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XPS 15-9570, Audio crackling and popping
I have an issue that renders the audio on this laptop unusable.
I have a new XPS 9570, and occasionally (I stress that word because 75% of the time there is no issue) when playing audio, either through the built in speakers or through the audio jack, there is a loud popping and crackling noise that accompanies the audio. This renders any audio generated by the laptop unusable.
Because the issue is not always present, it is very hard to debug since you can't know if the issue was actually fixed, or just temporarily gone.
Testing I have done thus far:
When playing a continuous tone, such as generated by , the issue is still present.
The crackling and popping increases with system volume, so if I turn the volume up on the laptop, the crackling becomes louder.
I have reflashed the BIOS to the newest version, uninstalled realtek, reinstalled realtek, disabled wave-maxx-audio (or whatever it is called), and tried using the built in windows drivers. Nothing has worked.
And note that when playing from bluetooth, there is no issue. So it is not a software issue in that way.
Very disappointing that on such an amazing laptop (it truly is amazing), an integral part of it is basically useless.
Carnefix
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February 17th, 2019 01:00
I have an almost new XPS 15-9570. The crackling is sporadic an so disturbing. The Audio delay playing Videos in Netflix/YouTube etc. makes it unusable. I have some Dell Computers and never had an issue like that. And I bought a Dell because I don´t want to have an issue lake that.
The new realtek Driver did´t help. The Change of the wlan Card to last Intel didn´t help.
If the Audio would work, it would be a great Laptop, so it is Nothing worth for me.
st-kovalenko
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February 17th, 2019 13:00
@Anonymous,
Has already been tried in my case and leads to no success.
Axl Jay
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February 18th, 2019 00:00
today the audio driver didn't recover properly from standby (modern standby). It started with heavily distorted audio until it crashed (red checked dot on the volume icon). I had to disable and re-enable the soundcard from device manager to restore audio.
New driver, new trouble! :Cool:
Dell-Alan D
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February 18th, 2019 07:00
@st-kovalenko that's interesting that your system doesn't emit the crackling sound via the bluetooth device. I have had other responses where the user has had wired and bluetooth headphones paired with the system and the crackling is also replicated through the bluetooth connection.
To confirm, regardless of what you files you playback on the system, i.e Windows sounds, mp3 stored on the system, or streamed audio i.e YouTube, Spotify, if you have the bluetooth received connected you don't get any crackles?
How are you connecting the bluetooth transmitter to the system, is it via the 3.5mm stereo port?
Would you be willing to disable the bluetooth on your system and then use it normally, without the external bluetooth transmitter connected, and confirm whether you still hear the audio crackling.
Alan
Dell-Alan D
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February 18th, 2019 07:00
@beefjerky thanks for this info, I haven't noticed the same sort of response around this issue on the workstation forum. So far , the updated driver has only been released for the XPS, even though the driver is the same. I would expect the updated driver to be rolled out to the Precision, unless the fix is not related to the audio driver and is found to be caused by something else.
Alan
Dell-Alan D
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February 18th, 2019 07:00
@Axl Jay no one else has mentioned having this issue. I suspect it's an isolated issue and nothing to do with the driver having issues. I would suggest either rolling back the system or trying a clean install of the driver again. It could come down to your Windows install being corrupt.
Alan
st-kovalenko
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February 18th, 2019 08:00
@Dell-Alan D
I have the notebook now more than month and hear every day musik over the bluetooth receiver, and have no problems with. I have never heard strange noises in the configuration.
That the other user over his external sound card also unwanted noise hears I also read, but he has a USB sound card, if I have the right thing. Unfortunately, I do not have a USB sound card to try it out. But I have the docking station BT16 I will try it.
The sound sources are often different (YouTube, Local mp3, Livestream's).
I connect the Bluetooth receiver wirelessly to the system, not the 3.5mm stereo port.
Even if there are no external devices connected to my notebook and the WLAN / Bluetooth card is completely disabled, I continue to have unwanted sounds in my internal speakers. The audio record I uploaded in my last post from 02-15-2019.
Honestly I have not tried the 3.5mm stereo port until today. Today I plugged in headphones for the first time. I had to connect them several times, because they are not always recognized ... Although the window of MaxxAudioPro come up the headphones did not always sound immediately. Another Problem?!
beefjerky
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February 18th, 2019 08:00
Thanks for the reply. I suspect many Precision users don't use the built-in audio often, me included. However, it is easily noticeable when I do use it. A workaround that worked for me is to set the output format to CD Quality (44.1KHz, 16bit). In my case, that seems to avoid the problem.
Please do make the team working on this aware that the issue also occurs on the Precision 5530.
Thanks!
Dell-Alan D
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February 19th, 2019 00:00
@SuzieG27 thanks for offering to contribute to the investigation. I'll drop you a private message with the information I require.
