Glitch and pop noises in Cakewalk

[Jmoog]

Hello, I'm pretty new to using Cakewalk HS 4. I'm noticing that when I record audio (i.e. guitar tracks, analogue synth tracks) I frequently get digital glitch or popping noises in the recorded track. This is happening frequently enough to where I am having to record tracks 2 and 3 times just to try and get a glitch/pop free track. There is usually only 2 or 3 "popping" noises in a given track but there is no way to mix around them and they ruin the whole track.

I am just wondering if I have something set wrong. Any help you all can give me will be appreciated.

[Zed10R]

Check latency. If it's set too low you will get clicks and pops.

[Nick98338]

The only clicks I get is when I record at too high a level. Gets worse when tracks are mixed. So, I make sure I record individual tracks at lower input levels. -12, or so. If the mix has clicks, I go back and lower individual tracks, then remix.

[trabalais]

What kind of interface are you using to record? If you are using the soundcard that came with your computer, that is most likely the problem. Consumer sound cards are great at playing back audio for games, etc. But they are really designed for recording. I would definately look at spending $100 or so and getting a USB or Firewire interface. You won't have any problems after that.

Thomas
www.yourhomestudio.com

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[bobs88s]

Several common culprits in my view. (disclaimer - I am not a pro - so I may botch a term or two along the way)

Buffer size. Windows does not actually multitask, but switches between running processes very quickly. If you have your buffer size set too small - say 64, and your computer is slow, then you will hear a drop out (pops, clicks) as Windows moves on to the next process before completely writing that 64k buffer to disk. Setting buffer size to larger numbers is where I would start.

Latency. This setting plays right along with the buffer size. Some systems work fine at very low latency values (less than 10 or even 5 ms.) If you are recording audio or using software synths, then you may find latencies as high as 40ms are not noticeable to you. We all have different sensitivity levels, and of course what we are playing matters a lot too. In the end however, too low a value here will cause pops & clicks and may crash your software. You can experiment with increasing buffer size to 128 and increase latency to 20ms and see what happens. Just understand that both can work together.

Clipping. One poster noted too high a recording value (too loud). In the digital world, zero is wide open - full loud. There is very little tolerance for going above zero. That awful noise you hear are big-time digital artifacts crashing around. If you produce clipping while you are recording, then stop and reduce input volume and start over. If you are clipping only during playback, then you are over-running your sound reinforcement system (speakers, amps, that sort of thing). turn it down.

Bob