Popping audio over multiple sound cards

[dynasonic]

I must be missing something in windows 7 settings or my BIOS and am hoping that you guys may be able to point me in the right direction. When I first installed Windows 7 64 Bit, I started getting audio popping all over the place with my Creative XFi Xtreme Music. I did have my rig overclocked and once I disabled that, I was able to get my onboard (Realtek) sound card functioning ok. The Creative Card still popped.

I like to listen to MP3's while playing World of Warcraft, it seems when I have both the game and Windows Media Center running audio will pop and studder. My PC should be capable of running both. (I7 920 / 6GB of 1600Mhz RAM / Caviar Black HD / Radeon 4950) I have this problem with multiple sound cards... Here is a list of what I have used soundcard wise, the issues I am having. Please let me know if there is some setting in Windows or the BIOS that I can try changing.

Creative Xfi - Pops all the time. I hate this card so I don't really care.

Realtek onboard sound - Pops/Studders when running WoW and WMC at the same time.

MAudio 24/96 - Pops on just WMC unless I have the buffer memory set to max and even then, it will studder or pop once every couple of minutes

Line6 UX2 - Can record music ok but pops on playback even with the buffer set to max

Presonus FP10 - Can record music ok but pops on playback even with the buffer set to max

I have turned off speedstep. My rig is running at stock speed. I have disabled core parking and have tried multiple media players beyond WMC and nothing really seems to fix it.

What could I be overlooking?

 

[not so gray matter]

It could be caused by a couple of things.

A) Interference. Move all items that could be causing interference away from the computer, ie. Routers, Modems, Cell Phones, etc.

B) Power Supply Issue.

C) Program/driver malfunction

Read this post at Tom's Hardware, could help you >> http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/170280-28-speaker-makes-popping-sound

 

[PeaB4YouGo]

On a (somewhat) related note: I have my UX-2 hooked up to my desktop (see sys specs). It works fine with the latest drivers. NO issues to note.

When I hooked it up to a Compaq laptop (no particulars, cuz I was in a hurry) I got that pop/static through EVERY output the UX-2 has. Headphones, Line-Out, Analog Out, etc...

I'm thinking power issues, where my situation is concerned. Do the USB ports on a laptop suffer loss of power compared to a desktop?