Audio is distorted -- XP Pro, SP3

  • Thread starter Thread starter BillW50
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BillW50

OS: Windows XP Pro,SP3
Audio Codec: CMI8738
Affected: All audio output
Third Party: Xear 3D Audio (set for 6 speakers, I have 5)

The audio output is distorted including the Windows start up wave. String
instruments sound out of tune, Wind instruments sound as if they have
vibrators attached, etc. -- that sort of thing. If I had to guess as to
"sounds like", i would guess that the audio sounds like it was
over-recorded.

My control is that i had a Win XP Pro,SP2 setup on the same hardware, same
software -- on the same machine -- and it was clear as a bell.

Any ideas?
Click to expand...

Yes I have an idea. When you make changes to an OS, there is always a
chance of breaking something. I would go back to SP2 and see if it works
again. Or find out if there is any updated audio drivers that is
compatible with SP3.

I personally regret updating some of my computers to SP3. As SP2 worked
perfectly for me except for one needed KB for hibernating with more than
1GB of RAM. Even OE6 compacting doesn't work right with SP3 either. As
it often hangs on folders.dbx if SP3 is installed.
 
OS: Windows XP Pro,SP3
Audio Codec: CMI8738
Affected: All audio output
Third Party: Xear 3D Audio (set for 6 speakers, I have 5)

The audio output is distorted including the Windows start up wave. String
instruments sound out of tune, Wind instruments sound as if they have
vibrators attached, etc. -- that sort of thing. If I had to guess as to
"sounds like", i would guess that the audio sounds like it was
over-recorded.

My control is that i had a Win XP Pro,SP2 setup on the same hardware, same
software -- on the same machine -- and it was clear as a bell.

Any ideas?

jim
 
jim said:
OS: Windows XP Pro,SP3
Audio Codec: CMI8738
Affected: All audio output
Third Party: Xear 3D Audio (set for 6 speakers, I have 5)

The audio output is distorted including the Windows start up wave. String
instruments sound out of tune, Wind instruments sound as if they have
vibrators attached, etc. -- that sort of thing. If I had to guess as to
"sounds like", i would guess that the audio sounds like it was
over-recorded.

My control is that i had a Win XP Pro,SP2 setup on the same hardware, same
software -- on the same machine -- and it was clear as a bell.

Any ideas?

jim
Click to expand...

I think Xear 3D Audio is part of the CMedia package.

In terms of the drivers, there are the old drivers, and then at one
point I think Creative bought some company that owned licensing for
a certain sound playback technology. And they forced the companies
that were previously using it, to stop. It took CMedia around
a year to re-write the drivers, to work around it. And for a
year, you couldn't get drivers from their site as a result.
Eventually, I think the drivers came back. The drivers now,
would be subtly different than the ones that came out
originally. This is probably a red herring.

So in terms of driver versions, you'd have an older version
on your sound card in-box CD, than the type of driver you might
get from CMedia now.

Your symptoms don't ring a bell, in terms of type. I doubt it's
a Delayed Transaction setting or a PCI Latency setting, as on
more modern systems, the first item is always enabled, and the
second one is probably not even a setting any more (could be
set to 32 or 64 by default). At one time, sound card problems
were caused by bus starvation. But your symptom description
doesn't match - bus starvation is described as "crackling"
when it happens.

So that leaves some other kind of shim, stuffed in by another
software. If you use Skype, they may have an "Echo Suppressor"
driver, which runs all the time, instead of just when Skype is
being used. And there may be an interaction between the
number of channels the echo suppressor handles, versus your
current sound setting. The Echo Suppressor might be compatible
with 2-channel running mode for the sound card, and be relatively
invisible if the card is run that way. And then muck things up,
if you use 5.1 . I'm just going from memory here, and grasping
at straws. Other possibilities are things like Ventrilo for
in-game audio communications for collaborative game play, as
sometimes game audio communicators need echo suppression to
prevent feedback if you're playing with an open microphone
and speakers next to them.

