Many of the following ideal settings, hardware, and best
practices have distanced music lessons in mind, but may apply to
other areas of your music study.
Internet and Computer Setup
Access to reliable high-speed internet is the most important
factor for a successful remote lesson experience—
At a minimum, it is recommended that you have at least a
1.5MB internet connection for high-quality video chatting,
regardless of platform.
It is easiest to use a laptop computer rather than a mobile
device.
It is recommended that a wired connection is used rather than
WiFi.
If your computer does not have an ethernet port, a simple
USB-Ethernet adapter can be
purchased from Amazon for as low as $13.
You will need a
CAT6 ethernet cable to connect your internet router to
your computer (into the USB-Ethernet adapter first if
necessary).
Audio Hardware
Using headphones/earbuds minimizes feedback or echo. Echo is
caused by your microphone picking up the other user’s audio
coming out of your speaker (at a delay) and sending it back. The
quality of the headphones is not important. Let your budget
determine your preference.
A high-quality external microphone can improve your sound for
the other person, but in some cases a cheap microphone can be
worse than your computer’s built-in microphone. Here are a couple
recommendations—
Note: Additional features were added in version 5.2.2, released
Sept 1, 2020. Be sure to update to the latest version of Zoom
before attempting to change the following settings.
In the preferences pane—
Video Menu
We do not recommend checking “Enable HD” nor “Touch up my
appearance” as it causes significant resource drain.
Under video please check “Mirror my video,” which only
affects your own view.
Audio Menu
If you have a particularly soft instrument (guitar, e.g.)
you may wish to un-check the box that says “Automatically
adjust microphone volume” and increase the input volume (on a
slider).
Suppress Background Noise = Low
Click on the “ADVANCED” button in the lower right and
choose these settings—
Check the box up top that says “Show in-meeting
option to ‘Enable Original Sound’ from microphone.”
During any meeting be sure to make sure this is
engaged in the upper left drop down menu, which is
not seen until the meeting begins.
Check “Disable echo cancellation”
Check “High fidelity music mode
Uncheck “Use stereo audio”
Virtual Background
We do not recommend using a virtual background. (Check
“none”). It tends to cut off edges of objects, which is not
ideal for music lessons.
If you missed the “Mirror my video” setting in the video
menu, go ahead and make sure it is checked here.