Dell posts a warning to users using VLC

[jassony]

Hey
My new Inspiron Dell laptop has void speakers warranty, Due to the usage of VLC media player.
There is an active discussion also going on there saying
http://en.community.dell.com/support-fo ... 92918.aspx WARNING! installing VLC Media Player voids your speaker warranty!!!

Is there any Specific reason for this or any action being taken on this. Any guidance/support will be helpful.

[Jean-Baptiste Kempf]

Dell is lying.

[Frankm999]

That is because Dell offers CHEAP speakers solution and therefore needs some reasons when they blow up so that they don't have to honor the warranty.

[topwebch]

VLC is a safe and well-known great software, so i didn't understand why dell is telling such bullshit ?
i think also that legaly they can not cancel your warranty like this

[drewkeller]

I"m not sure how VLC internally handles gain based on the volume setting, but I have noticed that setting the volume in VLC above 100% sometimes causes distortion. It depends on levels in the source and also sometimes how different hardware devices handle gain. Of course, some sources already have distortion in them (bad recording, bad editing, etc).

I've noticed a lot more distortion can be caused by with certain volume settings in MPC-HC.

Dell's explanation is technically correct. If an amplifier is in clipping mode, it uses more power than if it's not clipping (can be demonstrated mathematically). Whether that exceeds the power an amplifier can handle depends on how the manufacturer rated their amplifier. Since speakers are often selected with ratings near the ratings of the amplifier, this means the amp may be outputting more power than expected. So the speakers may be seeing more power than they were selected for (or maybe rated for).

Modern amplifier chips generally have thermal limiting and other limiting that would prevent damage to itself from too much power. Speakers are usually very simple can be damaged by driving more power into them than they are rated for.

You would hope that everyone would know what distortion due to overdriving sounds like and have sense to avoid it, but alas that is not the case.

[Phoenixrising72]

Thanks for this info I lowered the volume and the distortion for now seems gone. I would much rather use VLC than Windows Media Player it is much better. Don't know why Dell got involved it almost sounds like an issue on their end they don't want to admit.

[daaceking]

Must be embarrassing for dell. I've never had speakers gone bad. Even for laptops with bass boost. Clipping shouldn't be a problem. Get dynaudio for good measure. Heh heh

[drewkeller]

Part of my job involves working with loudspeakers and design of their amplifiers (ok, it's actually just a small part of my job). Overdriving these speakers doesn't usually cause them to fail right away, but they do fail sometime during the 72 hour endurance test I run.

[Jean-Baptiste Kempf]

I"m not sure how VLC internally handles gain based on the volume setting, but I have noticed that setting the volume in VLC above 100% sometimes causes distortion. It depends on levels in the source and also sometimes how different hardware devices handle gain. Of course, some sources already have distortion in them (bad recording, bad editing, etc).

I've noticed a lot more distortion can be caused by with certain volume settings in MPC-HC.

Dell's explanation is technically correct. If an amplifier is in clipping mode, it uses more power than if it's not clipping (can be demonstrated mathematically). Whether that exceeds the power an amplifier can handle depends on how the manufacturer rated their amplifier. Since speakers are often selected with ratings near the ratings of the amplifier, this means the amp may be outputting more power than expected. So the speakers may be seeing more power than they were selected for (or maybe rated for).

Modern amplifier chips generally have thermal limiting and other limiting that would prevent damage to itself from too much power. Speakers are usually very simple can be damaged by driving more power into them than they are rated for.

You would hope that everyone would know what distortion due to overdriving sounds like and have sense to avoid it, but alas that is not the case.

Sure, VLC output can saturate, but you can saturate doing the same by using your MP3 into audacity or by listening to Metal instead of Céline Dion.

VLC just uses the Windows APIs to output sound. At worse, you'll get a "castle" wave.

The truth is that their soundcard outputs power that are above what their speaker can handle. And this is their fault.

Maybe they should put on the warranty that one can only listen to "Céline Dion" and classical music...

[drewkeller]

I imagine Celine Dion has compression, so would not really be any different from Metallica. Classical music would not have compression. But theoretically, any waveform with a non-zero amplitude could be made to clip.

I saw some funny comments on some speakers on Amazon where one of the questions was whether the speakers would be able to play music by Prince. I still had it in my viewing history: http://www.amazon.com/Prince-Prince-the ... B0027VT6V4

[Jean-Baptiste Kempf]

I imagine Celine Dion has compression, so would not really be any different from Metallica. Classical music would not have compression. But theoretically, any waveform with a non-zero amplitude could be made to clip.

You know what I meant