Good luck,
Paul
 
On Thu, 22 Mar 2012 08:33:31 -0500, in
Yes I have an idea. When you make changes to an OS, there is always a
chance of breaking something. I would go back to SP2 and see if it works
again. Or find out if there is any updated audio drivers that is
compatible with SP3.

I personally regret updating some of my computers to SP3. As SP2 worked
perfectly for me except for one needed KB for hibernating with more than
1GB of RAM. Even OE6 compacting doesn't work right with SP3 either. As
it often hangs on folders.dbx if SP3 is installed.
Click to expand...

Thanks. Going back to SP2 is not really an option since that Disk will no
longer boot, but acts just fine as a system data disk. (most likely the
registry is corrupted on that one.)

The audio distortion is the same with or without that disk connected.

jim
 
On Thu, 22 Mar 2012 10:42:04 -0400, in
I think Xear 3D Audio is part of the CMedia package.
Click to expand...

Possibly. In my case, I bought it as third party hardware/software about
2 years ago.

The Xear information panel reads:

Audio Engine: Xear3D DS3D EAX
Audio Codec: CMI8738
Audio Driver Version: 5.12.8.1733
Audio Controller: C-Media Audio Controller
DirectX Version: DirectX 9.0C

C-Media 3D Audio Configuration 1.1.22.00
In terms of the drivers, there are the old drivers, and then at one
point I think Creative bought some company that owned licensing for
a certain sound playback technology. And they forced the companies
that were previously using it, to stop. It took CMedia around
a year to re-write the drivers, to work around it. And for a
year, you couldn't get drivers from their site as a result.
Eventually, I think the drivers came back. The drivers now,
would be subtly different than the ones that came out
originally. This is probably a red herring.

So in terms of driver versions, you'd have an older version
on your sound card in-box CD, than the type of driver you might
get from CMedia now.
Click to expand...

I'll be honest, drivers are a mystery to me. I seem to have some kind of
mental block when it comes to them.
Your symptoms don't ring a bell, in terms of type. I doubt it's
a Delayed Transaction setting or a PCI Latency setting, as on
more modern systems, the first item is always enabled, and the
second one is probably not even a setting any more (could be
set to 32 or 64 by default). At one time, sound card problems
were caused by bus starvation. But your symptom description
doesn't match - bus starvation is described as "crackling"
when it happens.

So that leaves some other kind of shim, stuffed in by another
software. If you use Skype, they may have an "Echo Suppressor"
driver, which runs all the time, instead of just when Skype is
being used. And there may be an interaction between the
number of channels the echo suppressor handles, versus your
current sound setting. The Echo Suppressor might be compatible
with 2-channel running mode for the sound card, and be relatively
invisible if the card is run that way. And then muck things up,
if you use 5.1 . I'm just going from memory here, and grasping
at straws. Other possibilities are things like Ventrilo for
in-game audio communications for collaborative game play, as
sometimes game audio communicators need echo suppression to
prevent feedback if you're playing with an open microphone
and speakers next to them.

Good luck,
Paul
Click to expand...

Yes. Luck is something I definitely need. :-)
It isn't feedback, i do not have Skype installed.
I do have DFC audio enhancer but the problem was there before as well
after installing that. (I had hoped that software might clean things up.)

I realize it could any one or more of many different things.

Thanks,

jim
 
jim said:
I'll be honest, drivers are a mystery to me. I seem to have some
kind of mental block when it comes to them.
Click to expand...

"Drivers" is just a fancy name for a program over which the user generally
has no control but which is used by other programs, generally to accomplish
some hardware task. A printer driver takes info from wherever and sends it
to the printer...an audio driver does likewise for sound (to the sound
card). They save programers from having to write low level code to deal
with devices thus allowing them to concentrate on their app.

--

dadiOH
____________________________

dadiOH's dandies v3.06...
....a help file of info about MP3s, recording from
LP/cassette and tips & tricks on this and that.
Get it at http://mysite.verizon.net/xico
 
jim said:
OS: Windows XP Pro,SP3
Audio Codec: CMI8738
Affected: All audio output
Third Party: Xear 3D Audio (set for 6 speakers, I have 5)

The audio output is distorted including the Windows start up wave. String
instruments sound out of tune, Wind instruments sound as if they have
vibrators attached, etc. -- that sort of thing. If I had to guess as to
"sounds like", i would guess that the audio sounds like it was
over-recorded.

