Snap, Crackle, Crap!

S

skyline889

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Oct 15, 2007
Messages
1,368
I've been having some major problems with my sound card lately. I have an EMU 1212m output via coaxial SPDIF to an external DAC and when I left in August, the set-up was working fine. I come back, Vista installs a bunch of new crap and I suddenly get snaps and crackles every time I open a window or load an internet page. I've now updated to Windows 7 and still the problem occurs. I've tried switching PCI slots, updating the BIOS, re-installing drivers and the PatchMix DSP software several times to no avail. I've also tried the optical output on the card and have experienced the same thing. Fed up, I also tried the onboard digital out and experienced the same snap and crackle I had heard with the EMU. The only thing I have been able to find is that at extreme low video resolution (1176x664) the problem goes away; I run a 1920x1080 tv though, so obviously this isn't a real solution. Any ideas? I'm completely at a loss for what's going on and why the system suddenly stopped working properly. It would seem like a bandwidth issue but why is this cropping up only now??
 
you wouldnt happen to be running a linksys wireless card would you?
 
maybe try turning windows sound down in the sound mixer applet
my sound is set to 15 and windows sound is set to 1
 
Thanks for the help guys. Unfortunately, I'm using on-board ethernet and have turned all Windows system sounds off so I'm still not sure what's going on.
 
re-install Vista from older media, so its similar to the image you had back in August?

try analog outs from the card, still a problem?
 
Ok I don't understand what the hell was goin' on. I pulled the 9600 out, installed my old 8800GTS, then plugged the 9600 back in and now everything seems to be working ok. Keeping my fingers crossed!
 
skyline889 said:
Ok I don't understand what the hell was goin' on. I pulled the 9600 out, installed my old 8800GTS, then plugged the 9600 back in and now everything seems to be working ok. Keeping my fingers crossed!
Click to expand...

maybe your BIOS just doesn't like you? :p
 
Well the problem returned, I have figured out that the crackling completely stops while my graphics card is set to a low resolution. The crackling returns when I set it at native 1920x1200, any clue what's going on? I'm tempted to just build a new pc but I'd like to tackle the issue if I can.
 
hmm, is there anything wierd going on at the interface level? check your pci (-e) slots and pins on the cards, looks for any sort of oxidation, might be worth it to yank the motherboard and have a look at the back side, see if a critter decided it was a good place to up and die (spiders.. roaches... you get the idea)

only other things i can think of would be to try different video drivers as it seems to be video related.. also keep in mind that the video cards on a pci-e bus share memory space with the main system memory.. different ram/different slots/different amounts?
 
Yeah it sounds like there's a problem getting data to the sound card. Something is not playing nice with it. Have you tried with a different video card? Does this only happen with the 9600? Isn't the 8800 more powerful anyway?

Dustin
 
dustNbone said:
Yeah it sounds like there's a problem getting data to the sound card. Something is not playing nice with it. Have you tried with a different video card? Does this only happen with the 9600? Isn't the 8800 more powerful anyway?

Dustin
Click to expand...

depends on the 8800 and 9600 in question

either way, I would agree sounds like theres a conflict somehow, either software or physical (heat, namely)
 
Yeah the 8800GTS was a 320MB so it sucked more juice but it too was running at low res when I swapped it as it was just a quick check. There's no problem with heat as my video card run cools but maybe I'll check the contacts or the back of the board for problems. Thanks for the help guys.
 
skyline889 said:
Yeah the 8800GTS was a 320MB so it sucked more juice but it too was running at low res when I swapped it as it was just a quick check. There's no problem with heat as my video card run cools but maybe I'll check the contacts or the back of the board for problems. Thanks for the help guys.
Click to expand...

9600GT should be faster than that hands down, and yes, use less power

so off to de-bug the system (literally) :p
 
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