Will an AI solve my pops and cracks issues? Guaranteed?

[YanKleber]

Hey boys and girls!

Lately I have experienced some annoying issues with my onboard sound card when playing stuff (surprisingly recording is totally fine). Each 15 seconds or so a 'pop' or a 'crack' rises turning an enjoyable listening into a frustrating moment. This is not the first time I have this problem. It seems to be something regarding to Windows 7 because I never had a single sound issue when I used Windows XP. As I was determined to figure this out I was after a solution and although I couldn't find any at least I discovered what is causing it. Thanks to a free application called 'LatencyMon' now I know that there are a couple of drivers provoking output sound latency and causing the 'pops' and 'cracks'. Unfortunatelly as I mentioned there is not an effective solution for this.

Anyway, the other day someone has told me here in forum that one of the advantages of using an AI instead a soundcard is that all the latency problems just vanishes. Well, while I wouldn't buy an AI for record purposes (I am really happy with the results obtained with my soundcard on this realm) I could seriously consider to buy one if I can get ensured that it will wipe all my sound issues off.

So my questions are:

1) Can a soundcard to be replaced entirely by an AI, either for input as well for output? Can I even uninstall my sound drivers and disable my onboard card?

2) Attaching an AI to my system will be completely solve all my latency problems including the output mentioned ones? Or this is just a guess?

PS: My system is an i5 running under Windows 7. Currently it has low memory (only 4GB) but I just ordered more 4GB that should be here on Monday.

Thanks!

 

[Tadpui]

Are you using ASIO4ALL? If not, it may be worth checking into to help your pops/clicks.

But basically, yes, a dedicated audio interface with the right buffer settings will help the pops/clicks because it takes some of the strain off of the CPU and its chipset. AIs are still capable of producing pops/clicks if the computer is under too heavy of a load. It'll still be a balancing act between CPU load and latency by adjusting the ASIO buffer size.

 

[YanKleber]

Are you using ASIO4ALL? If not, it may be worth checking into to help your pops/clicks.

Tadpui, excellent point! I never stopped to think that it only happened when I was enjoying music but didn't when I was listening to my DAW tracks.

Happens that I use ASIO4All at my DAW stuff but my default mp3 player (Winamp) doesn't. Bingo! By default it uses a proprietary DLL that communicates to the computer primary sound device installed. Anyway, after some googling I figured out that there is an specific ASIO version for Winamp. I downloaded it, throw into Winamp DLLs folder and set it as the output driver. Guess what? I am listening to some music now and so far I didn't get any pop/crack. I will keep checking to see if the problem doesn't returns, but I think that there is a big chance it won't.



Thanks for put a light on it!