Alan
Dell-Alan D
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February 19th, 2019 00:00
@LaughingJohn as I understand it, the DPC latency is being investigated as part of the research. The keyboard latency should have been improved with the BIOS updates that have been released.
Are you running the latest BIOS on the system?
Do you have problems with key presses on the internal keyboard also?
Do you connect your keyboard to the system directly or via a docking station?
Alan
Dell-Alan D
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February 19th, 2019 01:00
@st-kovalenko thanks for the feedback. Can you help with some additional details please -
a) What bluetooth devices are you pairing with your HiGoing receiver, are they bluetooth headphones or speakers?
b) If you pair either of those devices directly with the laptop do you then get the crackling audio through the paired device?
c) With regards to the headphones not being recognised, I wonder if that's connected to the problems you had previously with the audio driver crashing. Have you tried uninstalling the audio driver and then reinstalling it?
Alan
LaughingJohn
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February 19th, 2019 03:00
@Dell-Alan DThanks for coming back to me - I have a separate thread for my issues, but to answer your questions:
Are you running the latest BIOS on the system? Yes - all windows/dell updates applied including the latest Audio drivers.
Do you have problems with key presses on the internal keyboard also? TBH I haven't used it much to know but it's present on both a logitech wireless keyboard and a wired QPAD mechanical keyboard both of which were in use successfully with my old laptop.
Do you connect your keyboard to the system directly or via a docking station? I have tried both and the problem remains either way. The problem also affects the mouse, again both wired and wireless.
Other symptoms include popping in my USB headphones and the backlight on my QPAD keyboard flashing occasionally as if losing power.
I turned off c-state control based on another user's suggestion and all seemed fine yesterday and so far today. My QPAD keyboard is the worst affected but I won't be able to test that in anger until Thursday when I work from home.
My understanding is that that C-State is handled by ACPI so I'm not sure if it's the c-state code that is directly causing my problems or whether the c-state swaps might be being affected by a latency inducing bug elsewhere in the ACPI.
Possibly unrelated but I'm also getting errors in the event viewer like this one:
ESIF(8.4.10501.6067) TYPE: ERROR MODULE: DPTF TIME 85466514 ms
DPTF Build Version: 8.4.10501.6067
DPTF Build Date: Feb 16 2018 13:31:38
Source File: ..\..\..\..\Sources\Policies\ConfigTdpPolicy\ConfigTdpPolicy.cpp @ line 354
Executing Function: ConfigTdpPolicy::synchronizeConfigTdpPlatformSettings
Message: ConfigTdp not supported.
Policy: ConfigTDP Policy [0]
st-kovalenko
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February 19th, 2019 03:00
a) These are speakers
b) Yesterday I heard the music over half the day with headphones (wired, 3.5 stereo) and noticed at first nothing. Only that you are not always recognized when connecting. Whether I connect headphones or speakers via cable should have no difference.
c) You have confused me with other users, with me the driver is not crashed. As I said, I have no problems with external speakers, no matter how they are connected (Whether cable or Bluetooth does not matter).
LaughingJohn
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February 19th, 2019 04:00
Hi @Dell-Alan D, thanks for coming back to me , just FYI I already replied but my reply has vanished so apologies if this is a duplicate.
I have a separate thread for my issues but to answer your questions:
Are you running the latest BIOS on the system? Yes 1.7, I have all Windows and Dell updates, including the latest audio driver.
Do you have problems with key presses on the internal keyboard also? I haven't really tested this but I have the problem with a wireless logitech keyboard and worse with a QPAD wired mechanical keyboard. Mouse freezes with both wireless and wired mice.
Do you connect your keyboard to the system directly or via a docking station? I have tried both and the symptoms happen with both.
Yesterday I disabled c-state in the Bios and this appears to have solved the issue, at least on my work (wireless logitech) keyboard and mouse. I won't be able to test the wired set-up properly until Thursday.
Assuming they are related I'm not sure if the latency is causing problems with switching c-states in a timely manner or whether the c-state code itself is the actual cause.
I also get error message like this in the event viewer which may or may not be related:
ESIF(8.4.10501.6067) TYPE: ERROR MODULE: DPTF TIME 85466514 ms
DPTF Build Version: 8.4.10501.6067
DPTF Build Date: Feb 16 2018 13:31:38
Source File: ..\..\..\..\Sources\Policies\ConfigTdpPolicy\ConfigTdpPolicy.cpp @ line 354
Executing Function: ConfigTdpPolicy::synchronizeConfigTdpPlatformSettings
Message: ConfigTdp not supported.
Policy: ConfigTDP Policy [0]
Dell-Alan D
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February 19th, 2019 07:00
@st-kovalenko thanks for the reply and apologies for the confusion.
Alan