Simviation Forum - Snap,Crackle And Pop!

Jun 26^th, 2011 at 9:34am

BLAZE Offline
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BUILT LIKE A MACK TRUCK!
Spring City Pa. United States

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Hi Guys!
I have another Question, Some of the planes I use (when I'm in flight) cause my speakers to Pop and Crack and BOY is that annoying. It gets to the point were I have to stop that flight. Its a shame to cause those planes are realy nice. Cry

Has this happend to you? Oh yeah...It realy only happens when ATC starts talking. Thank you Blaze

"May the wind always be at your back and the sun upon your face. And may the wings of destiny carry you aloft to dance with the stars" Cheers George!

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Reply #1 - Jun 26^th, 2011 at 11:53am

JBaymore Offline
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As I remember... and I could be wrong.... you are currently using a computer that is a little light on "firepower"? Not a lot of RAM, shared graphics, and so on.

Aircraft with higher resolution (large) sound files can cause the audio hardware using shared memory on the computer to screw up. Add in the load of the ATC voices... and it overloads the system.

Try turning the sound quality in Settings down and see if it clears up.

best,

......................john

Intel i7 960 quad 3.2G LGA 1366, Asus P6X58D Premium, 750W Corsair, 6 gig 1600 DDR3, Spinpoint 1TB 7200 HD, Caviar 500G 7200 HD, GTX275 1280M, Logitec Z640, Win7 Pro 64b, CH Products yoke, pedals + throttle quad, simpit

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Reply #2 - Jun 26^th, 2011 at 12:13pm

Groundbound1 Offline
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I had a sound issue a while back (not the quite the same as the one you have) and I found that locking the target framerate to a lower number helped. ( I used to keep it set at unlimited.) Might be worth a try.

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Reply #3 - Jun 26^th, 2011 at 12:37pm

BLAZE Offline
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BUILT LIKE A MACK TRUCK!
Spring City Pa. United States

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Thanks Guys.
I'll give them bouth a try and let you know. Yes you are correct J, It's using hard drive space I alocated as memory Yep! Hey get this... the other day I minimized FS and did the contl,alt,delete thing...It was OVER a Gig. on the "page file" I never heard of such a thing! Angry

Cause FS if I'm right only sucks up about 130 to 150 Page file Mem.
Talk To Ya Blaze

"May the wind always be at your back and the sun upon your face. And may the wings of destiny carry you aloft to dance with the stars" Cheers George!

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Reply #4 - Jun 26^th, 2011 at 3:44pm

Strategic Retreat Offline
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My kids have the same problem in FSX, and I do under Train Simulator. The only solution, unless you can find a better audio driver (sadly my old SB Live hasn't this luck), and ALWAYS if you're under XP (I cannot really suggest to try this trick under 7 or Vista... in fact if you have one of those, just stop here and forgive me, but I can't help you), is to find and download the file Directx.cpl (easy to find, with Google), which is a control panel extension that allows you to test the DirectX installed on your OS and some of its parameters.

Once you have this file, double click on it (it works like an application), a window will appear, select the DirectPlay tag on the top, then press the DxDiag... button below on the right.

Another window will appear. Select the tag Audio on the top, and you'll find at about mid window on the left a slider that controls the level of DirectX acceleration of the audio hardware. Bring it from the full right it will be to only one notch before full left. Close all the windows and start the sim. You should have no problems now.

Let me know.

PS
I repeat, this trick works under XP. I have NO IDEA if it works under any other OS so I advise against trying it under Vista or Win7 (or other Windows version you may be using). If you do it anyway after this fair warning you do it under your own responsibility. I do not want complains if something blows up. Tongue

There is no such a thing as overkill. Only unworthy targets.

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Reply #5 - Jun 26^th, 2011 at 4:33pm

Opa Offline
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Plano, Texas

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Just curious.........

How is the Directx.cpl different from the dxdiag utility which comes with XP and which can be run from the Start/run dialogue?

David "Opa" Marshall

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Reply #6 - Jun 26^th, 2011 at 4:36pm

BLAZE Offline
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Hey Thanks S.R.
Yeah I am running Good'ol Win.xp on my free-bee computer upstairs. I think its better then seven personally. Talk to ya later Blaze

"May the wind always be at your back and the sun upon your face. And may the wings of destiny carry you aloft to dance with the stars" Cheers George!

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Reply #7 - Jun 27^th, 2011 at 8:48am

Strategic Retreat Offline
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Opa wrote on Jun 26^th, 2011 at 4:33pm:

How is the Directx.cpl different from the dxdiag utility which comes with XP and which can be run from the Start/run dialogue?

Would you believe me if I told you I didn't know until you told me? Tongue

The trick is an old one, and did work ever since... EVER, and back in the ol' times I never had any dxdiag utility, but must have downloaded a .CPL... so I simply went with the tide, to speak. Never knowing there was an internal command. Undecided

So I guess that instead of downloading whatever, typing dxdiag in Start, Run and then following the above mentioned stream of instructions is the same.

There is no such a thing as overkill. Only unworthy targets.

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Reply #8 - Jun 27^th, 2011 at 9:12am

jgf Offline
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village idiot
Columbus OH

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FTR, there is no hardware acceleration in Vista or W7, though there is dxdiag. If you're using a Creative card with these OSs (POS in the case of Vista), the Creative ALChemy utility may, or may not, help. It emulates EAX and some hardware acceleration functions for programs that require such.

Another cause of sound breakup could be latency. Some BIOS have options to change this, otherwise there are utilities to adjust it within windows. This basically adjusts how long a device has access to the bus after its IRQ is accepted; in the case of a sound card, if it times out before all the data is sent you get stutters and crackling. Most sound cards use a value of 32 or so, vid cards about 128. A common problem is new vid drivers setting the vid card latency to 256, thus hogging the bus. I had this problem with XP a while back; didn't affect FS9 but a couple of racing sims sounded horrible.