My control is that i had a Win XP Pro,SP2 setup on the same hardware, same
software -- on the same machine -- and it was clear as a bell.
Click to expand...

Disconnect the external speakers from the line-out jacks from the
motherboard backpanel. Connect headphones or a headset to the same
jack. Is the sound good or bad using the headphones or headset as
alternate speakers? This is a quick test to eliminate your external
powered speakers as the source of the problem. Some speakers provide
their own controls, like adding surround sound or other effects, so
their logic can go bad and produce artifacts in sound reproduction.

You don't say that this is a new problem that cropped up on an old host
that was working before or if it is a new hardware setup and this
problem has been exhibited ever since that hardware setup was created.
Is it a new problem on old working hardware or is it a new hardware
setup with the problem always there?
 
Disconnect the external speakers from the line-out jacks from the
motherboard backpanel. Connect headphones or a headset to the same
jack. Is the sound good or bad using the headphones or headset as
alternate speakers? This is a quick test to eliminate your external
powered speakers as the source of the problem. Some speakers provide
their own controls, like adding surround sound or other effects, so
their logic can go bad and produce artifacts in sound reproduction.

You don't say that this is a new problem that cropped up on an old host
that was working before or if it is a new hardware setup and this
problem has been exhibited ever since that hardware setup was created.
Is it a new problem on old working hardware or is it a new hardware
setup with the problem always there?
Click to expand...

Jim (OP) stated all was fine before SP3 was installed. So it isn't that
hard to figure out.
 
I have found it safest to close IE (if its open) and not be running anything
else at the time when I run OE compacting. I simply run OE from its
shortcut directly, and then compact all folders.
Click to expand...

What always works for me under SP3 is to toggle OE/IE for offline use.
Close OE. Then reopen (it better say it is still offline). Now compact.
It should run perfectly now. SP2 didn't require this nonsense though.
 
dadiOH said:
"Drivers" is just a fancy name for a program over which the user generally
has no control but which is used by other programs, generally to accomplish
some hardware task. A printer driver takes info from wherever and sends it
to the printer...an audio driver does likewise for sound (to the sound
card). They save programers from having to write low level code to deal
with devices thus allowing them to concentrate on their app.
Click to expand...

I think we can paint a more optimistic picture than that :-)

Ring 3 | "Kernel country, Ring 0 security"
|
User Program | <-- User program is blocked, and
| | can't touch hardware directly
|
+--------------> Driver (in ring 0) ------> actual hardware register

|
|

The driver must be carefully written, or the entire OS can become unstable.
Good driver writers "go to school" to learn how to write safe and effective
drivers.

On some of the older OSes, the security structure was rather flat, and
you could do whatever the hell you wanted. Those were great days
while they lasted. (As a hardware guy, I loved those days.)

But with more "protected" OSes, came restrictions. To help guarantee
a user program could never "tip over" the OS and cause a BSOD or
a kernel panic, the ring structure of the processor was used for
protection. By only allowing certain activities in each ring,
the operating system is protected from the evil or careless
user. (Or so the model goes...) The processor hardware, for
some strange reason, had four rings numbered 0 through 3, but
in practice, only two get used. No one has ever figured out
a use for the middle two of them.

When a driver is not installed, not one of any sort,
the Device Manager (Start : Run : devmgmt.msc) will show
a "mark" of some sort, to show a driver is not present.
When a driver is present, it carries out some kind of
operation to "register" its presence, so the OS knows
it is open for business.

If you had only one sound card and no driver for it,
the OS considers you have zero audio devices working,
and any alert sounds cause the computer beeper to beep.
That's a fallback if there are zero audio devices
ready to go.

It's still possible, for a valid audio device to be present,
and no sound to be heard. All you need to do, is turn the
volume to zero, or go into the Sound control panel and
select the wrong audio device and so on.

