My audio sounds just like the clip that was posted. I also have checked graphics drivers being up to date, audio drivers, checking with a set of speakers, windows update, reinstalling FFXIV, checking to see if windows was trying to "enhance" the audio in device settings, using a usb adaptor, and no success.

Seeing from other replies I might try to change to dx9 to see if that helps, but it also seems to not be fixing it completely according to those replies.