Audio cracking during video playback

[brandough]

This has been happening for a long time, but it's really starting to drive me insane now.
I noticed it happens more often the longer the computer has been on for. It happens whether I'm playing a downloaded video or streaming something through a browser. I suddenly hear the audio make a crack sound.. sometimes it can go about a minute without making it, but more often it happens every 10-20 seconds.
Through googling I think it's called a DPC latency problem?

Through my google searches I saw people were trying to figure out the problem through a program called LatencyMon, so I downloaded it and ran that and Latency Checker. I've included some screenshots after running both of these programs for some time in the attachments along with my DxDiag information. I tried to understand what LatencyMon was saying, but I couldn't really get it except for that "USBPORT.sys" and the others at the top could be the sources of my problems (I think?).
Please let me know if you need any other information to help solve this problem.

Thank you so much for any help!

 

[Hacb]

hmmm... do you use USB headphones or speakers? if so, the USBPORT.sys reference makes sense.

 

[brandough]

hmmm... do you use USB headphones or speakers? if so, the USBPORT.sys reference makes sense.

I use speakers.
I mostly use a soundbar which is connected from my computer with an optical cable. I also have computer speakers connected, but mostly use my soundbar as I have my computer set up to my TV with an HDMI cable for watching shows/movies.

 

[Hacb]

ok, even so, try updating USBPORT.sys, just in case, it might also save you some big trouble later.

 

[brandough]

ok, even so, try updating USBPORT.sys, just in case, it might also save you some big trouble later.

Probably a dumb question, but how do I go about doing that? Would it be with the windows updates? I just went through all of them and updated everything that was in there.

Also, I changed my power plan setting to "High Performance" and it seemed to help a little bit. It's still high, but it's lower than it was before. Here's a screenshot of what LatencyMon looks like now.

EDIT: Nevermind. The longer my computer is on the worse it's getting. Within in an hour it will probably be back to where it was originally.

 

[brandough]

Here's what it looks like an hour later...

 

[Hacb]

ok, it says you should check for BIOS updates, to do this follow these instructions:
How to Check Your BIOS Version and Update it

 

[brandough]

ok, it says you should check for BIOS updates, to do this follow these instructions:
How to Check Your BIOS Version and Update it

Gah.. it's not letting me update either.
I found out my BIOS is American Megatrends, so I went here and downloaded the "firmware update tool for Aptio and AMIBOS."
Then I move all those files (they come as a zip) to my computer, go into the AMIBOS file, go to the AFUWin file, then go to the 64 since my computer is 64-bit. In that file there's a "AFUWINx64" application which I assume is the program which should open and let me update the BIOS. But after I click that button a screen comes up which says it's recommended to close all programs, so I close all programs and then press "ok" but after I press that after one second everything freezes. The first time I did it I let the computer run for 10 minutes to see if anything would happen and nothing happend and the time stayed the same, so everything was frozen. I had to force shut it down. I tried it a couple more times and the same thing happens.. no program starts.. it just freezes.

I'll include screenshots of the files and then screen which I press "ok" on and then it freezes.
Please help! Thanks!

 

[Hacb]

there is a 64 and 32 folder, try the x32 version.

 

[brandough]

there is a 64 and 32 folder, try the x32 version.

Just tried it and I got an error message. "Error: Loading driver"

 

[Hacb]

try downloading it again, you my have had a dodgy download.

 

[brandough]

try downloading it again, you my have had a dodgy download.

Tried it. Same thing happens. :\

 

[Hacb]

ok, try again, this time right click and say run as administrator

 

[brandough]

ok, try again, this time right click and say run as administrator

Tried that and it did the same thing as before.
I did it a different way though. Instead of going through American Megatrends I went directly to my motherboards manufacturer. My motherboard is ASRock Z77 Extreme 6, so I went here ASRock > Z77 Extreme6 and installed the 2.8 (7/23/13) for windows. It was successful and it now says I have "P2.80" where it previously said "P2.60"
But.. my latency is still the same as it was before. I even disabled CPU throttling in the BIOS and that didn't change anything either.
Attached is a screenshot of LatencyMon after this BIOS update.

 

[Hacb]

next thing to consider is the audio drivers, check them for updates and if needed update them and try again.

 

[brandough]

next thing to consider is the audio drivers, check them for updates and if needed update them and try again.

Updated the audio (and video drivers while I was at it) and everything is still the same.
Attached updated LatencyMon screenshots after letting it run for 20 minutes.

 

[brandough]

Do you think getting a dedicated soundcard would fix this problem?
I'm so stuck on how to fix this that I wouldn't mind spending a little if it meant getting rid of these sound errors. :\

 

[Hacb]

maybe...

 

[brandough]

I just found something really interesting.
My mom and dad both have computers as well, so I decided out of curiosity to run Latency Mon on their computers to see if they might have the same problem. LatencyMon said both of their computers also have real time audio/video problems.
Attached is the screenshots of their LatencyMon results.

 

[Hacb]

maybe it is a normal thing... sometimes things can seem like errors ut are actually completely normal.