Bloody infuriating sound problem - Asus P5K Premium

[rosscouk]

Hi there,

I have just bought a new pc, about a month ago and have been having an issue with the sound. Specs

Quad Q9300 (455fsbx7.5), 4gb Corsair Dominator PC2-8500 (2x2gb), Asus P5K Premium (Black Pearl Ed) mobo (onboard sound). Win XP Service Pack 3, software is sound max. I have tried the HD audio and AC97 in the bios.

My problem may be related to the overclock but I am not sure, the sound basically pops and crackles on Itunes and seems to stutter on games like medievil 2 and crysis (funnily though, if I open up windows media or media monkey, sound plays fine). However it doesnt do it all the time, which makes diagnosing tough. I have all the drivers up to date (Soundmax 5.2). If I put the pc back to normal clock speeds then the sound problem disappears. The weird thing is if I leave the computer overclocked and turn it off and leave for a couple of hours and turn it back on, the sound can be fine. I won't have changed anything (still overclocked), and it works fine. Then occasionally the issue returns. Tried re-installing the sound drivers with no effects.

I have wondered about heat, core temp is reporting 45-48c at the moment and real temp 35-38 so that doesn't appear to the issue.

It is bloody maddening!!!!!

Can anybody help? Could it be a conflict somewhere, is it a driver issue, could I have something overclocked/under volted in the bios?

Cheers for any help it is much appreciated.
Rosscouk

 

[visorneon]

Hey, just to rule it out, are you definite its not a hardware problem, interference with the cables etc?

I know my friend who had the cables from his sub to his PC ran behind his CRT TV and it apparently interefered causing some fuzzy kind of noises, i guess because of the magnets

Im sure it isnt but best to rule it out to be sure

 

[rosscouk]

thanks for the reply, no its not interferance, a music file will play fine on mediamonkey, if I then try to play the same file on itunes the its all stuttery and popping. Whilst the itunes stuggles, all my games are the same, spluttering and popping with the sound, it seems to slow the games down aswell. If I was to turn the whole machine off, but not actually change any settings, the issue would resolve, itunes would be fine again as would games.

any more ideas?

I have been trying to get the standard windows high def audio driver to work, but no dice so far.

would a standalone sound card fix this?

 

[dragonsprayer]

455fsb and not enough voltage will do it

reduce the oc and check the sound does it work?

reset the oc correctly or reduce it
that is not a 455fsb mobo

 

[dagger]

455fsb and not enough voltage will do it

reduce the oc and check the sound does it work?

reset the oc correctly or reduce it
that is not a 455fsb mobo

Yep, p35 chipset boards run natively at 1333mhz (4x333) and reliably oc to 1600mhz (4x400) fsb. Some go higher, but it's hit or miss. In this case, miss.

 

[rosscouk]

Thanks for the replies.

The board at 455 appears rock steady, it primes for hours and temps are fine. The only issue is the sound (and the packaging on the board is all about how overclockable it is!). Plus what is strange is you can use it fine some days, no problem and others it has the issue with the sound, so it is difficult to isolate the issue. Also when I do have the sound issue (crackling and popping), why do I only get it in Itunes but not in media player for instance.

I have read there are issues with the jmicron controller and even that the pcspeaker can cause the problem.

When all said and done, I could buy an external sound card, do you think that would solve the problem? Or at least, it might go around the problem.

Finally there are a myriad of options to clock further if it is a volts issue, which do you think might need that little extra?

 

[dragonsprayer]

sound like a driver issue

you need to reinstall the drivers in right order for the apps being used or there may be a conflict with itunes and the sound

i do not use itunes but many people do without issues - i say reload drivers with oc off
you might have currupted a driver install with oc

you should always load and update with oc off - extra safe way to do it

 

[JohnnyMash]

I have an Asus P5K-SE/E8400 stock FSB (..for now...) in a Cooler Master 331 GLITE case, and I too found that the onboard sound was not very reliable. When playing GTA:SA, the sound would randomly drop out, channels would vanish e.g. there was ambient sound, passing cars, but no gunfire noises.

I tried latest drivers and whatnot, and I am aware that there is a slightly different sound chip in my lower-end board to the higher ones, but my solution was to set in BIOS the 'Front Sound Connector/Panel' (or whatever its called) to AC'97 mode rather than HD Audio mode. GTA now runs without sound issues, but not 100% sure if that was the cure. Give it a go. I don't recall any sound issues of late, and it was the only thing I tried, ohhh and I tried, that actually seemed to have a real effect on the crackling/popping/L/R balance problems I originally had.

and what dragonsprayer said... drivers at no OC for max installationability.. lol... That's not even a word, but meh. Hope it helps!

 

[artisanpc]

Hi folks -

I'm running a Xeon 3040 OC to 450FSB on a P5K-E Wifi/AP. No sound issues in XP, but when I installed Windows 7 32-bit to test (using the Vista drivers) I get snap crackle and pop on mouse scroll every 60 seconds or so. It turned out to be the wireless NIC interfering, disabled that and everything was fine (I run wired anyway).

Hope that helps someone.