Intermittant Crackling Sound From Speakers In LM 21.3

[Neke]

Hi!

I have had this audio problem from LM 20.2, but kind of just put up with it. Since I just updated to 21.3, and the issue still persists, I figured I'd try and sort it out, with your help.

• It is pretty weird, being intermittant; it's a kind of scratchy, static sound.

• It's not particularly loud and occurs at the same volume level regardless of whether the Volume is set to 0% or anywhere else up to 100%.

• It occurs when I move the mouse, especially (or perhaps exclusively) after I have had some audio going (eg normally a Youtube video), in which case it DOES seem to be louder for a short while, but the volume tapers off over time.

• If I'm moving the mouse, it happens pretty constantly (with 'breaks' depending on where I'm moving the mouse - see below, as it's a lot clearer on Youtube videos) until I stop moving it; after that, it kind of pulses for a while. So it's not a continuous sound, but an on-off-on-off etc thing.

• I just figured out, on Youtube videos, if I run the mouse pointer along the 'timeline' at the bottom, it IS a continuous loud scratchiness. It definitely doesn't like that. But if I drag the mouse pointer over a Youtube video, entering from the sides or the top, it's just a random intermittant type of sound.

I just tested on a couple of saved mp4 video files, and it does the intermittant scratchy sound, with no increase when I drag the mouse pointer along the timeline.

So perhaps there's something odd going on when Youtube caches or cues new video data in the background, esp if it allows that small preview box when we hover the mouse over the timeline. (Something that doesn't happen on standalone mp4 files.)

Not sure if I'm helping much with all that info, or not. But, hey. Anyway, I'll drop my system info below (BTW, I tried a few bits and pieces ages ago, so I already have the Pulseaudio tsched=0 edit on the default.pa Pulseaudio file - that didn't work.)

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System:
  Kernel: 5.15.0-100-generic x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 11.4.0 Desktop: Cinnamon 6.0.4
    tk: GTK 3.24.33 wm: muffin vt: 7 dm: LightDM 1.30.0 Distro: Linux Mint 21.3 Virginia
    base: Ubuntu 22.04 jammy
Machine:
  Type: Desktop Mobo: Gigabyte model: Z390 UD v: x.x serial: <superuser required>
    UEFI: American Megatrends v: F9 date: 10/15/2019
CPU:
  Info: 8-core model: Intel Core i7-9700K bits: 64 type: MCP smt: <unsupported> arch: Coffee Lake
    rev: D cache: L1: 512 KiB L2: 2 MiB L3: 12 MiB
  Speed (MHz): avg: 4687 high: 4702 min/max: 800/4900 cores: 1: 4652 2: 4695 3: 4697 4: 4662
    5: 4702 6: 4700 7: 4698 8: 4690 bogomips: 57600
  Flags: avx avx2 ht lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx
Graphics:
  Device-1: Intel CoffeeLake-S GT2 [UHD Graphics 630] vendor: Gigabyte driver: i915 v: kernel
    ports: active: HDMI-A-1 empty: none bus-ID: 00:02.0 chip-ID: 8086:3e98 class-ID: 0300
  Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 1.21.1.4 driver: X: loaded: modesetting unloaded: fbdev,vesa
    gpu: i915 display-ID: :0 screens: 1
  Screen-1: 0 s-res: 1920x1080 s-dpi: 96 s-size: 508x285mm (20.0x11.2") s-diag: 582mm (22.9")
  Monitor-1: HDMI-1 mapped: HDMI-A-1 model: HP V24i serial: <filter> res: 1920x1080 hz: 60
    dpi: 93 size: 527x296mm (20.7x11.7") diag: 604mm (23.8") modes: max: 1920x1080 min: 720x400
  OpenGL: renderer: Mesa Intel UHD Graphics 630 (CFL GT2) v: 4.6 Mesa 23.2.1-1ubuntu3.1~22.04.2
    direct render: Yes
Audio:
  Device-1: Intel Cannon Lake PCH cAVS vendor: Gigabyte driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel
    bus-ID: 00:1f.3 chip-ID: 8086:a348 class-ID: 0403
  Sound Server-1: ALSA v: k5.15.0-100-generic running: yes
  Sound Server-2: PulseAudio v: 15.99.1 running: yes
  Sound Server-3: PipeWire v: 0.3.48 running: yes
Network:
  Device-1: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet vendor: Gigabyte driver: r8169
    v: kernel pcie: speed: 2.5 GT/s lanes: 1 port: 3000 bus-ID: 03:00.0 chip-ID: 10ec:8168
    class-ID: 0200
  IF: enp3s0 state: up speed: 100 Mbps duplex: full mac: <filter>
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 2.49 TiB used: 26.73 GiB (1.0%)
  ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 vendor: Corsair model: Force MP510 size: 223.57 GiB speed: 31.6 Gb/s
    lanes: 4 type: SSD serial: <filter> rev: ECFM22.7 temp: 25.9 C scheme: GPT
  ID-2: /dev/sda vendor: Samsung model: SSD 860 EVO 500GB size: 465.76 GiB speed: 6.0 Gb/s
    type: SSD serial: <filter> rev: 4B6Q scheme: GPT
  ID-3: /dev/sdb vendor: Seagate model: ST2000DM008-2FR102 size: 1.82 TiB speed: 6.0 Gb/s
    type: HDD rpm: 7200 serial: <filter> rev: 0001 scheme: GPT
Partition:
  ID-1: / size: 72.78 GiB used: 20.06 GiB (27.6%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/nvme0n1p2
  ID-2: /boot/efi size: 486 MiB used: 6.1 MiB (1.2%) fs: vfat dev: /dev/nvme0n1p1
  ID-3: /home size: 145.2 GiB used: 6.67 GiB (4.6%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/nvme0n1p3
Swap:
  ID-1: swap-1 type: file size: 2 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) priority: -2 file: /swapfile
USB:
  Hub-1: 1-0:1 info: Hi-speed hub with single TT ports: 16 rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s
    chip-ID: 1d6b:0002 class-ID: 0900
  Device-1: 1-3:2 info: Logitech Wireless Receiver type: Mouse driver: hid-generic,usbhid
    interfaces: 1 rev: 1.1 speed: 12 Mb/s power: 50mA chip-ID: 046d:c542 class-ID: 0301
  Hub-2: 2-0:1 info: Super-speed hub ports: 10 rev: 3.1 speed: 10 Gb/s chip-ID: 1d6b:0003
    class-ID: 0900
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 27.8 C pch: 43.0 C mobo: 16.8 C
  Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A
Repos:
  Packages: 2755 apt: 2738 flatpak: 17
  No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/flatpak-stable-jammy.list
    1: deb [signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/flatpak-stable-jammy.gpg] https: //ppa.launchpadcontent.net/flatpak/stable/ubuntu jammy main
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/official-package-repositories.list
    1: deb https: //www.mirrorservice.org/sites/packages.linuxmint.com/packages virginia main upstream import backport
    2: deb http: //archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu jammy main restricted universe multiverse
    3: deb http: //archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu jammy-updates main restricted universe multiverse
    4: deb http: //archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu jammy-backports main restricted universe multiverse
    5: deb http: //security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ jammy-security main restricted universe multiverse
Info:
  Processes: 309 Uptime: 13h 30m wakeups: 0 Memory: 31.2 GiB used: 4.51 GiB (14.4%) Init: systemd
  v: 249 runlevel: 5 Compilers: gcc: 11.4.0 alt: 11/12/9 Client: Unknown python3.10 client
  inxi: 3.3.13

