Popping/Crackling with abrupt start/stopping with ANY audio

[tralf]

Hey all,

First off, need to say this is not an Ableton-exclusive problem. I'm posting here in hopes that some genius audiophile can fix my problem. I've spent countless hours trying to resolve this issue and have tried everything under the sun. I'm running Windows 11.

As the title suggests, I get small, yet annoying little pops and cut-outs when I start/stop audio in ANY application - youtube, windows sounds, Ableton, etc. I've run Latencymon, and of course it points to "NVIDIA Windows Kernel Mode Driver" (nvlddmkm.sys) as the main source of DPC problems. It's been said that NVIDIA drivers tend to have issues with audio/Ableton, but it's posing to be an issue everywhere for me.

Things I've tried:
- Updating Bios
- Updating ALL drivers (Focusrite, GPU, etc.)
- Clean remove/reinstall of drivers
- changing Regedit figures (as suggested by a Windows SE)
- Disabling all sound devices in Device Manager
- Disabling Fast Boot
- Run on Integrated Graphics
- Full Power mode, in both Windows and Nvidia manager
- Latency mode ultra in Nvidia Manager
- Disabling wifi/bluetooth
- Reinstalling Windows

Some notable specs of my rig:
Windows 11
i9-13900k
RTX 3080
MSI Mag Tomahawk z690
Focusrite 2i2 3rd gen

I'm posting here in particular because while it's "annoying" in other applications like youtube, it's especially hindering my music-making process in Ableton because I can't differentiate these clicking/cut-outs with other random sounds in my mixes.

Praying for an audio-god to solve my problem

[tralf]

128, 256, 512, 1024 - I've tried all.

[AbletonMASCHINE]

Last resort that I can imagine:

Disable the powermgmt. in the device manager for all USB devices / hubs.

[tralf]

Last resort that I can imagine:

Disable the powermgmt. in the device manager for all USB devices / hubs.

Thanks for the suggestion - I haven't tried that yet, I'll update once I do.

[tokyojoe]

I recently picked up an Alienware m15 r7 (Core i7 12700H, 32GB RAM, RTX3060) and have experienced similar issues. After updating Windows 11, the system drivers, and making all of the usual recommended OS tweaks for audio performance, I was getting frequent audio crackles and dropouts with Live 11.2.7. So I started looking at the Task Manager, LatencyMon, and Bitsum Process Lasso (free and very useful) to see what was happening under the hood.

ACPI.sys (power management) was high on the list, so I disabled the battery management in the Device Manager (seems to help). That NVIDIA driver (nvlddmkm.sys, latest driver) was also causing high DPC spikes, so I switched to a DisplayPort cable to connect directly to the Intel GPU (external monitor, laptop screen off), and the spikes from that driver stopped. Latency was way down overall in LatencyMon. Process Lasso also seems to help with its balancing algorithm, so I am leaving it on for now. Note, there are many recent threads on the NVIDIA forum about audio problems in general (games and everyday use) with the latest drivers for 3000/4000 series GPUs on Windows 11.

After all that, I was still getting some minor crackling with Live 11.2.7 even at rest. Then I discovered a thread on the Reddit Ableton forum about this very issue starting a few months ago with Live 11 (Win11, Alder Lake CPUs). Someone suggested setting the Windows 11 power plan to "Balanced" instead of "High Performance" and that is working for me and others.

I don't understand enough about the Alder Lake architecture, but for some reason when I set it to "High Performance," it seems like most of the cores are being parked when I look at the display in Process Lasso. However, under "Balanced" all of the cores are active again with somewhat higher CPU usage overall. Note, I have not tried any BIOS tweaks like changing the c-states or speedstep (probably bad to disable for a laptop). For comparison, I installed the last version of Live 10 on the same system and that did not have any noise problems.

[K2osha]

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