Window 10 small pauses when listening to music - drives me crazy

[Richter Di]

Hi, hope someone can help me since I have an issue with my relative new PC (bought in March 2022). I have none of these problems with my „old“ Asus ROG G752VT Gaming Laptop.

 

I am listening is with my

Windows 10 computer (more details below) and

Smyth Realiser A16 simulating 9.1.4 via HDMI

playing via Tidal.

 

I listen to music while working with my computer. The small pauses occur with every kind of activity but can not be triggered by opening a specific app or working in a specific program.

The problems of small interruptions remain also when using another USB iFi DAC via USB or even using the on board sound system.

Also using different players and playing music from the SSD does not change the problem.

 

Can anyone help, please? 

 

Here are the specifics of my Tower computer

 

Hardware : Desktop PC inkl. Windows 10 Pro 64bit
CPU: Intel i7-12700K, 8 X 3,6GHz, Typical TDP: 190 Watt Down TDP: 125 Watt
CPU-cooler: BeQuiet Dark Rock 4 Pro, max. TDP 250 Watt

Disk: 4TB SSD M.2 PCIe Corsair Force MP600 + 4TB HDD WD green 64GB DDR4-RAM ( 2 X 32GB )

Ram: 128 GB DDR4 3600MHz, Kingston Fury Beast

Graphic: MSI 370 TI
Mainboard: ASUS TUF Gaming Z690 Plus D4, Sockel LGA1700, Intel Z690 Chipset
opt. storage: ASUS Blue Ray Brenner BW-16D1-HT/B
Power: 750 Watt BeQuiet Straight Power 11

[One and a half]

What is the player software, perhaps increase the buffer.

[botrytis]

What do you have running in the background? I have never had issues with that in Win 7, 10, 11.

 

Also, 128 GB RAM might be your issue - how many sticks of RAM are you using 2 or 4?

 

TUF GAMING Z690-PLUS WIFI D4 | Motherboards | ASUS Gloabl

 

According to ASUS that RAM size is not supported.

[davide256]

12 hours ago, Richter Di said:

Hi, hope someone can help me since I have an issue with my relative new PC (bought in March 2022). I have none of these problems with my „old“ Asus ROG G752VT Gaming Laptop.

 

I am listening is with my

Windows 10 computer (more details below) and

Smyth Realiser A16 simulating 9.1.4 via HDMI

playing via Tidal.

 

I listen to music while working with my computer. The small pauses occur with every kind of activity but can not be triggered by opening a specific app or working in a specific program.

The problems of small interruptions remain also when using another USB iFi DAC via USB or even using the on board sound system.

Also using different players and playing music from the SSD does not change the problem.

 

Can anyone help, please? 

 

...

 

Should start with some basic fault isolation; right now the problem could be outside your computer (network) .

 

1. Do you experience the same problem playing locally stored music?

        If not , are you using wired or wireless connection? if using wireless, does the problem go away when switching to wired connection?

        If wired, have you checked Tidal FAQ's to see if there are any known router "gotchas" that should be checkedin your router configuration

2. If so, what driver are you using for music playback? Asio or wasapi? If both are available, does switching to the other resolve the issue?

   Does your Smyth device have a pass through mode to disable processing, to see if its added overhead is causing the symptom?

 

Didn't see any software install for the Smyth device but its always good practice to be running latest software (patches)

[ecwl]

Honestly, I have no idea what’s going on but if I were to guess, I would say it’s an HDMI issue?

Can you do the same playback just with USB instead? I’m guessing maybe you can’t get Dolby Atmos via USB? I don’t know since I don’t use Dolby Atmos via PCs.

Tidal app has an exclusive mode that you can turn on and sometimes it can help.

 

[Richter Di]

7 hours ago, botrytis said:

What do you have running in the background? I have never had issues with that in Win 7, 10, 11.

 

Also, 128 GB RAM might be your issue - how many sticks of RAM are you using 2 or 4?

 

TUF GAMING Z690-PLUS WIFI D4 | Motherboards | ASUS Gloabl

 

According to ASUS that RAM size is not supported.

