Audio Clipping With Any Music Program

D

DaCoOlNeSs

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Jun 8, 2004
Messages
1,474
Hey folks, you might have seen my posts from another thread on a similar subject... Except now it is far worse.

Whenever I am listening to music via any program, iTunes, Foobar, WMP it will clip the audio. This happens regardless of any EQ settings, or what is set in the creative control panel. Randomly it will sort of insert a crackle sound and it is making me not want to listen to music anymore! Does anyone have an idea of what is going on?


AMD Athlon X2 3800+
2GB RAM
Nvidia 7800GT
Creative X-Fi Xtreme Audio with latest drivers
Dlink 1GBps PCI Ethernet card (I am not sure of the exact model)
Windows 7 X64
 
Clipping is the result of either the pre-amp or amp running out of power and giving you audible distortion. Like turning up a stock car radio too loud.

What you are describing sounds like something a bit different.

I know a number of people who solved your noise issue (started back with Vista) by moving to a newer sound card using the PCIE express or PCIE express X 1 slots.

Radical thought, but try a non Creative card.
 
BillR said:
A quick Google, this is a common problem, pages and pages of the same complaint, same company, almost all Vista and up.

http://www.google.com/search?q=crac...-us&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&startIndex=&startPage=1
Click to expand...


Look around in the forum...that people out of ignornace blame Creative(because it the hip thing to do) dosn't mean they are right.

Unlike people that actually test their stuff and not just use a google search in a bad and misleading manner:
http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1466878

From the very FIRST page in this subforum.
Culprit = to little Vcore..not Creative.

And don't even get me started on NVIDIA's chipset woes, that people blamed Creative for too :rolleyes:
 
Okay well I tried taking out the XFI and it still happened with the onboard sound card.

I also tried that app that was linked (the latency checker) and it turns out all good, and assuming it was related to not enough Vcore, how come it does it when I am doing nothing at all? I don't have a virus scanner or any other system hoggers running. This is why I am at a loss.
 
What motherboard are you using? Your quoted specs don't match your sig; but many older Nforce 2/3 era boards have issues with PCI latencies and how different video card vendors set them in their VGA BIOS. You can try swapping your 7800 out for something else to see if it helps. Alternatively do the same with expansion cards. Everything has it's own latency (PCI should be 32, AGP 255, but some devices hog the bus). Network and video capture cards have been known to do this.
 
You know, I often hear clipping when the sound level in the Windows mixer is turned-up too high. I got clipping on my new Windows 7 install because the volume was turned-up to max, and caused distortion.

Try dropping the volume level in the mixer (applications and global), and see if that doesn't fix things.
 
My apologies, it's been so long since I was on [H] Forums that was almost 5 computers ago! It is updated now.

The chipset isn't Nforce 2/3 generation, so that won't be an issue. Unless this chipset has that problem.

I have tried dropping the volume levels of everything to no avail as well. So that is not it.
 
I've had this problem numerous times on XP and there have been times when I gave up trying to fix it except with very simple solutions.
When all else fails, reduce the volume of Wave, midi etc or permanently lower the PCs output volume, mixer volume... whichever helps.

My favourite fix that worked most often is to uninstall all audio drivers and reboot, re-install drivers.
Run a Driver Cleaner in between if that fails.
This resets internal gain controls which are often what ends up saturating as they are difficult to adjust from drivers etc.
I have found some games could screw the internal gain levels semi permanently if the game crashed, there were many strange causes.

Be sure that what you are listening to has not been badly recorded, ie it isnt saturated.
I was fooled by this when I badly ripped a CD and thought I'd stuffed my Windows audio levels again.
 
Well I tried the reducing all the sound outputs in Windows, and even at barely audible it still clips.

I also tried reinstalling all my drivers last night to no avail, it somehow made it even worse!

Also the music being listened to is not the issue, since it is 100% log FLAC rips, or even V0 MP3 files. Any song will do this, and they have never had a problem before.
 
Try plugging earphones directly to the card to see if its your amp having a problem.
 
Sorry for the delay, been busy at work the past while.


Anyways, plugged into the computer directly it still does it, so the MS40s are out of the question. Any other suggestions?
 
The NForce4 series motherboards are also prone to crackling issues, sorry.
Some more info:
http://csd.dficlub.org/forum/showthread.php?t=9221

There is also a possibility that you dont have any of the issues others have reported but actually have a faulty board.
Try a new install of Windows on a spare drive to see if it helps, give different drivers a shot too.
 
Nenu said:
The NForce4 series motherboards are also prone to crackling issues, sorry.
Some more info:
http://csd.dficlub.org/forum/showthread.php?t=9221
Click to expand...

Dammit. Looks like i fall in this category. Installed W7 over the weekend and now my X-fi XtremeGamer sounds like ass. Worked fine in XP on same system. My onboard Audio is fine with W7 and XP. I think I might be putting a sound card on my FS thread soon, unless I find a better solution.
 
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