New build audio pop/crackling/scratching

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16 Oct 2006
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Hi Guys,

Just put together a new build/major upgrade and I'm suffering from audio popping/crackling/scratching from the on-board sound (toss up whether to post here or the mobo forum...). It can be made very apparent by messing around with the Windows volume slider.

Specs:
  • Asus ROG Strix X570-F mobo
  • AMD Ryzen 5800X
  • HyperX Predator 3600Mhz RAM
  • old GTX 1070
  • old Corsair HX 650w power supply
Tried a few different bios versions, few different audio drivers, tried running the RAM at 2400Mhz (apparently some issues manifest when the FCLK is being pushed a bit high); not really had much luck.
LatencyMon shows no DCP issues.

One odd thing about the driver situation: if I use the Windows built in drivers rather than the Realtek drivers, the front panel audio is better but the back panel is still affected. When using the Realtek drivers, if I tick the option to split the front+back audio streams, then the front panel is better and back panel awful; when not split, both front+back are awful.

Never experienced anything like this on the old onboard sound I was using (MSI Z87/Intel platform).

Seems like it could be hardware related, but unsure where to go from here.
 
Yeah could be a driver problem. I'm no expert but what sample rate and bit depth you set at? (Playback devices-> speaker properties -> advanced) try setting to 24bit, 192000khz.

It has the same problem with headphones and speakers?
 
I've played around with the sample rate, didn't seem to make much of a difference. I haven't tried with speakers, but have tried with two sets of headphones; both are ok elsewhere (and in the old PC).

Edit: Ok, the plot thickens, and surely confirms bios/driver issues:

Reinstalled Windows, still have the issue.
Put three YouTube videos playing at once to see if it was too many audio samples/channels/whatever playing at once being the problem - audio perfect.
Mess around with the Windows volume slider while the YT videos are playing - audio perfect.
Stop the YT videos and mess around with the Windows volume - popping/crackling back!
 
Last edited:
Yeah could be. Next time it's crackling try going into Playback devices and right click -> Disable. Then Enable it. Does the problem come back straight away?
 
Unless you happen to be bat or dog there's zero reason to go for those highest sample rates,
So just to "change variables" drop it below 100kHz or even down to 44kHz to see if it makes any difference to problem.
 
It sounds like it may be a DPC latency issue triggered by idle C states. DPC latency on my 1st gen threadripper drops when I give the cpu some moderate load, but it's idle DPC is not bad enough to be an issue anyway.

Might be worth trying to disable all the power saving features as a test.
 
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