Avon audio problems.

so for awhile now the speakers on the laptop would make crackling and popping noises whenever some kind of sound was played through them. i never really thought much of it because my quick fix was to just go into the sound control panel and change the sample rate and bit depth to something else then back again and it stopped making the aweful noises. but every time i restart the PC it would start doing it again. eventually i switched the sound driver to the high definition audio one (the non-realtek one) which fixed the crackling problem with the laptop's internal speakers but whenever i hooked up my external speakers through the 3.5mm jack up i noticed this audible pop sound that would play frequently anytime some kind of audio is being played like a video on youtube or my personal music library. however i don't seem to hear it while running games. i tried to isolate the problem to maybe the 3.5mm jack is faulty? well i tried bluetooth audio in my truck which works really good with my phone but got some really bad distorted lows from the laptop on all the audio sample rates and bit depths. so i figured maybe software then but alas reinstalling the realtek drivers did nothing.

as far as what i've done and played around with goes, i've done the disable enhancements, didnt work. exclusive mode disabled didnt work. cycled all 6 available sample rates and bit depth modes, all of them had the same poppping sound occur with music playing and some made the external speakers crackle a little also. uninstalled reinstalled drivers from digital storm and realtek's website. didnt work. uninstalled the sound blaster connect. didnt work either. other things i've messed with is disabling various hardware components to see if anything changes, it didnt.

The only thing i found that had a different result was if i hooked my external speakers to my tv then hooked the laptop up to the tv and changed to the NVIDIA Output for HDMI to run the sound to the tv. no crackles or pops. just crystal clear audio. but if i switch the audio to the laptop's output back to popping and crackling. also the headset which is what i typically use if i game on the laptop works and sounds fine. no distorted sounds or crackling to speak of. the headset is the Creative Sound BlasterX H7's which runs on its own software through a USB Port.

i'm at a loss of what to even try next. trying to refrain from just reinstalling windows. my google results are starting to run dry. also still havent figured out how to get sound blaster connect reinstalled because i can't find an installation file.

i also forgot to mention that after i reinstalled the realtek drivers i tried bluetooth'ing to my stereo instead of my truck and i only heard the poppping sound a couple of times in about 8mins or so instead of constantly. it still does it fairly consistently with audio playback from say itunes and web browsers through the 3.5 jack. while gaming I still dont notice it at all. well either don't notice or hear it even if there's music playing from the game. haven't tried it in the truck again yet. probably see if that situation improved any later.

I don't think its a problem with the power strips or the wall outlets. i've got 2 other high end desktops at the house one with a stereo receiver and one with a small amp hooked up to them and i never notice any weird things in the audio playback with them. when i tried bluetooth in the truck it was running on battery. the rest of the time it was plugged in to a strip or outlet. i first noticed at work then later on at home. while i had it hooked up to the tv if i switched the audio source to the NVIDIA channel it was clear, but if i used the laptop audio heard the small popping sounds. also during that time i tried both with the laptop plugged in and without. same results.

I think based on everything i've tried and experimented with to this point, i still think it might have something to do with the realtek driver. because the HDMI audio is controlled by NVIDIA and the headset has it's own driver to control it but the laptop speakers, 3.5mm jack, and bluetooth all utilize the realtek driver. the reason you might could rule out faulty wiring (potentially) is because the laptop internal speakers, 3.5mm jack and bluetooth (BT runs through the wireless card for wifi) are their own separate parts and wiring jobs until they get to the mainboard of course. but they all produce they same issue.

At the time of the last post it was a little late in the day to call but i intend to sometime this week. it's not really a huge deal as is. just a minor inconvience while listening to music at work or home.