Weird, but whenever I sync my empeg, my PCs onboard sound actually sounds good. Normally I cannot stand to wear headphones unless I am playing music due to the weird noises caused by interference within the beast.

Is this any indication of a way to fix my problem or am I still destined to buy a new soundcard for her?

System Specs:
AMD 1.4 ghz
512 megs ram
40 gig 7200 RPM HDD
AOpen AK73 Pro with onboard sound and firewire (Possibly Video as well but I have another vid card in her.)

Any ideas??

Thanks!

Have you tried sticking the sound card in a different slot?

/Pepijn

Sorry if I never made it clear but the only sound "card" currently running is the onboard sound. I don't have a spare soundcard and the closest Computer Shop to me is about a 2 hour drive each way.

AOpen AK73 Pro with onboard sound and firewire

...never mind...

It sounds like some kind of interrupt problem. A PC can sometimes get into some weird state where each interrupt generates an audible click in the sound card. Perhaps emplode using the USB controller changes something that makes it stop. I can't think of anything that sounds less farfetched...

You could try turning off channels in the mixer to determine which channel is producing the noise. Perhaps it's one you don't need. Make sure you check all the boxes under Options/Properties in the mixer so you're actually seeing all the channels the mixer has.

/Pepijn

I was already typing my second reply... :-)

/Pepijn

Cool... but that didn't fix it. Mic was turned off and it was the only one that affected anything when turned on... it got real noisy.

Even with the entire volume muted I still get noise. I should also note that I am syncing via ethernet... which is done by a add on PCI card and nothing on-board.

It could be a ground loop. Have you tried plugging and uplugging different things on the back of your computer to see if the noise goes away?

When I got an extra-sensitive pair of headphones, they revealed a ground loop that I'd never heard before. I discovered that if I unplugged the USB cable between the player and the computer, the ground loop went away. Which was OK for me since I prefer to use ethernet anyway.

I have the same problem with my SBlive sound card. Its caused by some kind of irq sharing problem. I need to read up on how this high tech irq steering stuff works, Im used to seeing each device needing its own irq. I would strongly reccommend you drop by AOpens web site and see if there is a BIOS update for your motherboard. This could be an easy fix for your problem.

Sean

Been there, done that. Still the same.

I gotta try out the ground loop problem... actually I will try that now...

Nope... my first plan of attack on my ground loop has failed... I will have to do further testing at a later time.

Thanks for the ideas... keep them coming!

If you figure out what it is, please let me know. Im about to start messing with bios pci settings in a attempt to stop the annoying crackling sound. Ill post if I fix it somehow.

I gave up trying to fix mine and got usb speakers I just left the sound card in for the line in

Hmm. Have you tried updating the windows device drivers for that sound chip? Maybe it's a driver problem.

Another option might be to get a proper sound card and disable the one on the motherboard. Those are notoriously flaky.

Onboard sound disabled + new AOpen AW-850 sound card = nice clean sound... ahhhh... problem solved, music to my ears!