*Update at 10-3-2023: Certain versions of Nvidia GForce experience driver can also cause crackles and pops.
I just recently purchased BDF3 and while playing it on my pretty decent laptop. Experienced cracks and pops, with whatever buffer size.
In my journey to get BDF3 running without cracks and pops. I took the following steps and I am now a happy drummer. Hope this helps anyone out there. Here goes:
To prevent crackles and pops with your audio (4 possible problem areas)
I suggest you try each PROBLEM AREA and step in the problem area and test if this fixes your problem before you continue with the next step.
PROBLEM AREA 1. Windows ENERGY MANAGEMENT CHANGES
a). Energy management, set min and max processor status to 100%
Howto:
…Open the Control Panel menu on Windows 11.
…Select Power Options and open Change plan settings.
…Select Change advanced power settings.
…Scroll to Processor power management and expand it.
…Expand the Maximum processor state and set it to 100% when plugged in.
…Click Apply and Ok to save changes.
b). Energy management, disable energy management for usb (for usb soundcards)
Howto:
…Open the Control Panel menu on Windows 11.
…Select Power Options and open Change plan settings.
…Scroll to USB settings and expand USB selective suspend settings.
…Set the On battery and Plugged in settings to Disabled.
…Click Apply and OK to save changes.
c). Energy management, disable turbo boost (you might need a registry patch to enable this option)
Apply this patch to your registry if you can’t enable/disable Turbo boost on your machine(this one helped me a lot):
<FILE>
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\be337238-0d82-4146-a960-4f3749d470c7]
"Attributes"=dword:00000002
<FILE END>
Howto enable the option in your energy plan(if you don't already have it):
..Open notepad
..Copy everything between <FILE> and <FILE END> with out the text <FILE> and <FILE END> to your open notepad
..Save your notepad to your desktop as "energyplan-disable-turboboost.reg"
(make sure save as is set to all files, otherwise notepad will add an unwanted .txt extension to your file and it will not work).
..Open the saved file on your desktop
..In the popup allow to continue as you will want to enable turning on/off turbo boost in your energy plan.
Howto disable turbo boost in your energy plan:
..Open the Control Panel menu on Windows 11.
..Select Power Options and open Change plan settings.
..Select Change advanced power settings.
..Scroll to Processor power management and expand it.
..Expand the Processor performance boost mode and set it to disabled.
..Click Apply and Ok to save changes.
PROBLEM AREA 2. Windows Soundcard settings and driver audio alignment (I actually had a misalignment)
- Align your soundcards audioquality (44,1 Khz 24 bit etc) to windows audioquality or vice versa.
When your audiocard has it’s own settings panel align the settings with do the standard windows sound settings. - Windows sound settings, disable audio enhancement (lessens load on your CPU)
PROBLEM AREA 3. Check if there are any other soundcards on your system which are interfering with the soundcard you want to use. (I had 3 active soundcards).
- Start devmgmt.msc as administrator and in disable any other sound card in the “Sound, video and game controllers” except the one you are using.
These steps did it for me(what did the trick in the end was disabling turbo boost). If not for you here are some other things I came accross but didn’t use:
- Disable DEP on your machine (yes google it).
- Windows System settings, set for maximum performance (also google).
PROBLEM AREA 4. Remove your GForce Experience driver. After initially fixing my issue with crackles and pops I got it back after installing nVidia GForce Experience(Driver Version: 531.18 - Release Date: 2023 February 28). De-installed it and the crackles and pops where gone. No time to test with other Nvidia driver versions which probably eventually will not cause crackles and pop issues. Will report back later.
Good luck on your crack and pop free journey.