So

1) Yes, you can be missing an audio driver. You may see
a mark in Device Manager. You may be prompted by the
new hardware wizard, to load a driver, and it could happen
on each boot attempt. And worst case, you may even be
greeted by the computer case beeper doing some beeping.

2) With the driver in place, it's still possible for malfunctions.

A shim, otherwise known as a "Filter driver", is something
that sits in the stream, and messes around. I'm not sure
of the mechanics, and this is a vague handwaving sort of
diagram implying how a filter driver can choose to
interfere. In the case of an echo suppressor filter for
example (i.e. Skype), the filter driver would take in "echoed"
audio samples and output "un-echoed" samples on the other side.
Or react in any way needed, to prevent echoes from making the
audio unbearable.

User ---- Upperfilter --- driver --- Lowerfilter --- hardware

*******

In all the excitement, I've forgotten one other detail. Sound
drivers have "effects", such as "concert hall". You should
go into the CMedia control panel and disable all effects, as
a starting point when debugging. These pictures are in French, but
they're the only good ones I could find. The first one
shows "Effet sonore" or "sound effect". You'd want to
set this to disabled.

http://jmhauchard.free.fr/perso/informatique/carteson/cmi5.png

In this one, the setting is in the upper left.

http://jmhauchard.free.fr/perso/informatique/carteson/cmedia3d4.png

Turning off any virtualizer can help too. A virtualizer, converts
2 channel sound, into 5.1. If you had actual 5.1 content, like
sound coming from a DVD movie playback, then you'd want that
off. Turn it off, until you get the audio problems under
control.

http://jmhauchard.free.fr/perso/informatique/carteson/cmedia3d2.png

HTH,
Paul
 
On Thu, 22 Mar 2012 14:09:38 -0500, in
Disconnect the external speakers from the line-out jacks from the
motherboard backpanel. Connect headphones or a headset to the same
jack. Is the sound good or bad using the headphones or headset as
alternate speakers?
Click to expand...

That was an interesting test. The headphones had no distortion.

This is a quick test to eliminate your external
powered speakers as the source of the problem. Some speakers provide
their own controls, like adding surround sound or other effects, so
their logic can go bad and produce artifacts in sound reproduction.

You don't say that this is a new problem that cropped up on an old host
that was working before or if it is a new hardware setup and this
problem has been exhibited ever since that hardware setup was created.
Is it a new problem on old working hardware or is it a new hardware
setup with the problem always there?
Click to expand...

The *only* hardware change was using a new boot disk, and installing the
same base operating system from the same CD as was used for the previous
boot disk.

Thanks, the headphone test actually told me a lot.

jim
 
Paul said:
I think we can paint a more optimistic picture than that :-)

Ring 3 | "Kernel country, Ring 0 security"
|
User Program | <-- User program is blocked, and
| | can't touch hardware directly
|
+--------------> Driver (in ring 0) ------> actual hardware
register

|
|

The driver must be carefully written, or the entire OS can become
unstable.
Click to expand...

Oh. You mean they are not unstable natively? :)
_____________
Good driver writers "go to school" to learn how to write
safe and effective drivers.
Click to expand...

Yeah, they can be tricky. I recall a time back in Z80 days when I was
teaching myself assembler that I needed a floppy I/O routine. NP looking up
the op codes for the floppy controller but what threw me for a bit was that
a call to the controller did not return "in line"; instead, it returned to
an error trapping routine which had to have been set up previously.
___________
On some of the older OSes, the security structure was rather flat, and
you could do whatever the hell you wanted. Those were great days
while they lasted. (As a hardware guy, I loved those days.)
Click to expand...

Yep. DOS as opposd to an all encompassing OS.
____________
But with more "protected" OSes, came restrictions. To help guarantee
a user program could never "tip over" the OS and cause a BSOD or
a kernel panic, the ring structure of the processor was used for
protection. By only allowing certain activities in each ring,
the operating system is protected from the evil or careless
user. (Or so the model goes...) The processor hardware, for
some strange reason, had four rings numbered 0 through 3, but
in practice, only two get used. No one has ever figured out
a use for the middle two of them.
Click to expand...

