So your headphones are making a hiss, crackle, or some other sound you definitely didn’t order from Spotify. Annoying. Especially if you paid more for the headphones than your neighbor did for their used Golf. Don’t worry—most of the time it’s a perfectly normal phenomenon or something that’s easy to fix.
What causes hissing?
Active noise cancelling (ANC) is essentially a small microphone that listens to the environment and generates an anti-noise signal. This process always produces a little background noise—that’s physics, not a defect. Every ANC headphone in the world does this, no matter the brand. Sony, Bose, Valco—all of them.
But there are cases where the noise isn’t small at all and sounds like someone crumpling a candy wrapper next to your ear. In that case, it might be one of these:
- Firmware is outdated. Updates often fine‑tune ANC in particular.
- The environment confuses the microphone. Windy weather, a gym’s air conditioning, or other strong airflow can throw the ANC microphone off. This sounds like crackling or sputtering.
- The earpads don’t seal properly. If the pad doesn’t sit evenly against your ear, ANC tries to compensate for the leak and the result is noise.
- There’s an actual fault in the device. Rare, but possible. Moisture or dirt may have gotten into the microphone.
How to fix it
- Update the firmware. Download the Valco app (Android / iOS), connect the headphones, and check for updates. This is always the first step. Always.
- Try without ANC. Turn off noise cancelling and listen. If the hiss disappears, the issue is specifically related to the ANC function, not the headphone drivers.
- Do a reset. Plug in the AUX cable and unplug it—this resets the headphones’ settings. On older models this surprisingly fixes a lot of issues.
- Check the earpads. Do they fit snugly? Have they worn flat? Poor pads let sound leak in and ANC gets confused. You can order new pads from our online store.
- Test in a different environment. If the crackling only happens at the gym but not at home, the culprit is most likely the air conditioning or some other airflow. The ANC microphone reacts to wind like a weather reporter in a storm.
- Try different ANC levels. If your headphones have adjustable ANC (VMK25, VMK25.2, NL25), try a lower level. Noise cancelling at full strength produces more background hiss.
If that doesn’t help
If the update and reset don’t help and the hiss is audible even with ANC turned off, there may be a hardware fault. Send us a message at info@valco.fi – include your order number and preferably a short video or audio clip where the issue can be heard. Our service team in Kajaani will sort it out. We repair devices—we don’t throw them away.
A little ANC background hiss is therefore normal—it’s the price you pay for not having to listen to your coworker’s phone calls. But if the noise sounds like there’s a hamster family living in your headphones, get in touch and we’ll sort it out.
