Audio is stuttering & altogether choppy now and again...

[cuckoo4]

Hi All:

Win XP
3.0Ghz Processor
2GB RAM

I don't know where to start. I installed an M-Audio Audiophile 24/96...sounds great. But every now and again the audio stutters...say I'm playing an MP3 in iTunes, Quicktime or Windows Media Player...Also when I'm writing music it will happen.

I've gone through several tutorials for tweaking XP for audio. Still happens...

What I'm reading tells me to check for an IRQ conflict. When I check, the soundcard appears to be at IRQ 19 with a couple other things...could this be my problem?

How do I check? Anything else I can try???

Thanks!!!

 

[cuckoo4]

I was reading that their could possibly be an issue between my PCI graphics card & the soundcard. Switching to AGP may do the trick.

Do people generally have issues between their soundcards & a PCI graphix card?

 

[one4thumb]

With IRQ sharing it is unlikly there is a conflict, unless the sound card wants exclusive rights to that IRQ. It sounds more like a driver issue.

I just had that problem with my notebook, among others. I just reformated. Although I am not suggesting some the sever!

How old is the audio card? Try rolling back the driver to an older one. Also check the manufactors website for driver upgrades. Do not install any driver updates from Windows update. I think that is where I inherited my problem from.

 

[cuckoo4]

Thanks, the card is several years old...hmmm, about 4 at least.

 

[maxthedork]

When doing 24/96 recording and playback, make sure you have the RAM in the machine to support it. A gig at the minimum, but more preferably. You want to make sure especially when you're recording that you don't ever cache to the hard drive. Remember that the hard drive is CONSIDERABLY slower than RAM, and other than your CD-ROM and Floppy is the slowest IO device on your machine. If you want to try audio input with your current hardware and make sure it's not the card itself, try ramping it down to 16/44, which is standard CD-quality audio. If you find that setting it to a lower bit-width and samplerate eliminates the choppiness, invest in more RAM. Otherwise the card itself may be faulty (but I HIGHLY doubt that).

 

[maxthedork]

Also, I've had issues with PCI graphics and sound, but that mostly applies to when you're listening to an audio file (MP3 or streaming) and browsing web pages. Scrolling up and down when there are images on the page only makes it worse.

 

[Johnthephoneguy]

he has 2GB of ram so i don't think thats the issue.

 

[maxthedork]

Does he have an AGP or PEG slot? I'd try that route next.

 

[cuckoo4]

*Does he have an AGP or PEG slot? I'd try that route next.*

I have an AGP, what's PEG?

 

[maxthedork]

PEG = PCI-Express Graphics, it's another type of video port on the motherboard. If you have AGP, you more than likely don't have PEG (it's pretty much either/or).

But like I said, I had numerous problems with audio playback when I had a PCI video adapter, and they went away when I upgraded to an AGP card.

 

[Sympology]

May be obvious, but are any AntiVirus/ Antispyware or updates running when it happens?

Stu..

Only the truly stupid believe they know everything.
Stu.. 2004