Sound prob, Need help

Been having sound problems the last two weeks in games and while watching films on my 3 month old Sound blaster z, I get cracking and popping noises that is driving me mad and has made gaming unplayable for me.

Tried everything from reinstalling Win 10 to updating drivers/Checking Bios/Cables, Removing one speaker at a time and the noises are still there, Logitech 5.1 speaker set up (1 year old).

I even tried removing the card and going though the on board sound but I still had the popping noises so its not a faulty card.

I am now at a loss on what else I can do to sort the problem out except maybe buying new speakers but I am reluctant to do this as I have recently spent a small fortune on a MSI 1080X and a top of the range G Synch so funds are a bit low at the moment.

Do you guys know of anything else I can try before I throw the towel in ?

Thanks in advance for any advice you can give me.

Have you tried moving the sound card to a different slot ? was this happening before you got the new 1080 ?

peahead said:

Have you tried moving the sound card to a different slot ? was this happening before you got the new 1080 ?

Click to expand...

Tried different slots and no I didn't have the noises before the 1080.

I was convinced it was a faulty card but I am also getting the nasty noises though the on board sound with the Z removed so I am leaning towards a recent Win 10 update that has caused the issue..

Was just about to try out my Razer headphones to see if the noise comes though but my son has stolen/borrowed them for his PS4. so will have to wait a bit as he is in a online match.

You sure it's not the 1080 causing it?

Wouldn't re-installing Windows 10 have left it in a state, where it was pre whatever update that you think may have caused the issue?

Could be updates, but also could be the 1080 causing it. Did the problems start after getting the 1080, or did you have the GPU some time before these problems started?

finally sorted out my sound problem by re-installing the drivers that came with the Z.

What is still confusing me was I was still getting the static and popping noises with the Z removed and using the on-board sound.

The only thing I can think of is these issues started after I had the Win 10 Anniversary update so maybe that was the cause, Anyway it sounds crystal now and I am happy it was a driver problem rather than a hardware.

Thanks for the replies