Audio popping issue

[Geirr]

I'm going to guess that the northbridge might have something to do with it and it isn't just a CPU issue. I say that because I've tried to help a friend troubleshoot it. They used the integrated sound at first which was southbridge. Southbridge has to go through northbridge to talk to CPU.

Had friend try to run audio off her graphics card only. Graphics card on her old motherboard has no direct CPU access, it goes through northbridge first. Still had issues.

Friend tried a 70$ soundblaster audio card. Said card still has to go through northbridge to talk to CPU and should have offloaded some work off the CPU. Still had the issue.

Maybe the changes to audio are jamming up the northbridge on older CPUs, as well as just not being good for those CPU designs.

[Puss_Kat]

I'm going to guess that the northbridge might have something to do with it and it isn't just a CPU issue. I say that because I've tried to help a friend troubleshoot it. They used the integrated sound at first which was southbridge. Southbridge has to go through northbridge to talk to CPU.

Had friend try to run audio off her graphics card only. Graphics card on her old motherboard has no direct CPU access, it goes through northbridge first. Still had issues.

Friend tried a 70$ soundblaster audio card. Said card still has to go through northbridge to talk to CPU and should have offloaded some work off the CPU. Still had the issue.

Maybe the changes to audio are jamming up the northbridge on older CPUs, as well as just not being good for those CPU designs.

IO Chipsets are irrelevant to this issue.

Sound cards do not "offload" work from the cpu,
Vista removed the hardware abstraction layer for Sound devices, only certain Creative cards can forward hardware dsound to the hardware dac/apu via openal on vista-10.


CPU utilisation is reduced considerably in 6.08, the issues should no longer manifest,

I can also no longer reproduce the exponential increase in CPU usage when muting SFX and Ambient in area's full of such effects.

[redghost289]

As far as I can tell, this appears to be fixed with patch 6.08! I checked a few areas, entered combat, did a trial, and heard no crackling nor distortion. Crystal-clear background music, even in combat, for the first time since Shadowbringers! If you're reading this before logging in for the day, it might be safe to get your hopes up!

[Vallek]

Ditto the above, as far as I can tell its been fixed!

[Baekho]

Just wanted to check in to say the same, first impressions are very positive! I immediately noticed the game performing better since those occasional microstutters I have had since the launch of EW seem to be gone. Visited multiple areas where I experienced audio issues, did open world combat + a trial and no crackling sounds whatsoever thus far. If any problems show up I'll report back but otherwise I am hopeful that the issue has been fixed!

Wishing everyone a good time ingame!

[Puss_Kat]

the fix will also result in reduced cpu temperatures, less spikes to CPU and better performance across all content.

[Nommers]

Early testing is extremely promising on my end. No issues whatsoever in the usual spots. I think we should probably wait a day or two for more people to do more testing before saying it's 100% fixed, but so far so good.

Side note, but does the audio actually sound better to anyone else? It might just be placebo from not having played in a month, but I'm surprised at how clear everything sounds and I think I'm noticing more small/ambient sounds in various places.

[Cenne]

I'm so extremely happy I could cry. I don't wanna jinx it of course, but I can play with my sound on again!

[Puss_Kat]

Early testing is extremely promising on my end. No issues whatsoever in the usual spots. I think we should probably wait a day or two for more people to do more testing before saying it's 100% fixed, but so far so good.

Side note, but does the audio actually sound better to anyone else? It might just be placebo from not having played in a month, but I'm surprised at how clear everything sounds and I think I'm noticing more small/ambient sounds in various places.

A side effect of the issues was that sound buffers were not available to play new sounds properly leading to them being dropped or distorted.

[Grimno]

Only had about 10 minutes to test before running to work.
Early tests are looking really good.

Set audio position to 40/100 and went into my house and immediately started casting assize + holy as white mage and nothing stuttered.
Loaded into Limsa and Radz and got no stuttering during the loading screen.
Then went into Deltascape 4.0 solo and messed around and had no issues there either.
Will do more when I get home but now it's time for work.