Sound stuttering issue with version 8.4.A.3.1

[Tristram]

Hello,

after updating the Walkman app to the latest version I've been experiencing some sound stuttering problems, which seem to affect the application's performance only when the phone (Xperia E1) is in standby mode, with the display darkened. Every now and then the sound pauses, skips (no more than a few seconds), then restarts; everything is fine for two or three minutes before it happens again. I don't know how to describe it exactly; not knowing how the applications works, I'd say it sounds like it's rebuffering. Also, the problem seems to happen only if ClearAudio+ is turned on. Deactivating all possible sound enhancements (ClearAudio+ or other manual settings) music reproduction is smooth, but sound quality is poor.

High volume levels seem to make things worse, increasing the frequency at which those glitches occur, though I'm not completely certain about this. The issue isn't easy to predict or reproduce: playing the same track twice can yield very different results: first time smooth, second time stuttering; or the other way around. My music collection is on a class 10 microSD card; it's all in MP3 format, mostly encoded using VBR at medium/high quality. I tried rebooting and deactivating stamina mode, it didn't help. Bluetooth and Wi-Fi are turned off. I don't use applications for Facebook, Google+, GMail and similar.

Thanks for your assistance

[Jaeskit]

Hi after updating to the new version 8.4.a.3.1 my z1 still has major sound loss, i listen to dtum and bass nearly every day and the high end is fine but when the beat and bass kicks in the sound drops, it was fine on the last update so i dont understand why the new update does this, also when i turn the volume up it doesn't get any louder it only goes louder when the volume is at full, its really starting to annoy me and i wish the walkman sound quality was the same as when it ran on jelly bean, please sony can you sort this out.

[lcr]

Did anyone get back to you on this. I am facing the same issue which I found very irritating. Had a Samsung phone the last 2 years and never had an issue. 2 weeks with the Xperia and this...

[Tristram]

No, unfortunately. I ended up using another application to listen to music; I hope it's only a temporary issue, because I was really happy with the Walkman app before this update. It really seems to be a problem with the buffer size. My Xperia E1 has a Walkman button on the upper edge which allows me to pause and resume playback without looking at the display; it's very convenient, and one of the reasons that made me buy this phone. Without the Walkman app, that button is useless.