distracting echo with more than two or three people on WebEX call.

[lfazen]

Every time I have more than two or three people on my WebEX meeting there is a distracting echo at each person's device.  Most are on desk tops but some on iphone or ipad.   I can stop the echo by muting everyone but the speaker but then there is no way to have a discussion with everyone muted.  What is the problem here? 

When I am on Zoom meetings with other groups this echo is not present.

What to do?

[kndskelton]

How did your participants join your session? Do you see call-in user in the participant list while the names of the participants are showing? If so maybe they dialed in first the joined with their computer audio. This appears to be very common.

[lfazen]

I still don’t understand. When I log into a WebEX session I am hosting, one of the last things I do to begin session is “turn on Video” and “turn on computer audio” while I see my name on the screen. Is there another way to do this?
Do I need to use headphones? Does everyone need headphones?
Thank you,
Louis

[Fritz_H]

@lfazen 

I think @kndskelton was talking about people who join a meeting by phone AND by computer (which does not seem to be very reasonable to me...).

By doing so, the voice of a participant may be recorded by the phone AND by the microphone of the Computer (Notebook).
This may cause this unwanted echo-effect.

[kndskelton]

Thank you for explaining my thoughts better Fritz_H. Was trying to post my response before I was distracted. 

Yes, for some reason when a participant sees a phone number to call in.. they'll join by phone then join using the computer. What happens then results in the paricipant joining with audio twice.. once by phone (Call-in User) and by computer. If you instruct your participants to click the "Join" meeting button and select how they wish to attend with audio.. either computer or call-in this is more efficient. If they plan to join by phone they'd click call-in or call me.. Cisco will pop a window open with all the call-in information;; phone number, Meeting ID# and Participant ID. once entered Webex will know how that participant joined with audio and show their name and if they're on the phone or computer in the participant list. Also.. WebEx will then allow you to use the controls to mute and unmute your phone.. overriding computer audio settings. (Hope that makes better sense).

[Fritz_H]

@lfazen 

I guess you know, that the effect is caused by the microphone picking up the sound from the speakers (nearby?).
Since this echo may be caused by just one single meeting-participant but be heard by all:
* Did you try to mute them individually to find out who causes the issue?
Webex (-Teams) offers several audio-options: one of them is "music mode": this reduces the audio-processing/optimization to a minimum.
* Perhaps one of you enabled this option by mistake?
Another Audio-option refers to background-noise removal.  I guess this options wants to be checked...