4 x 32 GB (before I had 2 x 32 with the same problem).

[Richter Di]

15 hours ago, One and a half said:

What is the player software, perhaps increase the buffer.

I use Tidal and Foobar but also used other players.

[botrytis]

Check what is running in the background.

 

Your memory has not been tested with this MB. Change your memory. Look at the link I previously linked. ALWAYS BUY RECOMMENDED MEMORY.

[Richter Di]

2 hours ago, davide256 said:

 

Should start with some basic fault isolation; right now the problem could be outside your computer (network) .

 

1. Do you experience the same problem playing locally stored music?

        If not , are you using wired or wireless connection? if using wireless, does the problem go away when switching to wired connection?

        If wired, have you checked Tidal FAQ's to see if there are any known router "gotchas" that should be checkedin your router configuration

2. If so, what driver are you using for music playback? Asio or wasapi? If both are available, does switching to the other resolve the issue?

   Does your Smyth device have a pass through mode to disable processing, to see if its added overhead is causing the symptom?

 

Didn't see any software install for the Smyth device but its always good practice to be running latest software (patches)

 

I experience the problem with local files, e.g. music I have ripped.

The problem does occur quicker when I enabler the 9.1.4 Dolby Atmos support on Windows 10 but also comes up with stereo. But less often.

I have use the Smyth (latest firmware) as well as ifi USB Dac as well as the on board sound card.

 

[Richter Di]

5 minutes ago, botrytis said:

Check what is running in the background.

 

Your memory has not been tested with this MB. Change your memory. Look at the link I previously linked. ALWAYS BUY RECOMMENDED MEMORY.

I will for sure try.

[Richter Di]

8 hours ago, botrytis said:

What do you have running in the background? I have never had issues with that in Win 7, 10, 11.

 

Also, 128 GB RAM might be your issue - how many sticks of RAM are you using 2 or 4?

 

TUF GAMING Z690-PLUS WIFI D4 | Motherboards | ASUS Gloabl

 

According to ASUS that RAM size is not supported.

I just checked and they 64 GB Ram I used until last week where supported. I already had the problems with 64 GB: https://www.asus.com/de/motherboards-components/motherboards/tuf-gaming/tuf-gaming-z690-plus-d4/helpdesk_qvl_memory/ 

Kingston

KF436C18BBAK2/64

2x 32GB

3600

3600

DS

SK Hynix

18-22-22-39

1.35

1,2

[botrytis]

I have never had that issue with any PC, be it an old Petium DUO, all the way to my Ryzen 5 2600.

 

There maybe an issue with 690 MB's from ASUS (only ones reported) slowing down the CPU.

 

https://www.hardwaretimes.com/intel-core-i9-13900k-may-be-up-to-25-slower-on-older-z690-motherboards-vs-z790/

[davide256]

Try disabling Windows OneDrive, I've had it cause quirky behavior

[yamamoto2002]

I experienced similar problem, pause occurs several minutes interval, and found the root cause and fixed. It is caused by HDD spin-down for power savings. Changing it to never spin-down (0 minutes) to fix sound playback pause. There is another possible cause: when computer monitor is turned-off by power savings, HDMI display built-in speaker device disappears and it causes sound device list update event and some music player may upset.

 

if your playback pause occurs more frequently, try this page for troubleshooting https://support.native-instruments.com/hc/en-us/articles/209571729

 

 

[botrytis]

That is why the OS should be on an SSD - as long as one does that - no issues like that.

[yamamoto2002]

7 hours ago, botrytis said:

That is why the OS should be on an SSD - as long as one does that - no issues like that.

This can happen on computers with SSD OS drive and HDD data drive. It can happen even on all-SSD system: On some SSD, wake-up from sleep-state takes some time. Music playback process stops until pending read is resumed.

[botrytis]

Never had this issue with any music programs.

[audiobomber]

I have had music interruptions with some player software programs on my W10 laptop when playing files from my NAS. I now use MusicBee exclusively for local files, no more issues and a truly great, free, music player.