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Reply #9 - Jun 27^th, 2011 at 3:29pm

Strategic Retreat Offline
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Using PCI Latency Tool 3.1 brought the audio card down to 32 from the previous 64 and it had a perfect zero result under FSX to resolve the problem. Have yet to find under TS, but seen the results under the FSX... I don't think there'll be any step forward. Sad

All the other devices are set at latency 0, only the audio card was at 64... I'm rather dubious if it is a good idea to put to not the latency of the audio card too, to see if perhaps starts working well. Undecided

I remember this problem was given to me the first time on a previous rig configuration different than the actual, under FS9 by the PMDG 737 and it was cured by the installation of the then new drivers for Xp, but ever since there has be no new driver for the SB Live... and seen I hate using the MB onboard audio because they are a resource hog, given that its audio-processing power comes from the CPU, and given that a lot of new add-on cards builders have learned this trick and to save 20 cent per card do not make audio cards with self reliant electronics, but relying totally on the CPU themselves, like they were inbuilt on the motherboard... I'm in a bind and would be EVEN if I wanted to buy another audio card. Angry

There is no such a thing as overkill. Only unworthy targets.

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Reply #10 - Jun 27^th, 2011 at 3:40pm

BLAZE Offline
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BUILT LIKE A MACK TRUCK!
Spring City Pa. United States

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Man..you guys are sooo far above me with this stuff......Keep it coming!

I'm just wrighting down what I can use. Heck..who needs computer school. Wink

"May the wind always be at your back and the sun upon your face. And may the wings of destiny carry you aloft to dance with the stars" Cheers George!

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Reply #11 - Jun 27^th, 2011 at 6:34pm

H Offline
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save face...
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BLAZE wrote on Jun 27^th, 2011 at 3:40pm:

Man..you guys are sooo far above me with this stuff......Keep it coming! I'm just wrighting down what I can use. Heck..who needs computer school.

To think, all I was going to suggest was that you stop eating breakfast while flying or try a different cereal

...

although I do question whether or not you're comprehending the latest technology when, rather than writing down the right stuff, you're wrighting it down, Orville (or is that Wilber -- I could never tell their wrighting apart).

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Reply #12 - Jun 28^th, 2011 at 7:37am

BLAZE Offline
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BUILT LIKE A MACK TRUCK!
Spring City Pa. United States

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OOOPS! I will do it the wright way next time...That's funny on the Cereal

"May the wind always be at your back and the sun upon your face. And may the wings of destiny carry you aloft to dance with the stars" Cheers George!

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Reply #13 - Jun 30^th, 2011 at 11:06am

jgf Offline
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village idiot
Columbus OH

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Strategic Retreat wrote on Jun 27^th, 2011 at 3:29pm:

Using PCI Latency Tool 3.1 brought the audio card down to 32 from the previous 64 and it had a perfect zero result under FSX to resolve the problem. Have yet to find under TS, but seen the results under the FSX... I don't think there'll be any step forward. Sad

All the other devices are set at latency 0, only the audio card was at 64... I'm rather dubious if it is a good idea to put to not the latency of the audio card too, to see if perhaps starts working well. Undecided

...

I have never seen a vid card with a zero latency setting; the vid card is the heaviest user of the bus, settings in the 96-132 range are common. Audio cards are almost always at 32; if you're doing heavy RTA sound work a setting as high as 64 may be necessary, but this is rare. Occasionally a LAN card will get a latency setting, but this is uncommon and usually a very low setting (8-10).

The total of all latency settings cannot exceed 256, and should never even come close to that. Usually only the audio and video cards will have a specified latency since they are transmitting a lot of high priority data with noticeable consequences if this is interrupted. Any device with an IRQ will have a latency though most are not directly adjustable and are effectively set to zero; which, if I understand correctly, means they are only given bus access if they specifically request it and will lose it once anything else requests it. Any device not given a latency value will be treated as if it were zero.

Latency is something that rarely needs adjusting, unless something like sound problems arise, or a driver/software install changes the settings adversely. The 128 for vid, 32 for audio, are almost standard settings.

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Reply #14 - Jun 30^th, 2011 at 5:04pm

Strategic Retreat Offline
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jgf wrote on Jun 30^th, 2011 at 11:06am:

I have never seen a vid card with a zero latency setting; the vid card is the heaviest user of the bus, settings in the 96-132 range are common. Audio cards are almost always at 32; if you're doing heavy RTA sound work a setting as high as 64 may be necessary, but this is rare. Occasionally a LAN card will get a latency setting, but this is uncommon and usually a very low setting (8-10).

The total of all latency settings cannot exceed 256, and should never even come close to that. Usually only the audio and video cards will have a specified latency since they are transmitting a lot of high priority data with noticeable consequences if this is interrupted. Any device with an IRQ will have a latency though most are not directly adjustable and are effectively set to zero; which, if I understand correctly, means they are only given bus access if they specifically request it and will lose it once anything else requests it. Any device not given a latency value will be treated as if it were zero.

Latency is something that rarely needs adjusting, unless something like sound problems arise, or a driver/software install changes the settings adversely. The 128 for vid, 32 for audio, are almost standard settings.

Don't know what to say. Probably PCI Latency Tool 3.1 is not totally capable to examine my system (in signature) or... what? I don't know. The only thing I can say with certainty is that all the other devices BESIDE the audio card were put to 0 latency (I'm not making this up) and the audio card was and still is (as I've uninstalled PCI Latency Tool, since latency manipulation didn't affect audio quality) at 64. Tongue

There is no such a thing as overkill. Only unworthy targets.

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