Thanks in advance for any ideas and help you can offer on this one!

[Pepi]

This fixed mine

echo "options snd-hda-intel power_save=0 power_save_controller=N" | sudo tee /etc/modprobe.d/hda.conf

[Neke]

Thanks Pepi. No luck with mine. I think it's a little bit worse - I did a reboot after trying your suggestion, and the issue happens when I hover over the video thumbnails on Youtube's homepage now. Not sure if it was doing that already, though. I'll let it settle down after the reboot, in case there are any start-up processes that affect this issue. It's definitely a weird problem!

[Neke]

Mainly a note to self to check this out properly when it's not 3am. Lol.

Uninstalling speech-dispatcher:
viewtopic.php?t=377702


But if any of you have any thoughts on this as a potential source of the problem, I'd be interested. It seems to be installed by default, and I have seen a ton of people claiming getting rid of it (or disabling it) fixed their various sound problems. I guess I could try it - or just Uninstall via the Software Manager (and re-install if it causes its own problems as a result of its absence?)

---------------------------------------------------
Edit to add:
Another forum post, suggesting perhaps an Intel Audio problem. Maybe I'm just stuck with it.

viewtopic.php?t=380682

[Neke]

I wonder if any of you know whether this might cause a problem:

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**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 0: ALC887-VD Analog [ALC887-VD Analog]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 1: ALC887-VD Digital [ALC887-VD Digital]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 3: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 7: HDMI 1 [HDMI 1]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 8: HDMI 2 [HDMI 2]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 9: HDMI 3 [HDMI 3]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 10: HDMI 4 [HDMI 4]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

I was perusing this thread for ideas:

viewtopic.php?t=389383

And did an

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aplay -l

In the Troubleshooting thread, the 'model' output for this command had a Card 0 for the Analog Sound and Card 1 for the HDMI Sound. All mine are Card 0. Should HDMI be different to Analog? Or is it just that the 'model' (in the Audio Cards Detection section) had an NVIDIA driver too?

Lost my Startup/Shutdown Sounds too, after uninstalling speech-dispatcher. I'll see if re-installing it brings them back. It didn't get rid of the sound crackles in any case.