Realtek, Windows 7 64RTM Crackle/static/popping

astrospec said:

Found out that the gradual rise in DPC latency is actually due to the "real time protection" scanning by Microsoft Security Essentials AntiMalware Program.

If you are running MS Security Essentials, this is most likely your issue. There is no current fix other than disabling "real time protection":

MSE gradually increases DPC latency when there are high network activity

I tried a lot of the other suggestions posted here without luck. Turns out, MSE was the source of my problem and it was mostly affecting iTunes. I didn't like the idea of disabling real time protection (which also generates lots of warnings by the software). Instead, under MSE Settings>Excluded Processes I added iTunes.exe and iTuneHelper.exe. That eliminated the popping.

Hope this solution helps others.

Hmmm... I will try the MSE solution as well when the issue appears.

Sattesh said:

I THINK i've found the problem.
It may be caused by the computer over heating

Use this to find the cpu temperature = Download Speccy 1.05.183 - Download - FileHippo.com

The temperature should be around 40+ to 50+ but my temp reading are showing 60+
So this must be why the problem disappers after a shut down ad the computer temp goes down during a shut down(i think)

Please post ur cpu temp here to confirm or kick this theory out

I can almost kick this theory out immediately. I constantly use Speccy to keep track of my temperature and so on. It's never above 45 C (that's 113 F).

Hmm mayb it not the heat then(still gonna check my fans though)
but i did a complete system restore to the original factory settings and i still have the problem...
so it cannot be a software problem..........................

It's been a while since I checked the forum here, but I decided to work on the skipping problem again. I have not found a solution yet, but I know a bit more about how it works now.

I have a GIGABYTE GA-P55-UD3R with Realtek High Definition Audio. The actual audio chip is ALC888 codec. The ALC888 chip is an Intel High Definition Audio compatible chip and talks to the P55 chipset as such. In order to play audio the drivers must control the P55 and the P55 exposes the ALC888 as an Intel HDA codec. So I decided that new drivers from Intel might be the fix. It turns out that Intel doesn't provide audio drivers for the P55. The actual sound driver is the Microsoft UAA (Universal Audio Architecture) Bus Driver. I believe whatever is causing the skipping is in the Microsoft driver, not the Realtek component. I looked at what IRQs were in use by my system and none were assigned to the Realtek device. However IRQ#22 was assigned to the MS UAA Bus Driver. So when the sound chip signals the CPU that it needs more audio data, it's definitely the MS driver that is getting the signal.

I'm reasonably sure that it's not a hardware problem as I don't get any skipping in Linux.

Had the same problem with crackling sound on my onboard realtek souncard (ASUS M4A89TD PRO) and using a free streaming software called Spotify. Disabling MSE Real Time protection (Microsoft Security Essentials) immediately fixed the problem. Seems like adding the Spotify application to the excluded processes works as well. Added uTorrent as well just to be on the safe side.

I tried lots of fixes none worked until I deleted DIVX ( which was apparently not compatible with Window 7 64 bit OS installed on my DELL, since it was 32 bit(1 yr old HD PC)...seemed to have solved the problem. Spoke to a friend (knowledgeable about PCs) he said its important to check the bit rate of software before downloading since if the are incompatible, can cause conflicts in OS..hopes this helps
BRyAN

hi everyone
i signed in only to confirm that using the most recent Nvidia drivers right now it is 266.99 permanently solved the problem for my acer aspire latop with realtek HD audio running win7 ultimate 64 bit
this solution was first suggested in page 22 by a fellow poster that i want to thank very much sorry i cant recall the name
please let me remind everyone that this problem may have more than one cause and more than one solution
so if you have the exact same issue as the majority of us the major guide line would be
1)run DPC latency checker
2)try out different drivers for audio chip
3)or Nvidia graphic chip (which worked for me personally)
4)or perhaps network card (as reported by other users)
finally test the machine run your biggest resource hog be it a game or an application and better multi-task many programs until your machine screams for mercy if the sound is still clear then congratulations you can keep your windows 7.
i also noticed (someone correct me if i am wrong) that all of us were upgrading to windows 7 as our machines were manufactured prior to windows 7 . maybe if the problem appeared on a PC that is originally loaded with windows 7 by the manufacturer the customer support would be forced to solve the problem which never happened.
good luck

Hello,

I also registered to share what fixed my problem. I recently started having the same problem with crackle and popping on my Sony Vaio w /Realtek sound and it was driving me crazy. Running Windows 7 64-bit. I read the posts here (and learned a lot!) but nothing seemed to fix the problem. I contacted Sony support and they recommend I use windows restore back to a restore point when direct X was installed. I really didn't think this would work but after the restore no more popping or crackling for several days now. I do some light gaming on my laptop and apparently when I installed Fallout 3 (the installer just did it) it installed an old Direct X version or something weird.

Anyway, I know there are so many different causes / fixes but though I'd share a fix that worked for me.

whitespace37 said:

So I was having similar problem. My on-board sound card (realtek acl888) was crackling and making nasty sounds. even the windows startup was cracking. i thought it was either drivers or bad onboard card. so i updated the drivers but to no avail. then i purchased an old SB Audigy 2 card to test it out. And it did the same thing. If I booted into ubuntu using a live cd it would fix the problem. no cracking. this lead me to think it was 7, or the 64bit drivers.

My Solution: when I first built the computer I intended to do some OC'ing. Which I did. Then ended up leaving it at stock after a while. (may try again later) however i was using Easy Tune v6 from Gigabyte to help with the overclocking.

Using this program: dpc latency checker - Google Search

i figured out that it (Edit:Easy Tune v6) was causing realtime issue performance for my computer. (possibly how it interacts with the processor to do the soft OCing?) by disabling this from starting with my computer and turning it off, this solved my sound problems.

I was VERY HAPPY and I hope you will be too!!

Thank you! This worked!!

Created an account to share that Gigabyte's Easy Tune was the cause of the crackling in my audio as well. Cursed bloatware.

As originally posted by Bill321, killing the Gigabyte Easy Tune 6 application really does eliminate the crackling noises on my system while playing music.
Simply by uninstalling the ET6 application (maybe not needed but did a reboot afterwards)!
Bill321, you are a hero!

By the way, my board is a Gigabyte 870A-UD3. ET6 came with installing the drivers for the board. Thought it may come to use later, but now i'm glad to throw it in the waste-bin.

Thanx 4 sharing everybody!