Audio popping issue

[iDrawBagman]

Chiming in that I'm having similar issues with audio since 6.08. Can't say for sure when the problems first arose as I took a break from the game during the Endwalker release. I was still in Heavensward content at the time and didn't want to take up space in the queues, however I don't recall the issue being apparent until recently so I can only assume.

Unlike many others here who are running into audio problems on Mac, I'm seeing them on Windows 11. For me, the problem appears as a glitchy, popping sound that cuts in and out seemingly randomly and occurs constantly (as in every few seconds). Logging out and back in can temporarily resolve the issue, but it can resume in as little time as 2 minutes, or it could not return for half an hour. Out of all the troubleshooting attempts I've made, this is the only trick that's made any difference and nothing resolves it completely.

This Youtube video from Derek demonstrates what I've been hearing best.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFYhFu3n_18

From the experimentation and exploration of the bug that I've done, it seems to be tied specifically to ambient sounds in "sanctuary" towns and settlements. I've yet to hear it in general field areas in my experience. I've also determined that the noise this popping seems to introduce is actually a sort of crowd ambience sound. While it sounds like little more than a glitchy popping sound most of the time, every now and then, particularly while moving, I can hear what sounds like chatter from a large crowd. The kind you might hear when there's a large number of player characters in a single area, even if there aren't other players in the zone with me. It actually comes in most clearly when I log out after the bug begins as that crowd ambience sound will play for about a second before returning to the main menu. This leads me to think something in the game's sound engine is bugging out the crowd audio simulation.

Restarting, reinstalling, updating drivers, changing my system audio settings, turning off dualsense/ds4 support, trying the spatial audio pack, among countless other troubleshooting attempts did nothing to resolve this issue. While logging out and back in can mitigate the issue for a small amount of time, its far from a fix and it makes long sessions where I'm doing quests in towns and settlements headache-inducing. Will be keeping an eye on these forums and hoping for a fix/patch soon as this issue has made it extremely difficult to play this game for extended periods of time.

[MEMANIAsama]

Chiming in for my spouse. Within the past 2 weeks (6.08) her speakers have started crackling and popping. Sometimes the audio is perfect, other times the audio is a hot mess. It's never consistently being buggy. Whatever "fix" was implemented seemingly has busted the audio for other users now. At this point SE should be giving out free Spacial Audio packs (or at least a longer free trial) to all the affected accounts since it seems to be the only workaround that keeps the game playable in any manner. I hope this gets resolved by the next patch. I'll be sure to have her submit an in-game bug report in hopes something is achieved.

[Gr1m2th]

So I've tried just about everything and I have had audio issues since the release of 6.0.

Beside the headaches the audio creates when I travel or move thru zones, yes I actually travel around w/out my headset on because of the continuous audio issues I experience.

I have even purchased the 3d audio pack and ran with that, but guess what - I still experience the same issues with this entire janky experience.

Hard to be immersive and enjoy the full experience when you constantly suffer static, hissing and popping as you travel, etc.

$20 US, while I thought this was a solution, was a failure in itself with not fixing the issue this seemed to cause with adding this function and feature.

The 3d Audio is subpar when compared to the previously working audio thru my 7.0 surround sound headphones. The "improved 3d audio" fails to impress, the locations the sounds come from is disjointed and the distance of the audio will sometimes make it seem something is either right on top of you or very far away when in fact it's the opposite. The 3d audio will also overly focus on subjective sounds and push background noise to the forefront.

If the audio pack fixed the hissing, I would chalk it up to another fix for something that was not broken, instead I wasted the money on an "upgrade" thinking it would correct what it might have broken in the first place.

SE - I'm not amused, this has been happening since December, please address this. I hate listening to the audio like it's an AM radio broadcasting during the WW1 as the enemy tries to shell my position.

Rain triggers it.
Crowd Sounds.
Winds.
IE all environmental affects that make the game alive. You turned this into the audio from the late 80's Atari on a bad connection.

[NodIfYouCanHearMe]

6.0.8 also broke sound for me. Prior to this patch, I experienced zero sound issues. I now experience the odd crackling noise others have reported. Like the above poster, these are most noticeable in Sanctuary Cities, and are commonly triggered by ambient sound effects. Can confirm, rain, wind, and crowd sounds all trigger the sound crackling. The issue's severity varies per zone. The Churning Mists, for example, has nearly constant crackling noises, whereas Thavnair (even while raining), has minimal issues.

I'm running Windows 10 Pro on an Intel Core i7-7700 CPU @ 4.20GHz, 16GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070. I have two sound setups: earbuds plugged into the PC that use ASUS Xonar DGX Audio from my soundcard, and a Logitech PRO X headset with its own separate Logitech PRO-G drivers. Issue occurs when using both.

[Anemoshi]

Patch 6.08 is what started the audio issues for me. At first, I had some crackling and popping sounds with just wind while mounted. When I logged off and the game was shutting down, I would hear a second or less of the "crowd" noises. Then one day, I started having both these issues along with crackling and popping sounds going the whole time I play except when in a duty, unless I'm just not noticing it since I turned my ambient sound way down and there's as lot of sound effects and BGM drowning out everything else during combat. I'll have to double check this.

[ClaraKitty]

I haven't had the audio popping in some time, but I've noticed when I'm outside the apartment, the crowd sounds start up and it's all glitchy. Rather annoying. Hubby and others have this same issue too.

[Rueby]

I'm having the same issue shown here, I thought I was just hearing things and I couldn't place a finger on what.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFYhFu3n_18

I hear it in shiro, almost everywhere as well. I think it might be ambient noise? I'm not even sure if this is what causes it????? I try to play with BGM on cause I can't stand the scratchy sound anymore.

[Larirawiel]

If you have an AMD CPU then disable TPM in the BIOS/UEFI. AMD TPM can cause those sound cracklings or other unpredictable slowdowns like mousepointer stuttering. There will be soon[TM] a BIOS update fix for this with AGESA 1.2.0.7.



Cheers

[Icehunter]

I just wish the ambient sound was back to normal. I used to be able to hear rumbling of motor cycle, gathering, crafting ,etc, even my footsteps. ambient slider is now broken for long time.

[SilverSurfer]

Ambient track is still giving distortion in 6.1, worst in some areas than before.