Sound Popping with new USB Sound card

[Unimatrix Xero]

I got myself a Creative X-fi 5.1 surround pro (USB) model today and ive just settled down to watch a film and ive noticed there is alot of sound popping.

Now i know its not the movie as i watch it perfectly the other night with no problems

OS Win 7 Ultimate x 64

using most upto date x-fi drivers from creatives website

Anyone know whats going on??

Thanks in advance

[John.D]

Might be those drivers. Manufacturer's drivers aren't always the best drivers.

I found that the drivers on the ASUS site, for this were worse than the drivers Win7 installed for the onboard sound. You could turn the volume up to 100%. And it was like it was only up 1/2 way. Barely audible. And the videocard I had the drivers on the ASUS site caused like a dead pixel on the screen. Once I uninstalled the video drivers the dead pixel disappeared.

Will it work with the Win7 drivers (if its got them)?

[Unimatrix Xero]

I think it has I'll give them a try in a bit and I'll let you know mate :)

Thanks for getting in touch

[John.D]

If the latest version makes a popping sound, try the version before that if its available. It may be the version you're using thats causing the prob / popping. If its got onboard sound, did you disable it in the BIOS??? Might make a diff

[Unimatrix Xero]

I've not disabled the ob sound I'll do that as well

[a1ien]

Run DPC Latency checker, see if it finds anything. http://www.thesycon.de/deu/latency_check.shtml

If it does, a solution is often had by updating every last driver on your system until the DPC check shows latency is normal.

[Unimatrix Xero]

Just uninstalled xfi rebooted and disabled ob sound chip in process of rebooting atm

[Unimatrix Xero]

Run DPC Latency checker, see if it finds anything. http://www.thesycon....ncy_check.shtml

If it does, a solution is often had by updating every last driver on your system until the DPC check shows latency is normal.

just done a check and all is in green even when running a HD movie

it does say 'Some device drivers on this machine behave bad and will probably cause drop-outs in real-time audio and/or video streams. To isolate the misbehaving driver use Device Manager and disable/re-enable various devices, one at a time. Try network and W-LAN adapters, modems, internal sound devices, USB host controllers, etc.' but still remains in green

Im currently running on default windows update drivers and so far no crackling or popping i have noticed in XBMC its changed to 'Direct sound' from 'WASAPI' what does that mean?

[Unimatrix Xero]

As a test im about to reinstall the x-fi drivers to see if the o/b sound was causing problems, if the popping comes back i know its the official drivers :/

[Unimatrix Xero]

Well the popping as come back with the official drivers and XBMC is back to WASAP: Speakers (SB X-Fi Surround Pro 5.1) when i select 'Direct sound: digital pass though' or direct sound: Speakers' all the popping goes away...

[John.D]

There's a bit about WASAPI here. The prob maybe XBMC. Not the drivers. Look at section 5

System -> Video -> Playback (Analog/SPDIF/HDMI)

IMPORTANT NOTE:- These changes are only for test purposes in order to eliminate these settings as a possible cause of issues, this is not guidance of how things should be set under normal circumstances. If testing with these settings shows no difference then they can be set back to whatever you chose.

Make sure DXVA2 hardware acceleration is disabled and select Software as Render method

Make sure Sync playback to display is disabled (this can be a cause of distortion if using a WASAPI device as this can cause interference on the audio stream) <- this maybe the cause of the popping? If this option is in the latest version of XBMC

It looks like this popping sound is a known prob when WASAPI is used. WASAPI can also cause crackling

[Unimatrix Xero]

Just tried step 5 and still getting popping, so im going to have to use direct sound, thanks for doing some digging i was just having a poke around on the XBMC forums as well

At least its just not me having issues, shame it cant be fixed though

Thanks for your help mate

[John.D]

Sweet no probs :)