Audio popping issue

[ChilledApple]

For those with RealTek chipsets on their motherboard you can get a marginal improvement by installing the latest drivers for your sound chip.

What it sounds like is happening is the new spatial sound engine is processing some kind of after effects on the sounds. in single instances this is fine, however it seems like the FX series has an issue with processing these sounds, either its cache is too small or some quirk of its architecture. either way this is unacceptable, you should have the choice to revert back to the old sound engine, they keep in DX9 after all and literally nobody uses that anymore.

And thats where i doesn't add up. I am having this issue most in single instances like the rising stones and every inn room. With the spatial audio pack activated i just have to enter those instances and wait a few seconds until the audio breaks. However with the pack activated combat is fine. If i deactivate the audio pack it is exactly reverted. Single instances are fine unless i am not using any Skills, but combat sound is broken.

[Rannzyr]

While some are saying PS4/PS5 users can also experience the issue too, I've yet to actually see proof of it happening...
If we could get some video of that, it could help get it noticed probably.
I mean nothing would make "Maybe it's 10+ year old CPU's" lose all credibility like the PS5 having issues lol

People who say it's an issue with a 10 year old CPU have no idea about computers or hardware and can be readily ignored.

Especially since this issue only cropped up in endwalker with the push for this crappy immerse audio engine. I could play the game fine at 60 FPS max settings, my CPU doesn't suddenly become untenable overnight.

What stings more is I love this game, I want to do the msq buy I can't because the audio is so bad.

[Rannzyr]

And thats where i doesn't add up. I am having this issue most in single instances like the rising stones and every inn room. With the spatial audio pack activated i just have to enter those instances and wait a few seconds until the audio breaks. However with the pack activated combat is fine. If i deactivate the audio pack it is exactly reverted. Single instances are fine unless i am not using any Skills, but combat sound is broken.

It's going to be different for every person more than likely. In my testing I've found that melee classes suffer the most, especially warrior and dark knight shoes.

I've had it happen in quiet areas and loud ones. Overall the audio is just broken and it should not have been released in this state.
We are not running some whacky combination of hardware, we are running a very common CPU that's still good to this day.

[Rannzyr]

Seems like a weird fix to install a driver made 4 years ago to fix a problem in 2021/2022

Realtek Driver:
Vista, Windows7, Windows8, Windows8.1, Windows10 Driver (32/64bits) Driver only (ZIP file) R2.82 2017/07/26 427 MB

it is so old it is downloading at 40kb a sec. It will be done in 4 hours, despite already having it on my system as windows installs a newer version, i'll try it none-the-less.

40.0 KB/s - 15.6 MB of 417 MB, 3 hours left (not exaggerating)

It's because realtek abandoned the chipset drivers long ago because they are just bad at doing audio drivers.

It does improve it for me but as I said your mileage may vary, I'm just trying to go down the list of solution's I can possibly try. I can't find any ini or settings to limit the amount of audio channels so that idea is out.

[XenophineEX]

It's because realtek abandoned the chipset drivers long ago because they are just bad at doing audio drivers.

It does improve it for me but as I said your mileage may vary, I'm just trying to go down the list of solution's I can possibly try. I can't find any ini or settings to limit the amount of audio channels so that idea is out.

I am close just buying this stupid new audio thing they have to make this go away, but apparently even that is broken. I just want combat to work. I play as a dragoon, and it is crippling not to be able to hear things.

To be exact their last "fix" on making combo sounds "more noticeable" made it to where I can no longer hear them over the stuttering and now I am lost unless I stare at my combo bars and turn the sound off.

[aaantares]

Also using an AMD FX series processor, had some audio crackling when Endwalker dropped but it was manageable (switching between Standard and Bass Boost in settings often got rid of it for some hours); the latest patch however made it unbearable. The only way I can play with sounds on is to turn the camera away from the enemy - the issues begin the moment I enter a battle - as all sounds that come from the sides or behind don't cause any issues, only the sounds that come from front centre and front left/right do. I've tried nearly every suggestion found in this thread & what was suggested in the patch notes but none of them helped me so far; I still need to try using monitor speakers instead of headset but at this point I'm not very hopeful & I'd like to keep using my brand new headset :-(

I realise the FX series cpus aren't recent at all but for example mine, the FX-8370, is 7 years old (2014) which... isn't ancient like many of the official responses imply.

[XenophineEX]

My processor is also AMD

AMD FX(tm)-6300 Six-Core Processor 3.50 GHz
Installed Ram 16.0 GB @1866
Nvidia geforce gtx 960
mobo msi 970

It has played everything including this quite well, minus the sound issues.

Need to add it is on windows 10 home, (paid for) 64 bit.
Windows 10 Home version 21H2; OS Build 19044.1415

I can also add I have another 12gig's of vram across 3 drives, and 1 drive a solid state for only system performance at 80 gigs a ssd.

