Mysterious Crackling

[Bkkgreg]

Hi

Looking for a bit of help from one of the fine people on this forum. I record a podcast and have recently started having weird crackling sounds that I cannot figure out.

We use: Carol microphones -> Wharfedale EZ-m 20x2FX mixer -> ESI U24XL -> Macbook Pro. We use Audacity to record, and Soundtrack Pro to edit.

An example of the sound can be heard on our podcast here, worst around the 32 minute mark. http://www.bangkokpodcast.com/thai-language/bangkok-podcast-thai-language-series-2/

This crackling is AFTER running it through Soundtrack's click remover four times.

The crackling seems to get louder the louder we talk, leading me to wonder if it's a problem with the electric current? The cables are all secured and jiggling them doesn't affect the sound in any way. For some reason, the crackling only shows up after we've been recording for a while, getting progressively worse.

Any help would be much appreciated, thanks.

 

[burymyteeth]

I am also using a USB soundcard from ESI (the UGM 96) and I am dealing with some really bad crackling issues. I was excited to find your post to see if someone had offered a solution, too bad. However, I gave a listen to the link you provided and I couldn't hear any crackling at all???

 

[Soulman51]

Buffer size ?

I was having a similar problem on music playback. My buffer size was set small for recording and reducing latency but on playback the crackling sound showed up. After I increased the buffer size for playback the cracklilng disappeared.

This was on a PC not a Mac but it might be worth a try. Good luck.

 

[stefangs]

i'm not familiar with your equipment, but if it's not a latency/CPU issue it could also be caused by a mismatch in sample frequencies or digital sync source. that is easy to overlook.

stefan