Distorted Crackling

  • Thread starter Thread starter Jamie1989
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J

Jamie1989

New member
Hi all, new to this forum, but I do a lot of home recording and studied it for a year.

Im good with computers and usually can fix problems, but I thought it would be quicker/easier to try here since im sure somone else has had the problem before.

What im using:
Cubase SX 2 + VST instruments (drums moslty but sometimes orchestral)
Windows Vista
M-audio Mobile Pre (USB dual channel)
On-board sound/graphics

Problem:
During recording/playback I'm getting an aweful crackling sound, at first I thought it was clipping, but my input gain is pretty low and the output indicators are not even in the yellow, also when I export an MP3 and play with WMP I get a perfect sound. Sometimes its not so bad but the more tracks I add and the more audio I layer, it gets worse, sometimes its not bad but its getting a bit hard to mix, trying to listen carefully to the levels/eq and all i hear is crackling. I think the problem maybe something to do with hardware. I never got this on my old computer using the same cubase and the same M-audio interface. I also noticed that when I scroll through the project (whilst playing) it crackles as i move the scroll bar, and sometimes other graphical things like playing with the eq graph. Ive been living with it for a while since I can still mix down and export, and the the exported track is fine, it just seems to be getting worse, and mixing is becoming hard.

Any suggestions?

cheers,
Jamie
 
Crackling is a sign that the computer has trouble handling what you are doing.

I assume it is a fairly new and powerfull computer, so the hardware is probably not the problem, unless your audio interface is set at a very low latency. Increase the latency and see what happens. If there is no or little effect than it is probably caused by Vista, because Vista runs all kind of programs in the background.

Tweak Vista for recording and that might solve the problem.

Cheers

Wim
 
cheers. Ill give it a try. I agree the computer is only 1 year old, not insanely powerful but should do the job, 4gb ram. cant remember processor power but it cant be too bad.

As for tweaking vista, you have any tips? i done some already since i got it like disabling user account control, windows aero and such.

ill have a look and see what i can do with the latency first
 
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