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Pops & Crackles During Playback

Posted: Mon Nov 03, 2003 5:06 am
by Dino
I have Sonar 2.0. Running Windows 98 SE with a Pentium 3 800 PC, Sound Blaster 16 PCI Card, I am getting lots of Pops & Crackles during playback mode. They appear at different times in different places. I've done ALL the obvious things like MS config, Changing Buffer and I/O settings and nothing seems to work. Also CPU Usage is like 8% and Disk Space is 2%. Please Help ! Thanks in advance !

Posted: Mon Nov 03, 2003 11:14 am
by andychap
The Creative 16 PCI card is a very low spec card and not really suited to this type of application. If you have invested in Sonar 2.0 then it would be wise to invest in some hardware that will cope, at the very least a SB Live or a USB audio interface.

Normally sliding the slider on the options audio general page towards the right would take out pops and clicks, if not it's down to the quality of the card or some external interference.

Posted: Mon Nov 03, 2003 2:20 pm
by Dino
So your saying the card is not up to snuff. OK, I understand that. But if I move the latency towards the Safe setting it should help ? I'll try this, but I think I have tried that already. I was using Sonar with my old built in Crystal Sound Card and I thought this card might be an improvement. I was thinking about getting the M-Audio Mobile Pre USB Mic Pre-Amp external Card, but I'm concerned because I only have USB 1.1 I hear USB can have it's problems also. Thanks Andy !

Posted: Mon Nov 03, 2003 6:41 pm
by andychap
No problem with USB 1.0. It's faster than the interface on the sound card. Remeber midi data flows in serial at a fixed rate and midi can cope with plenty of it.

I use a Creative MP3+ USB Audio interface with analogue lini I/O and optical digital I/O plus headphone socket and mic in. It's great, cheap, only £40, and it's all powered by the USB 1 socket.

It has some handy sofytware with it including a wav editor and Mini Disc recording facility. There is also the Creative Soft Synth included so if you need midi sounds you have them.

The Digital I/O is absolutely noise free and crystal clear.

Crackle & Pops

Posted: Tue Nov 04, 2003 12:04 am
by Dino
Oh yea Andy, BTW, I'm really not recording any Midi just Audio. I only use the Midi to hear and use my Metronome for the timing of my initial track. I'm just recording Acoustic Guitars and Vocals. Mo Drums or Keyboards.

Posted: Tue Nov 04, 2003 12:13 am
by andychap
I cheat a bit when recording. I have a mini disc deck and the A/D convertors are far superior to any souncard. I rig my gear up like this.

Guitar > amp > mic > old porta studio > analogue in on MD deck > Optical digital out of MD deck > digital in on creative interface.

I can get lovely clean recordings this way. It's not the proper gear to use but you use what you have got and a little experimenting goes a long way.

I honestly think your problem is whith your soundcard. The SB 16 is just a playback card for things like CD's and multimedia sounds. I had a SB PCI 128 and to be honest it was rubbish. I then went to the SB Live and things got a bit better, it was great for midi but noisy for recording. I now use this MP3+ because I can't afford a decent soundcard at about £150. I could have afforded it if I had known what I was doing in the first place because I wouldn't have spent money on all these other crap cards.

No Metronome

Posted: Tue Nov 04, 2003 9:12 pm
by Dino
Now it seems I don't have a Metronome all of a sudden. I was getting the Midi High Hat a couple of days ago but now it's not working. I just recently ran Wave Profiler and then set Midi Out & In but nothing. What happened ? I am just a newbie @ this, so please bare with me. Thanks to all !

Dino

Posted: Wed Nov 05, 2003 12:44 am
by Dino1956
Scratch the Metronome Question. I got it. It seems it was set to the wrong port.