Ok now more confused than ever! Last night for the first time ever, just when I was thinking "why do I bother to wear a headset when I can't speak to anyone?" All of a sudden I heard a guy speak and saw his speech icon appear! I didn't even know it was on the lower right side of the screen! His mic was "broken" and by that I mean it sounded like he was under water, but I spoke back to him and my speech icon appeared for the first time ever! It was one guy, in one of twenty five games last night, and it never occurred again. I have changed no settings at all, and it's definitely not a loose connection or blu tooth issue because voice mail and parties work right off the bat as they should.
Johnnysaurus, to me this proves it's an issue with the game or Xbox live? Oh for the record it was Eastern server around 2200 GMT.
any ideas? From the messages above it seems I'm not the only guy with this problem, but does seem I'm affected worse than anyone else!