"Future expansion"? :)
______________
2) With the driver in place, it's still possible for malfunctions.

A shim, otherwise known as a "Filter driver", is something
that sits in the stream, and messes around. I'm not sure
of the mechanics, and this is a vague handwaving sort of
diagram implying how a filter driver can choose to
interfere. In the case of an echo suppressor filter for
example (i.e. Skype), the filter driver would take in "echoed"
audio samples and output "un-echoed" samples on the other side.
Or react in any way needed, to prevent echoes from making the
audio unbearable.
Click to expand...

Not only things messing with the audio directly either. I once got a new
sound card; audio had been fine but was terrible with the new (supposedly)
better card...it was all "burblely". The problem turned out to be - after a
lot of time looking - a software cooler program.

--

dadiOH
____________________________

dadiOH's dandies v3.06...
....a help file of info about MP3s, recording from
LP/cassette and tips & tricks on this and that.
Get it at http://mysite.verizon.net/xico
 
On Fri, 23 Mar 2012 07:24:27 -0500, in

This sounds like the kind of thing i need.
Not only things messing with the audio directly either. I once got a new
sound card; audio had been fine but was terrible with the new (supposedly)
better card...it was all "burblely". The problem turned out to be - after a
lot of time looking - a software cooler program.
Click to expand...

"Burbely" -- i like that one. I have variously described it as "sounds
underwater", "fuzzed", "too many audio artifacts" -- or just "distorted".
If the CPU is hot, I get 'kind of' a reverb effect on voice.
I am listening to vocal streaming now and it sounds just fine,though i can
hear a minor fuzzing accentuating stressed word endings. It is on hi-def
classical music where it is really annoying, because I know how the
strings and winds are supposed to sound.

Now here is a strange occurrence -- but computers are strange anyway--
yesterday, after i did the suggested headphone test, i plugged the speaker
back in and enjoyed a couple of hours of feel-it-through-the table fairly
hi-def classical from http://kuscstream.org/mp3/kusc128.m3u . Does that
make sense that an unplug/replug of the front two speakers would fix it?
No. But if was a brief 'fix', by last night the reproduction problems
were back.

There is no commercial 5.1 system here. I have 3 computer power units,
powering 2 sets of 2 speakers (plugged as Front and Rear) and one large
10" woofer floor speaker (plugged as sub-woofer but showing on the display
and reacting as "Center" speaker.). As far as effects, all GUIs for
configs are 'generic/music'. System "Volume Control" is less than max
for WAV and Line-In (unused).

I feel it is going to end up being something like a "software cooler"
(though i am unsure what that is) -- IOW, something that others would say
has nothing at all to do with audio reproduction.

jim
 
jim said:
On Thu, 22 Mar 2012 14:09:38 -0500, in


That was an interesting test. The headphones had no distortion.



The *only* hardware change was using a new boot disk, and installing
the same base operating system from the same CD as was used for the
previous boot disk.

Thanks, the headphone test actually told me a lot.
Click to expand...
Do the speakers have a volume control? Turn it down.
 
On Thu, 22 Mar 2012 14:48:07 -0500, in
Jim (OP) stated all was fine before SP3 was installed. So it isn't that
hard to figure out.
Click to expand...

I have gone back over what i said and if i gave the misimpression that the
audio reproduction problem started with SP3, i am sorry. SP3 was really
the only choice i found to update the "new" system (really a much used old
system) via a third party (a necessity).

(Yes, I *could* have applied the 100+ KB's,patches and program updates
from and existing on the previous boot disk and thereby avoided SP3, but
that was not a reasonable choice.)

jim
 
jim said:
On Thu, 22 Mar 2012 14:09:38 -0500, in


That was an interesting test. The headphones had no distortion.



The *only* hardware change was using a new boot disk, and installing the
same base operating system from the same CD as was used for the previous
boot disk.

Thanks, the headphone test actually told me a lot.

jim
Click to expand...

One thing that plugging in headphones does, is take the sound
subsystem from 5.1, back to stereo. If the CMedia control panel
has "virtual 5.1" mode, then the headphones probably caused that
to be switched off. And perhaps as a consequence of your test
results, the virtual 5.1 effect should be turned off in the panel.

