Computer audio troubleshooting help

Hi all,

I am at my wit's end. After moving apartments about 3 months ago, my computer's audio began glitching periodically. It occurs in all audio sources I've tried (mp3, flac, flash, video game audio) and it changes from instance to instance, sometimes more of a skip (slightly distorted audio, then silence, then resumed audio all in the span of ~1/2rd of a second) and sometime more of a "grinding" sound (still for ~1/2 a second). During this brief period, it sounds like the audio is halting, rather than continuing but not (eg, when it happens in the middle of a lyric, the first half of the word will play, then it will glitch, then the second half of the word will play). For instance, if a 

Before I go into what I've done to troubleshoot it, here is my set up:

CPU: Intel i7-930 @ 2.8 ghz

Motherboard: Asus P6X58D-E (Realtek High Definition Audio)

Memory: 2x 6GB (3x2GB) DDR3 1600

Sound Card: Creative X-Fi Titanium

Video Card: XFX HD 5850

Primary (OS) drive: OCZ Vertex 2 60GB

Storage drive: Haitachi SATA II 2TB HDD 7200RPM

OS: Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit

Speakers: Logitech Z-5500

Headphones: ATH M50

Here is what I've done to troubleshoot (in chronological order):

- Tried various Realtek High Definition Audio drivers (R2.65, R2.42, R2.22) The latest drivers caused the glitch to occur less frequently, but it still happened.

- Full reformat of OS drive

- RMA motherboard

- Tried various Realtek High Definition Audio drivers again

- Tried new memory (Crucial 2GB DDR3 1066)

- Installed discrete sound card (Creative X-Fi Titanium)

Unfortunately, none of this solved the issue. I have also verified that it isn't a problem with my Z-5500s or my ATH M50s by reproducing the problem on both and by playing hours of music on both out of an ipod and -never- hearing the glitch. 

There are really only two other things that I can think of:

- There is something wrong with one of my hard drives. I am disinclined to believe this as audio glitches are the only symptom. Video and games play perfectly (other than the audio for video and games which glitches and skips). I also used HD Tune Pro and watched the I/O from my storage drive as I played music and there didn't seem to be anything special about those moments when it was glitching.

- There is something wrong with my CPU. I have no idea what could possibly be wrong with it that it would do everything else fine but not audio, but it is the only part of my PC that I haven't swapped out yet (I tried and Intel made it such an impossible hassle to RMA that I gave up for the time being)

I really can't think of anything else that it could be.

The only remaining shred of information I have is that it (very anecdotally) seems to happen slightly more often when my computer is "doing something" (opening a new program, moving between tabs in a browser, etc.). That said, it also happens when I'm not doing anything else at all and it does not correlate to high CPU use (I've never seen CPU usage higher than 50% when it happens).

Thanks for the idea! I checked and the X-Fi Titanium I have in right now is running at 24 bit, 48000 Hz. I'm not sure what the onboard audio was set at before.

To answer your other questions, I first noticed the problem while I was using on board audio. I thought maybe there was an incompatibility between the Realtek chip and Windows 7 which prompted me to get the Creative sound card. Creative didn't explicitly mention the P6X58D-E on their website but I looked around and a lot of other people seemed to be using the X-Fi Titanium with it just fine.

As for power, Im using a Cooler Master GX Series 750W PSU, so it should be fine...?

And I'm not giving up, its just frustrating... I've been struggling with this thing for 3 months (RMAs take -forever-) and I just want it to work...

I'm using iTunes primarily, though it also happens when playing youtube videos and video games. Interestingly, I'm not 100% sure I've had it happen in VLC. I'll try that out a little later.

And thanks for the optimization guide. I'll give it a shot and let you know how it goes.

Quote:

Originally Posted by holden4th 

What media player are you using?  Can I refer you to this to see if it makes a difference

 

http://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/downloads/Windows_7_Optimization_Guide.pdf

 

I'll be blunt - the way that W7x64 handles audio has some serious issues and despite others on this forum saying no, just about every sound issue like yours is W7x64 based.

 

Try out all the mods that the sweetwater site recommends and if that doesn't work then come back and I'll tell you wahti did that solved the problem.