Audio popping issue

[Elliah-Seraheart]

I've got a theory.

Can ya'll list:
1. What driver + version you are using (Control Panel -> Hardware&Sound -> Sound -> Device Properties -> General -> Properties -> Driver)
2. Type of Device Stereo/Quadraphonic/5.1/7.1 Sound -> Configure -> Test out and set it correctly.
3. Scope of issues experiences
4. GPU (since NVidia 1080 and 1070 seem to have trouble with atmos)

I've found a post from a year ago that tricks FF14 into outputting surround sound to stereo headphones.
Apparently, when FF14 starts up it checks whether your audio device is stereo, 5.1 or 7.1. Depending on that, it decides to output surround or stereo. The post in question tricked FF14 by manually assigning their stereo device to 5.1 or 7.2, then starting FF14, then switching it back to stereo.

As an aside, these very people used to experience the exact same issues of popping/stuttering audio, or missing audio altogether. This is the exact same thing we are experiencing now. For them, it happened when they used MSI Nahimic, Sonic or other third party surround software that didnt play nice with FF14.

I also know that FF14 doesnt actually use the windows audio driver, but comes with its own driver.

All of this leads me to believe, that with the Introduction of Endwalker and crucially, Spatial Audio, we are now having issues with FF14 falsely detecting our audio capabilities. Whenever audio is "cutting out", it's trying to feed us surround sounds our drivers/devices cannot actually output (similar to test feature in Sound/Configure). Hence why we then hear messed up audio interfering/overlayed on the stereo audio. This also makes sense with the obstruction theory - since audio that is obstructed is surely modified in some way by surround/spatial. I'm not yet sure how DX9 / DX11 play into this - since I don't understand how rendering and tessellation works - but I believe the way things are rendered may make a difference, since the audio needs to know where things are in relation to the listener and what the environment looks like, to know what it has to do with the spatial/surround data.

Edit: Using Square Enix's Immersive Spatial Audio fixed everything for me. This just leads me to believe that I'm onto something with my theory.
Though it is a paid service, there's a 25 day trial. I hate how it sounds- but using the trial allows you to actually play Endwalker and gives you 25 days to wait for the audio fix.

If you are reading this and I'm right... Pls hire me Square. I work in Software Testing and always wanted to work in gaming. Willing to relocate and/or learn japanese. I'm serious.