S3220DGF, Audio output sporadically muting itself

I have an HP laptop and a mac mini connected to my Dell S3220DGF monitor. The laptop is connected via the display port and the mac is connected via HDMI. The problem I face is that since I am using the audio line out port of the monitor to connect my speaker (JBL Charge 4), the music or sound being outputted occasionally drops, muting itself for a fraction of a second or so. This is especially true if there is a period of silence in the video or music, and then when the sound picks up, the speaker will not output anything until a little into the audio (similar to when I start playing any music), after which it will play but will also begin dropping segments of the audio as mentioned earlier.

• I connected my headset to the headphone out port, and faced the same issue, so it is not the audio line out port itself that is the issue.
• I have connected the laptop to the speaker directly with the same 3.5mm stereo plug used to connect the speaker to the audio out port of the monitor, and the audio no longer drops. Bluetooth connectivity between the laptop/mac and the speaker does not drop the audio either, which shows that the speaker or the wire are not at fault.
• Since the mac is connected via HDMI and the laptop via DP, and both yield the same results, I doubt that both are at fault.

Searching online has not provided me any relevant results, which is why I am asking you guys directly. Could you please help me with this? It will be much appreciated.