Another thing to add it that I have everything set to programs, as that would reap the most benefit here, setting things to background processes won't work. I have also gave the game near realtime processor priority, yet even then it only eats about 40%. The processor is also overclocked and running under 70 degrees at 4.2 ghz.

This is the mobo page https://us.msi.com/Motherboard/970-GAMING/Specification

the main take-away from that mobo page is the audio device: Audio

• Realtek® ALC1150 Codec
- 7.1-Channel High Definition Audio
- Supports S/PDIF output

[MoonstalkerZ]

My dad, a 40-year veteran of the programming industry, had several insights that I'd like to share here.

First, the community team's response of blaming user hardware may not be the opinion of the devs, or even of the individual community team members, but could be a result of orders from on high based on advice from lawyers. If SE delivered a non-functioning product, and the problem IS on their end, they could be liable for damages, depending on how the laws work in Japan. So though yes, the response sucks, we shouldn't be abusive to the community team - it's entirely possible they're just doing what the lawyers told them to, and being nasty isn't going to help them fix anything.

His second insight is about what the devs might have been dealing with when they were writing the new sound engine. If they were basing it around this third party system, they would have had to figure out how to work with an unfamiliar API, and there's a good chance they had to contort their programming around this API. Also, I could be wrong, but it doesn't look like Embody is a Japanese company, so if the documentation was only written in English and they didn't have any programmers fluent enough in English to understand the documentation, they'd need to get someone to translate first. Not only does that require someone who speaks both Japanese and English, but it requires a translator with programming knowledge in both languages. (Trust me, as a former amateur translator, googling stuff will only get you so far if you don't even understand the subject matter.) It's certainly not an excuse for the shoddy mess they pushed out at the last minute with no warning, but that's a programmer's opinion of what the devs' experience might have been.

Finally, he mentioned that their inability to reproduce the problem is a HUGE barrier to fixing it. He said that at this point, their best bet is to find someone who has the bug and flat out buy their computer (and pay for a replacement, of course - $2000 is nothing to SE).

So several takeaways from that.
1) Temper your expectations. They can't even reproduce the bug. It's not going to be fixed in two weeks unless they can immediately reproduce the bug.
2) I realize that means the game's going to be an awful experience for a long time. Go ahead and unsubscribe if you want, if enough people do it it'll put pressure on them to get it fixed quickly, but also don't feel bad if you don't unsubscribe - I plan on playing anyway, I still enjoy it enough that I'm not willing to give it up just to send a message.
3) I really do think they're trying. While the situation is extremely frustrating, even anger-inducing, writing abuse at the devs and the community team on the official forum isn't going to help any.
4) DO keep up the pressure, though. Keep talking about it, keep sending bug reports (DETAILED bug reports), keep tweeting. I understand we're all angry and frustrated, but do TRY not to be a total jerk about it.
5) I keep seeing people posting their hardware in here, bug symptoms and steps they've taken to fix it. Don't just post them in here, post bug reports as well. It's the bug reports that they're going to read.

[Maeklos]

So the VAC did actually stop the stuttering?

If thats the case it may be a problem with FX chips and their motherboards onboard audio. unfortunately its something I cant exactly test because who has sound cards anymore?

I'm stumped to be honest, I just cant believe that its not been addressed when its been reported thousands of times.

The VAC did not stop the stuttering. It just turned it from audio garbage (extremely loud G-G-G-G-G-G-G-G-G) to muting effects. Basically, the VAC driver wasn't putting through the audio garbage, making it sound like someone was flicking the Mute button really quickly.

[Maeklos]

So several takeaways from that.
1) Temper your expectations. They can't even reproduce the bug. It's not going to be fixed in two weeks unless they can immediately reproduce the bug.
2) I realize that means the game's going to be an awful experience for a long time. Go ahead and unsubscribe if you want, if enough people do it it'll put pressure on them to get it fixed quickly, but also don't feel bad if you don't unsubscribe - I plan on playing anyway, I still enjoy it enough that I'm not willing to give it up just to send a message.
3) I really do think they're trying. While the situation is extremely frustrating, even anger-inducing, writing abuse at the devs and the community team on the official forum isn't going to help any.
4) DO keep up the pressure, though. Keep talking about it, keep sending bug reports (DETAILED bug reports), keep tweeting. I understand we're all angry and frustrated, but do TRY not to be a total jerk about it.
5) I keep seeing people posting their hardware in here, bug symptoms and steps they've taken to fix it. Don't just post them in here, post bug reports as well. It's the bug reports that they're going to read.

I really like these takeaways and add my own support to them. The team just made an amazing expansion with Endwalker. And, yes, it sucks that we can't enjoy it -now-, but I think that we can all agree that these folks who have just gotten out of at least a couple months' worth of hard crunch deserve some time off with their families for the holidays. Plus, we've all already gotten 21 days of free game time out of all this. Adding it up for everyone who's subscribed, that means that Yoshi-P's given his players something like $20 million just to try to set things right already.

So, keep it up, don't give up, but temper expectations until after the holidays.