"Real" 5.1 content may be available on a DVD player application,
sending movie sound to the speakers.

Some games, may have content suitable for driving 5.1.

For many other sources, only the front two speakers will be
driven. At least, as long as the "virtual 5.1" feature is turned
off. Check to see if an ordinary stereo source, is only giving
stereo sound to the speakers. That would help prove that the virtual
thing is really turned off.

Paul
 
On Fri, 23 Mar 2012 14:48:34 -0400, in
One thing that plugging in headphones does, is take the sound
subsystem from 5.1, back to stereo. If the CMedia control panel
has "virtual 5.1" mode, then the headphones probably caused that
to be switched off. And perhaps as a consequence of your test
results, the virtual 5.1 effect should be turned off in the panel.
Thanks.


"Real" 5.1 content may be available on a DVD player application,
sending movie sound to the speakers.

Some games, may have content suitable for driving 5.1.

For many other sources, only the front two speakers will be
driven. At least, as long as the "virtual 5.1" feature is turned
off. Check to see if an ordinary stereo source, is only giving
stereo sound to the speakers. That would help prove that the virtual
thing is really turned off.

Paul
Click to expand...

I am pretty much in the dark here, tell me if this tells you anything:

~~~~~~~~~~~
FILE: C:\CMI8738_WDM_0639XP_driver\CMI8738_WDM_0639XP\setup.ini
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
; web downloading upgrade package drivers
[InstallOption]
; WebSetup=0 for customers, 1 for downloading, 2 for single driver
installation
WebSetup=1
; FullPackage=0 for web upgrade version, 1 for full package drivers
FullPackage=0
; DriverOnly=1 means install drivers only, 0 means install both APs and
drivers.
DriverOnly=1
; InstallWDMDriver=0 means install VxD driver, 1 means install WDM driver
InstallWDMDriver=1
bLINEINasREAR=1
bLINEINasBASS=0
bMICasBASS=0
bMidi=1
bGamePort=1
bOnSoundCard=0

~~~~~~~~

Ok... Found it under Control Panel GUI >Sounds and Audio Devices>Volume
Tab> Speaker Settings>Advanced>Advanced Audio Properties> Speaker Setup
It was set to 5.1 Surround Sound, I changed it to
"Desktop Stereo Speakers". (there were 14 choices).
I "APPLYed" it. No change. (Probably requires a reboot for any change to
take effect.) When I reboot after i send this message, i will check to
see if the change "took".

jim
 
On Sat, 24 Mar 2012 10:41:15 -0500, in
Ok... Found it under Control Panel GUI >Sounds and Audio Devices>Volume
Tab> Speaker Settings>Advanced>Advanced Audio Properties> Speaker Setup
It was set to 5.1 Surround Sound, I changed it to
"Desktop Stereo Speakers". (there were 14 choices).
I "APPLYed" it. No change. (Probably requires a reboot for any change to
take effect.) When I reboot after i send this message, i will check to
see if the change "took".

jim
Click to expand...

You guys are magicians! I rebooted and started some classical which was
in a violin solo and then went to a crescendo. No distortions. (And
suitably loud)

Thanks!

jim
 
jim said:
On Sat, 24 Mar 2012 10:41:15 -0500, in


You guys are magicians! I rebooted and started some classical which was
in a violin solo and then went to a crescendo. No distortions. (And
suitably loud)

Thanks!

jim
Click to expand...

It's a guessing game. But aided by your good observation on the headphones.

I've suffered enough misery on my own cheap sound solutions, and
the things they do in the driver are not to be trusted :-)
They can't just send the sound samples to the speakers,
without "playing" with them.

If you think you've had trouble so far, try and get some
3D games to sound right. On my current sound solution,
if I slip on headphones, the "separation" on the sound effects
is all wrong, even though the control panel knows I'm using
headphones and not speakers. My "solution" is to not use
headphones :-( What should happen, is the level of mixing
between left and right, is supposed to be different for speakers
versus headphones.

Paul
 
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