Audio crackles when playing video

[neilcourtney]

I'm having some trouble with a new PC I just got/built. I intend on
using it as my primary DVD player, but with the audio problems I've had
lately, I'm debating that choice...

When I play ordinary audio, MP3s, shoutcast, or even Windows sounds,
everything sounds great. As soon as I play something with video,
though, the audio plays along to the tune of snap, crackle, and pop,
without the rice crispies.

System:
Win XP - Media Center Edition, with Service Pack 2
AMD 1.4G, SIS chipset
384MB RAM
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 440 (IRQ 5)
On-board Audio Card: C-Media AC97 (crackling is worse)
Added Audio Card: Sound Blaster Live! (IRQ 11)

I've done quite a bit of browsing online, and I have yet to find a
definitive answer to this problem. I've seen lots of suggestions, from
disabling plug and play to disabling serial ports and such, but nothing
has fixed this.

Any help anyone can provide would be greatly appreciated...

Neil
(e-mail address removed)

 

[Sleepy]

I'm having some trouble with a new PC I just got/built. I intend on
using it as my primary DVD player, but with the audio problems I've had
lately, I'm debating that choice...

When I play ordinary audio, MP3s, shoutcast, or even Windows sounds,
everything sounds great. As soon as I play something with video,
though, the audio plays along to the tune of snap, crackle, and pop,
without the rice crispies.

System:
Win XP - Media Center Edition, with Service Pack 2
AMD 1.4G, SIS chipset
384MB RAM
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 440 (IRQ 5)
On-board Audio Card: C-Media AC97 (crackling is worse)
Added Audio Card: Sound Blaster Live! (IRQ 11)

I've done quite a bit of browsing online, and I have yet to find a
definitive answer to this problem. I've seen lots of suggestions, from
disabling plug and play to disabling serial ports and such, but nothing
has fixed this.

Any help anyone can provide would be greatly appreciated...

Neil
(e-mail address removed)

Dont use the onboard sound simply because its thin and tinny sounding and
completely inadequate for playing music and films.

I see you've avoided IRQ sharing which was a possible culprit.
Are you using the latest motherboard drivers from the manufacturer
and not just the ones in Windows? Same goes for your soundcard.

Your problem is most likely one of latency and some device trying to hog
resources.
Theres a utility called PCILatency
http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=951
that you can use to force devices to share the bandwidth equally.
For example graphics card sometimes get a latency of 200 or more and other
devices only get 32
- equalize the latency at 32 and all devices get an share.

 

[kony]

I'm having some trouble with a new PC I just got/built. I intend on
using it as my primary DVD player, but with the audio problems I've had
lately, I'm debating that choice...

When I play ordinary audio, MP3s, shoutcast, or even Windows sounds,
everything sounds great. As soon as I play something with video,
though, the audio plays along to the tune of snap, crackle, and pop,
without the rice crispies.

System:
Win XP - Media Center Edition, with Service Pack 2
AMD 1.4G, SIS chipset
384MB RAM
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 440 (IRQ 5)
On-board Audio Card: C-Media AC97 (crackling is worse)
Added Audio Card: Sound Blaster Live! (IRQ 11)

I've done quite a bit of browsing online, and I have yet to find a
definitive answer to this problem. I've seen lots of suggestions, from
disabling plug and play to disabling serial ports and such, but nothing
has fixed this.

Any help anyone can provide would be greatly appreciated...

Neil
(e-mail address removed)

MIght be a PCI latency issue, try this,
http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=951

If it doesn't help, or not enough, also try newer sound card
driver, and if you have any unused features on your
motherboard that are enabled, disable them in the bios.
You wrote about serial ports, but even if that didn't seem
to help, might as well leave them disabled if unused.
While in the bios if the PCI latency is adjustable and at 32
or 64, try raising it to 96 or 128.

Try a different PCI slot for the sound card.

Is your motherboard still using original bios? It might not
be necessary to have the latest bios but something produced
after a few revisions have elapsed isn't a bad idea.

Another possible attempt would be using APM instead of ACPI
power management. I would leave that as a last resort and
maybe even try another sound card before doing that. Google
will find details but you shouldn't need to do it.

 

[NuQ]

I'm having some trouble with a new PC I just got/built. I intend on
using it as my primary DVD player, but with the audio problems I've had
lately, I'm debating that choice...

When I play ordinary audio, MP3s, shoutcast, or even Windows sounds,
everything sounds great. As soon as I play something with video,
though, the audio plays along to the tune of snap, crackle, and pop,
without the rice crispies.

System:
Win XP - Media Center Edition, with Service Pack 2
AMD 1.4G, SIS chipset
384MB RAM
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 440 (IRQ 5)
On-board Audio Card: C-Media AC97 (crackling is worse)
Added Audio Card: Sound Blaster Live! (IRQ 11)

I've done quite a bit of browsing online, and I have yet to find a
definitive answer to this problem. I've seen lots of suggestions, from
disabling plug and play to disabling serial ports and such, but nothing
has fixed this.

Any help anyone can provide would be greatly appreciated...

I would upgrade the RAM to 1GB. Also, use the add-in sound, not the
onboard. Also, as the others have suggested, make sure you using the
motherboard drivers, not Windows. For the sound AND video, make sure
you are using the manufacturer or chipset drivers, not Windows.

If that doesn't help (it won't hurt and should be done anyway), try that
PCI Latency util that was mentioned.