Okay, so either my ears got hyper sensitive somehow to nuances in audio frequency or my WXA-50 got damaged.
I have a question to the owners of this power amp. Does your amp produce static noise of any kind on passive speakers?
My Desk Setup: Mac Mini M1 + WXA-50 + 3020i Pair (with 3.5mm to RCA & Nakamichi banana plugs w/ 12 gauge spool)
This afternoon I quite literally heard the static noise, for the first time. I thought it was an outside noise and ignored it at first, but then when I went close to the speakers, turns out there was indeed a noise coming out of the twitter. It boggles my mind as to why this is the first time I'm listening to the static. I've been using this since August 2020 and at the time I was in a very quiet place too, compared to where I am right now. But never before; weird. So, here are things that I observed, and did to find out why it might be happening (while playing nothing).
1. It's barely audible from normal desktop sitting position but the noise is there; if you are in a quiet room and wxa50 has -10db or higher, you'll hear the noise. Specially if you switch to bluetooth from aux, you'll feel the speakers suddenly went quietER.
2. The noise increases as I turn up the volume on the wxa-50 and it's not the aux-rca cable either cause I unplugged the aux cable from mac mini. Interestingly, the noise is tripled when there is nothing connected in the RCA input. But bluetooth input the noise is significantly reduced, like 1/3rd. And for optical it's the quietest (like almost non existent) So it's not the fault of the speakers either I guess.
3. I turned off every electrical equipment including lights in my house to see if this issue is due to an electrical fault somewhere else. But the noise remains. For the past 5 months, I've noticed that sometimes when a fan or light in another room is turned off, there is a noticeable crack/pop in my speaker. Not exceptionally loud but loud enough to startle you when you are sitting alone in a quiet room.
The fact that the speakers are not dead silent even when my computer is turned off is bothering me. Again, the noise isn't too much to interfere with daily tasks but with aux input it's really annoying me, and I can't figure out why I haven't noticed this before. If I touch the 3.5mm end of the 3.5mm to rca cable (rca connected to the amp), there is a strong tingling/vibrations.
I'm using an outlet from the wall that is grounded and using a Honeywell surge protector that shows "Protected" in a green dot. Despite that, I discovered this noise today.
Even right now, I have the max volume on WXA-50, and nothing playing from the computer side - there is a significant hiss / static noise going on.
What is this? And how do I get rid of this?
EDIT:
I just came from a friend's house where I took both the amp and a 3020i speaker.
I tested the amp on a Edifier passive speaker - SAME THING. Hissing noise when AUX is selected on my amp despite the fact - there was no input at all on the amp. And tested S/PDIF as an input - no noise there. Tested different outlets in his house also - always same results. So I'm quite confident that it's not the speakers & the noise is being caused by the amp and the amp only.
Now the question remains - Is this level of noise omnipresent in all Yamaha amps of similar kind or should I look for a service centre?