Audio Crackling with certain sounds frequencies (16-bit games) and watching Youtube.

[yhn_yohan]

Hello!
I am new here on the forums but have been a rog consumer for quite some time. 

Around august 7th i started noticing audio crackling popping up all of a sudden when i was playing Super Metroid (listening to the audio through my capture card) and ever since then the problem has been a constant. 
The best ways i can provoke it is by going on youtube and skipping in the video or adjusting the volume or by playing Super Metroid and firing a shot or when high pitch sounds in the soundtrack. 
It also occurs at random when listening to people talking on discord. 

I'm at my wits end after countless hours of troubleshooting, googling, testing and replacing things. 
So i'm here hoping someone can help me. 

I have a ROG Strix B550-f mobo with a ryzen 9 5900X and a ROG Strix RTX 3080ti. 
When i first noticed the crackling it was through 4k capture utility for my el gato HD60 Pro running on Windows 10 Pro. 

I thought this was a software issue at the time and was planning to reformat and upgrade to windows 11 anyway, which i did but the problem was still present. 

Since then i have tried updating and downgrading my audio drivers (using Mokichus posts being part of it)
I've done the same for chipset, gpu and drivers for capture card. 
I've updated my bios. 
I replaced my capture card to a new one. 
I've tested different Headphones and Speakers, both USB and 3.5 and through a DAC. 
I've reformatted the pc twice since i initially formatted it. (back to windows 10 and windows 11 again) and the issues are present on a clean install. 
I've made sure to check all my cables in my build are ok and replaced USB cables, power strips and cables to make sure it's not some kind of interference there. 
Adjusting voltages in BIOS to see if i can get any difference. 

Only thing that seems to help somewhat but barely is by making sure audiodg.exe has high cpu priority, it seems to reduce it happening. 

I don't know exactly what is causing this problem but it's disheartening to deal with and i don't know what to do next and i'm really considering going for a new build at this point. 
 
Please note that most things that you can easily find through the "audio crackling" googling rabbit hole i have tried. 
Thankful for anyone taking their time and trying to help.

[Jiaszzz_ROG]

Hello @yhn_yohan 

Thank you for reaching out to us.
Could you please confirm if you are currently using the ROG STRIX B550-F GAMING / ROG STRIX B550-F G... / ROG STRIX B550-F GAMING WIFI II? 
Based on your description, the audio crackling issue first occurred while playing a game with a capture card and has since randomly occurred during high-frequency sound scenarios.
May I ask if you have tried adjusting the audio sample rate and bit depth?

We recommend completely uninstalling audio-related drivers and reinstalling the drivers provided on the motherboard’s official website under Support > Driver & Utility > Driver & Tools for your specific operating system.
For example, please install the Realtek Audio Driver V6.0.9411.1 For Windows 10/11 64-bit on the ROG STRIX B550-F GAMING, shut down, clear the CMOS, restart, and enter safe mode to check if the intermittent audio crackling issue persists.

When troubleshooting, please also avoid connecting with a capture card, DAC, external devices, or any adapters, and refer to the user manual to connect your headphones or speakers directly to the audio ports on the rear of the motherboard.

Thank you.

[yhn_yohan]

Hello @Jiaszzz_ROG
thank you for replying !

Sorry, i am using a Rog Strix B550-F Gaming

I have adjusted the audio sample rate and bit depth but it had no effect on the issue.

The issue presents itself the best when i play older games like 16-bit, and i assume it's because of the sound frequencies. (see example of when i first noticed it at 4:10 in following video: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2219045254?t=00h04m10s)
It does also present itself on youtube (see example https://streamable.com/tdvg47) and while i was looking up the video on twitch for me to share i noticed that the same thing with the volume button and crackling occurs on twitch video player.
The issue also presents itself in discord calls when certain people speak.

Unfortunately i've tried reinstalling the very drivers you've mentioned and clearing cmos, i can't really test it out in Safe mode since none of the applications when it presents itself the most are accessible in it.

I have tried with Headphones and speakers using both USB and 3.5 on the back and front (and different ports) to no avail.

I've also made sure to not have anything else except only the necessary plugged in to test if it occurs and it does.

And like i mentioned, this happens on clean installs of both WIndows 10 Pro and Windows 11 Pro.
To make sure it wasn't a capture card issue which i thought at first i did change it out and i have tested without it being inserted but the issue still presents itself.

I've also enabled MSI mode on all the available devices using the MSI mode utility.

Thank you for taking your time, i hope my information will help you get a better picture of the issue.

[Sentinal13]

Have you tried blowing an air duster over your motherboard and ensuring that there is no dust anywhere.   Also check your fan cables are not  close to the sound ics / chips    Maybe try with disconnecting the fans for a short time.    Do you have your High definition audio enabled on your graphics card ? Maybe try disabling it in device manager 

[yhn_yohan]

Thank you for taking your time and reading about my problem.

I've taken apart and cleaned my pc to make sure no dust got stuck anywhere it shouldn't along with reseating all my cables.
I did however not try booting up without my extra chassi fans before and did so now.
 Sadly the issue is still present even without them connected.

I've disabled the HD Audio since i don't use it, i've tried enabling it as well but didn't make any difference.

[Sentinal13]

The only other thinking that I have is maybe try a different load line calibration in your bios    Sorry you are having problems. 

[achugh]

Hi @yhn_yohan thank you for sharing the streamable link in your post above. I could not fully understand your issue from the first (twitch) link first.

Can you also share some more details of your setup exactly? I am still not able to picture what all is connected and how.

Let us start with how you recorded the streamable video. What all was connected and how you recorded it?

As an example, you have your capture card (say Elgato) connected to capture the video and audio then give complete details of what exact model you are using how the wires are connected (as an example say you are using Elgato 4K Pro card and you have your RTX 4070 HDMI out is going into the HDMI IN on the Elgato 4K Pro. The HDMI out from the 4K Pro is then connected to the Dell 2423 P Monitor. I am making it up to give you an example of what we need).

Once you provide your setup details and also any software and driver versions of the devices you are using we can then work here to provide additional help.