Audio popping issue

[minopoki]

Using the new spacial sound pack DID NOT work for me either.
Maybe it gets slightly better if I set both my sound device and the game settings for spacial sound, and that's all. I still get stuttering sounds anywhere, specially in battles, and what's worse, during voice action on cutscenes.

There really doesn't seem to be anything we can do on our end that is a guaranteed fix. Some things work for some people, but nothing at all works for some (and I tried everything that was suggested, from dx9 to updating drivers, updating windows, terminating processes etc.).

We will have to hope on SE fixing this for us, and I just hope it happens soon, because I was so hyped for the new content, and now I can't know whether it will someday be playable on my computer…

[Potchoko]

I see I'm not the only one with this problem
Well I've already tried running the game on dx9 but clearly this is a problem with the game and not my machine.
I hope it gets resolved, the experience I had is very frustrating, unfortunately the way is to wait for a patch to solve the problem

[AsheNabuddis]

Hi all!

In an effort to help others with the audio issue, I've done a few tests, and together with a few other tickets present in the forum, came to the conclusion that the issue (at least for me) comes from a great taxation of parts that were not present before.

By closely paying attention to my CPU and GPU's performance, I've noticed that at moments of 99% or 100% of use, the issues would be most prevalent. By doing the following, I've managed to cut the audio issues up to 99%, still facing some stuttering here and there that lasts for about a second, but in comparison to earlier, it is barely unnoticeable.
If you haven't yet, try these steps:
- Notice your GPU and CPU usage while normally playing the game. If it is normally reaching the higher 90's:
- Decrease your graphics one level down (I was at maximum, downgraded to High (laptop))
- Kill all other programs running on your pc. (Discord, browsers, razer chroma or other peripherics applications, etc)

I guess that something was done in this patch that is taxing lower-end computers (or higher-end ones with some specific requirement) more than normal, as it is to be expected with any software release of this size. I believe that, as time passes and bugs that are consuming too much processing power are fixed, so too shall the audio issues. Or so I hope.

[minopoki]

CPU usage doesn't seem to have nothing to do with the issue for me.
As I just checked, playing the game for about 5-10 minutes, my CPU usage oscilated between 25-50%, and my GPU usage between 30-55%, both never getting even close to 60%, and the audio stuttering would happen independent of the usage values. Sometimes it would happen when CPU was at around 28%, other times when it was around 45%. Same for GPU.

Reducing video quality was the first thing I tried on fryday, before I even knew this issue was affecting other players, and it also made no difference at all, even when setting to 30 fps.
Terminating other processes was also something I tried. I closed everything that I could and that I knew was not an important process for Windows, and also no difference.

I have also tried disabling my second monitor, in attempt to reduce video proccessing, and also no difference.

Having more players around seems to trigger this happening, which may suggest that it's indeed related to exceess processing, but, on my experience, it seems to be something that the game is having trouble to execute due to some flaw on programming or something rather than a performance related issue.

[TaleraRistain]

CPU usage doesn't seem to have nothing to do with the issue for me.
As I just checked, playing the game for about 5-10 minutes, my CPU usage oscilated between 25-50%, and my GPU usage between 30-55%, both never getting even close to 60%, and the audio stuttering would happen independent of the usage values. Sometimes it would happen when CPU was at around 28%, other times when it was around 45%. Same for GPU.

Reducing video quality was the first thing I tried on fryday, before I even knew this issue was affecting other players, and it also made no difference at all, even when setting to 30 fps.
Terminating other processes was also something I tried. I closed everything that I could and that I knew was not an important process for Windows, and also no difference.

I have also tried disabling my second monitor, in attempt to reduce video proccessing, and also no difference.

Having more players around seems to trigger this happening, which may suggest that it's indeed related to exceess processing, but, on my experience, it seems to be something that the game is having trouble to execute due to some flaw on programming or something rather than a performance related issue.

See that's the weird thing with mine. There's no rhyme or reason. I'm off alone in a deserted part of the world gathering and constant stuttering on the BGM. Then a whole bunch of people for a FATE roll in and I join in and combat is clear for the first time since Friday. I did all the graphic stuff too and closed everything but XIV, since I am on older hardware and thought I may have to sacrifice the look for the sound. But it made no difference.

[Crimson1128]

in my case, I've found a definitive way of testing to see if it's still a problem; I go to the Gridania inn room, go into settings, and manually mute the ambient audio. For some reason, in my case, the *lack* of nearby ambient audio (or footsteps) seems to cause it, as does muting ambient audio??? In any case, none of the methods I've tried have worked 100%; some things have made it less frequent (although I haven't the faintest which changes helped), but it still happens nonetheless. That being said, I do still think it has something to do with specific system setups, as my laptop- which is less powerful- runs the game completely fine.

[AurelGuthrie]

Same here, my issue seems to happen at random. There doesn't seem to be any correlation with CPU or GPU usage. It can happen if I'm just chillin' by an aetheryte, if I'm alone jumping around in lavender beds, or in combat. The latter is the one that causes it the most, like the game can't handle too many sounds happening at the same time

[Asiina]

Being in an Inn room is the most consistently way to get it to start, but then it doesn't stop after that.

[GrimmStronghammer]

I'm having the same issue.
I have had a little luck putting the equalizer to standard. Although it may have been only luck. The issue returned after a restart. Additionally i have found that turning off or on sound channels (ambient, music, voice, ect) has no effect on frequency or duration.

[ToastyKeen]

I've posted on other threads, but I'm also having the same issue. I do see Soken did reply to a tweet about it so at least I know the devs are working on it. I'd still like some official confirmation via the forums or lodestone but I'm glad that there's been some acknowledgement of the issue.