Audio popping/cracking while gaming [Win 11]

[n0stalghia]

Three days ago, my audio started popping/cracking while gaming. The noise is there only while gaming, as soon as I close the game it is gone.

 

Not only the game itself is affected, by all audio streams. I can be listening to YouTube with a game open and hear cracking/popping, as soon as I close the game (without pausing/restarting the video) the noise stops.

 

It only affects my USB audio device; using the 3.5 headphone jack is fine.

 

I've tried putting the games in exclusive fullscreen and windowed borderless mode, it has no effect, issue is present on both (tried with Elden Ring and Slay the Spire). The USB audio device works fine on another (non-Windows) system, so that shouldn't be the problem.

 

Tried reinstalling Nvidia drivers on the off-chance it helps, well, it didn't. I tried recording the issue using OBS, but the video recording has no noise, it's only happening during real-time playback.

 

Is anyone experiencing anything similar? I can't find any mentions of this online so far.

[bezza...]

try updating audio drivers windows sometimes installs random drivers from ages ago. 

[n0stalghia]

I did, but the USB device is using Microsoft's own drivers. Realtek device (3.5 jack) is running fine

[demonix00]

I've had the same issue with my corsair headset and the way I "fixed" the issue was to unplug the headset from the USB port and plug it back in (I put the word fixed in quotes because it doesn't always fix the issue as it could take several attempts for the crackling to not happen and it isn't a true fix since it will still return).

[n0stalghia]

Yeah, that sadly doesn't help. However I've now tested the entire setup (DAC+amp+headphones) on another machine and there is no noise present there, so something must be wrong with my machine. Since the noise is present both in the mobo rear USB port and in the front panel USB port I assume it's a Windows issue... I guess I'm looking at a reinstall. Again.

[n0stalghia]

One fresh reinstall later, the noise is gone.

 

Thanks, Microsoft.