Rough/scratchy audio --> Amplification level [FIX/WORKAROUND]

[leyabe]

Hi,

I am getting rough/scratchy/crackling sound from my onboard sound card. This occurs at any volume level above 50-60% in Windows. In Windows 10, if you go in the Sound control panel the issue is easy to experience by playing the "Asterisk" or "Calendar Reminder" sounds, but I heard it in other sounds too, even listening to music didn't seem right.

Not speaker-related, as it happens with my two different speaker sets, and with my headset too.

I traced the issue back to the amplification level in ASUS's Supreme FX Audio driver.
For me, the Amplification level was set to "Extreme" by default, which is the highest of the three possible levels. Dialing this back to the lowest level, labeled "Performace" in the driver (typo in the driver, not my typo) resolves this issue. With basic ("Performace") amplification no sound distortion is heard.

As additional information, I found that not installing the ASUS Audio driver and relying on the Windows 10's built-in driver results in the same issue, and in fact even worse as the Windows driver does not appear to expose an UI to change the amplification level, so you're stuck on "Extreme".
to save everyone's time, the Windows built-in driver does not appear to honor the registry setting where the ASUS driver stores it's amplification level setting either.

Lastly, using the official Realtek driver as opposed to the Windows or the ASUS driver also resolves the issue, as it defaults to the lowest amplification level and not the highest. The Realtek driver does not appear to expose an UI to this setting either, but at least makes my PC sound better, at least in my case.

[richac]

leyabe wrote:
Well, this thread has lost traction, but ASUS, is there any way you would be able to provide an updated driver that remembers the "Amplify level" that the user selects?
Currently this setting reverts to "Extreme" at every reboot.

I don't think this should be very difficult to implement, the mechanism for switching amplify levels is already there, you just need to remember the user selection across reboots, you know, save the setting to the registry or to a local .ini or .cfg file or something... shouldn't be that hard.

I wonder if this is related to similar issue i have with the b250f gaming board. Audio is fine, until i reboot, then I get random crackling/popping. Pain to keep reinstalling the drivers on every boot. Hope asus fixes it.


Also @OP, sometimes I get that issue if I have microphone on. You hear the static at high volume. You could lower mic input or just disable the option to hear it through speakers.

[masterac]

Change your power supply, a bad power supply can be the reason, its possible the noise you hear are the cpu, use to happen to me but on a old asus mobo maximus extrem V, then i change the psu and soundcard too.

Still hapen when i play with friend that have old pc, i can hear their cpu over their microphone.

I havent test the onboard sound card of the zenith yet, i use a usb yamaha controler, i will use a jack 3.5 and tell you if i get anything, since i use a 1500w psu that run underload because of its capacity

[richac]

masterac wrote:
Change your power supply, a bad power supply can be the reason, its possible the noise you hear are the cpu, use to happen to me but on a old asus mobo maximus extrem V, then i change the psu and soundcard too.

Still hapen when i play with friend that have old pc, i can hear their cpu over their microphone.

I havent test the onboard sound card of the zenith yet, i use a usb yamaha controler, i will use a jack 3.5 and tell you if i get anything, since i use a 1500w psu that run underload because of its capacity

Its not the psu, its a driver or bios issue. A usb sound card would most likely bypass the problem, but I paid for my board for the sound chip as well, assuming it would work correctly.

[masterac]

richac wrote:
Its not the psu, its a driver or bios issue. A usb sound card would most likely bypass the problem, but I paid for my board for the sound chip as well, assuming it would work correctly.

affirming something without any idea on what it could be is a bit odd, it is more likely he didnt buy the psu recently so it could be a bad one or cheap one, the board on the other end is new, ans since he is the only one posting about this its probable that its the psu

bad power delivery can do a lot of noise on sound, thats also why you dont plug your speaker or peripheral audio device on a power strip, but on an individual one ( same go for the pc)

it also why i have an overkill 1500w power delivery for my computer, so its will never be under high load i think i am around 400w right now.

here are multiple post explaining it :

http://forum.corsair.com/v3/showthread.php?t=85166

https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/static-noise-while-using-onboard-sound.1529077/

https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/245585-psu-making-static-noises/

and here is the rest since there is a lot of it

https://www.google.fr/search?num=30&rlz=1C1ASUM_enFR767FR767&ei=3FwGWqKvH8jRkwX4wJDQCA&q=psu+static+...

