switch off the Wi-Fi adapter. They either take two or three times to pair and when successful, I cannot switch the playback device from my speakers to the Bluetooth stereo earphones until I disable the Wi-Fi.

It's not the earphones themselves as they work with my tablet and phones perfectly fine. I believe it may have something to do with an unscheduled and unwanted update from Windows 10 yesterday. I thought I had turned them off but apparently not because they were almost halfway yesterday.

The other explanation is that there's some inteference from my router as I was trying to upgrade speeds by switching to 5GHz on the router page but since my laptop didn't support that, I gave up and switched back to 2.4.

What could the issue here be?