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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.
crsdahl
9 Posts
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February 24th, 2019 06:00
I just noticed the echo issue described in my earlier post only seems to affect non Microsoft programs. It is present in Chrome, not in Edge, it is also present in VLC Player while not in the standard Groove Player. To test my theory I grabbed the UWP Version of VLC Player from the Microsoft Store and tried it but it also has the issue, so it's not a UWP thing but a Microsoft vs. non Microsoft I guess.
I've also been using dual boot with Manjaro Linux for 2 days now and so far I haven't encountered any problems under Linux(understandable since DPCs are a Windows thing)
As to how often I encounter the Problem: usually 1 or 2 times a day(if using Windows). There are two versions of it: sometimes it's just some single pops now and then which usually go away without doing anything, and sometimes it's a constant distortion. To fix the later one one I execute the batch script posted by @TheBjorn on page 2 of this discussion.
Notice my experience is pretty much limited to headphones through I did encounter the problem with speakers.
Dell-Alan D
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February 25th, 2019 06:00
@jjm223 thanks for the response.
Can you confirm that you don't have the audio crackling issue with Linux but only within the Windows environment?
Alan
jjm223
4 Posts
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February 25th, 2019 08:00
@Dell-Alan DWhen I experienced the issue I can confirm that this only occurred on Windows. I have not experienced any audio glitches on Linux. However, the latest driver release seems to have fixed the crackling issue for me on Windows.
If it would be helpful, I am comfortable reverting to the old driver and doing further testing.
ofthedoor
7 Posts
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February 25th, 2019 09:00
I had the same audio popping issue, since day 1.
Scrolling down a twitter page is the perfect test: nothing happens when you scroll down images of course but at soon as there's a video, the browser sends the info to the OS, and "POP!" here comes the sound of your sound card turning on. "" POP POP". That's your sound card turning off. Rinse and repeat.
You can find people complaining about this since 2017. Call Dell tech support and they behave like it's all new to them and ...don't have a fix.
That tells what this company has become. They used to have top CS and tech support. Now they're like anyone else.
I M
5 Posts
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February 25th, 2019 10:00
This looks like a survey for doing creative work on Dell computers? There are only a few questions that relates to audio issues and the rest are related to music and video production.
To be clear, the crackling issues do not only happen when producing music, they also happen when listening to music.
DELL-Chris M
Community Manager
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February 25th, 2019 10:00
All,
One of our Dell audio engineers has created this confidential survey. Please fill it out. This will help our XPS platform team pin point the issues.
rizzis
1 Message
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February 26th, 2019 03:00
This is scandalous. One of the most expensive ultra laptop of Dell is unusuable because of crackling sound. And Dell does nothing to correct it!!
You are not an Apple and never will be..
It's a shame!!!
I do meetings with top companies on skype business, webex, gotomeeting, etc. And sometimes i heard nothing on the calls that we discuss million dollar top projects because of this **bleep** laptop which generates noise and crackling sound at the background which happens random!!!
All you say it's deactivate some spatial sound or reactivate. You do not know even the real solution..
I will put this laptop to the trash soon. I have already ordered a new laptop...
Dell-Alan D
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February 26th, 2019 06:00
@jjm223 thanks for the offer of support. As your system appears to be working fine with the latest driver I would rather not revert back to the previous driver revision. I'll drop you a private message to get your tag details so that I can add it to the file I have to pass back to engineering.
@crsdahl has advised he is also using a dual boot system so hopefully he can help with any additional questions I have.
Alan
st-kovalenko
33 Posts
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February 26th, 2019 11:00
For the sake of experiment, I have been listening to music through the Groove-Music for the last 3 days. At the same time using the built-in speakers.
And I should note that there are no problems with sounds yet. Coincidence or user @crsdahl is right that this is related to DPC!? I do not quite understand what the DPC is responsible for. But I hope this information will be useful.
crsdahl
9 Posts
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February 26th, 2019 13:00
I believe you misunderstood me. The Microsoft/non Microsoft app thing is not about crackling/popping but about the echo problem with the new driver. I even think it's still present in the Microsoft apps just not that much as in Chrome, VLC, etc. The sound is simply not as good as with the previous driver. The echo problem is always present when using the new driver not only sometimes as with the crackling. Actually I don't have much experience regarding the crackling problem with the new driver because the echo is so terrible I went back to the old one straight away(but I had some crackling right after installing it).
I believe it is not in question(?) that the problem is caused by DPC Latency in ACPI.sys. Actually there even is another forum thread on this.
DPC is a mechanism used in Windows to coordinate background tasks(such as processing the audio buffer). It is explained on here. The last paragraph even concerns the DPC Latency Problem we have.
This is also the reason the problem doesn't exist when using Linux because Linux does not have DPCs I believe. I still didn't encounter any problems under Linux while using it for the last few days.
You can check your laptop for it with this or this program. I believe some People even had success by assigning their audio emitting programs to specific CPU cores with low latency.
The fact you didn't have any problems in Groove could still be interesting: maybe the problem only exists while streamin g audio and not while playing stuff from the harddisk. That would match with the Wikipedia article linked above. My experience is limited to YouTube music so far.
glenrs
4 Posts
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February 26th, 2019 14:00
Same issue here. Reboot puts it right but it's not good.
st-kovalenko
33 Posts
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February 27th, 2019 00:00
@crsdahl, I've already played local files to a different player (AIMP, and I think I also tried Windows Media Player), and had problems with the sound. It is interesting that I do not have these problems with groove music. I will continue to test and report again later.
AndreaBussolan
2 Posts
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February 27th, 2019 01:00
I followed your instructions, posted by Chris on 2-20-19, to install the new driver and it worked only for a couple of days, but then the audio started crackling and popping again. The problem now is less frequent, but higher in intensity.
Dell-Alan D
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February 27th, 2019 07:00
@st-kovalenko @crsdahl thanks for your continued input. Anything else you can add as your testing continues is greatly appreciated.
If we require anything specific, I shall be in touch.
Thanks again,
Alan
Axl Jay
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February 27th, 2019 10:00
Hi @Dell-Alan D ,
just to keep you informed that since the installation of the last realtek driver I did not experienced audio glitches with audio playing anymore.
However I'm still having stuttering\popping\crackling with my external audio device while editing\recording with my DAW Reaper (power settings max performance, cpu around 25%, RAM less 50%, no other applications running). Even disabling C-State Control doesn't make any significant improvement for me. I'm still blaming the DPC latency problem.