[spadizzle]

masterac wrote:
affirming something without any idea on what it could be is a bit odd, it is more likely he didnt buy the psu recently so it could be a bad one or cheap one, the board on the other end is new, ans since he is the only one posting about this its probable that its the psu

bad power delivery can do a lot of noise on sound, thats also why you dont plug your speaker or peripheral audio device on a power strip, but on an individual one ( same go for the pc)

it also why i have an overkill 1500w power delivery for my computer, so its will never be under high load i think i am around 400w right now.

here are multiple post explaining it :

http://forum.corsair.com/v3/showthread.php?t=85166

https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/static-noise-while-using-onboard-sound.1529077/

https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/245585-psu-making-static-noises/

and here is the rest since there is a lot of it

https://www.google.fr/search?num=30&rlz=1C1ASUM_enFR767FR767&ei=3FwGWqKvH8jRkwX4wJDQCA&q=psu+static+...

Brand new PSU here, check my profile. Does it on the Zenith. Crosshair VI had no sound issues with the same PSU.

[masterac]

spadizzle wrote:
Brand new PSU here, check my profile. Does it on the Zenith. Crosshair VI had no sound issues with the same PSU.

if you used already the psu with another motherboard..thats not new son

[JpArizona]

I run a lil home studio and to me it sounds like you have a simple ground loop issue.

Its when you have your speaker wires running next to power wires or other electrical wires, or have powered speakers that are plugged into the same outlets as the source.

You can buy a ground loop isolator for like 8 bucks, and if this is the problem its not an asus or anyones issue just how these type of things work.

[klepp0906]

same issue on z370 maximus x formula.

been through a plethora of drivers. they default to "performace" (engrish) when i have my headset set to stereo, but the minute i change it to 7.1 it defaults to extreme. Extreme sounds better in general, but changing the volume knob on my headset (razer tiamat 7.1 v2) i can hear feedback through the headset. Or in retroarch when navigating the menu at extreme i get crackles with the navigation click sound.

same as the distortion in the windows cancel sound effect thing.

everywhere else its fine more or less.

someone said realtek is blaming it on M$ interrupts or some such? has anyone tried changing to MSI using MSI mode utility? it would need to be re-done every time you update your drivers which is a pain, and if it alleviated it one would question why its not the default.

of all my drivers only 2 dont use MSI, nvidias gpu driver, and realteks audio driver. the rest all do.

[EviLFazZ]

Exact same issue here since I first got my (crappy low budget ...:p) ROG Zenith II Extreme Alpha way back in March 2020 and the drivers have not changed or been updated since.

My only work around is setting this 'so called' high end motherboard to the lower audio quality and then it is stable/works, anything sends ear-deafing noise to all ports front and rear (depending which ever is enabled at the time of changing and starting ANY audio, films, music, web based, games, etc) :mad:

I have requested help from Asus directly a few times now and the only thing they keep saying, is send the board for RMA. Great, so I loose my build for a year, whilst they possibly figure out, pay £££GBP's to send from the UK to some distant international address (last time was the US), whilst having costly parts just sit here do nothing and we all know, it is not hardware, it is software based, as this is not the first time this happened (all their Threadrippers boards have suffered the same until they did 'something' about it) :mad:

20+ years with Asus and I seriously regret the last 3 years of wasting my time and (huge amounts of) money with them and their zero support for such basic things :mad:

[Tux-box1]

I started a thread before finding this one, https://rog.asus.com/forum/showthread.php?120806-Nahimic-high-volume-static
What I'm experincing is: at random timing my audio will go full valume static, it's very painful.
I thought the issue was with Nahimic, as this handles the Sonic Studio/Sonic Radar stuff. If I'm wrong on this let me know.
I moved my head set connections to the front, has anyone else tried the front audio connectors? For now I haven't run in to the issue but I've not had the time to verify.
I prefer to use the rear as that works best with my desk setup. Before anyone asks, my audio cables are shilded and routed specficly to aboid interferance and cross noize, the computer is on dedicated UPS(Pure Sine) by it's self and I get the same issue on line power, its the only thing on this circuit.