Cracking sound through home cinema

Cracking sound through home cinema

Author
Discussion

matrignano

Original Poster:

4,585 posts

216 months

Sunday 16th May 2010
quotequote all
Weird one...

I have a PC / media centre hooked up to my Samsung home cinema. Connected via jack audio out on the PC's sound card, and L/R phono audio in on the home cinema.

When the AUX/audio in is activated on the home cinema, the sound is badly "crackly", even if the PC is actually not playing anything. This phenomenon doesn't seem to be present immediately upon start up of the PC, but begins a few minutes into usage. The only way of getting rid of it is by muting the audio on the home cinema (muting on the PC doesn't change anything).
I've bought a new cable but the problem is still there, so cable cannot be blamed.

Weirdly, when another input is used on the home cinema, e.g. DVD player via HDMI, television via SPDIF, or XBox via component, no crackling sound is ever produced.
It only happens with the PC via phono audio in...

Any suggestions as to cause and solution??

headcase

2,389 posts

223 months

Monday 17th May 2010
quotequote all
Make the fault condition occur then pull out the cable from your PC to the home cinima kit. If it carries on crackling then it is a fault on thet input of your cinima kit, if the problem dissapears as you pull out the cable then the crackling noise is being outputted from your soundcard.
Its possible that excess volume from your soundcard may make the cin kit input distorted.

matrignano

Original Poster:

4,585 posts

216 months

Monday 17th May 2010
quotequote all
The cracking sound stops when I pull the cable out.
The intensity of the cracking sound is directly proportional to the volume, it doesn't just appear when the volume goes above a certain level.

So it sounds like its my sound card... But it's weird that the problem only occurs a few minutes after switching the PC on, and not immediately on start up.
Could it be overheating, or is my sound card really on its last legs?

dave_s13

13,859 posts

275 months

Monday 17th May 2010
quotequote all
Try running the PC with the case off, this will reduce the temps by a few degrees.

Or

Buy a new sound card.

Or

Buy a new motherboard with integrated sound/HDMI

FlossyThePig

4,092 posts

249 months

Monday 17th May 2010
quotequote all
Have you got another amp or computer speakers you can substitute to see if the crackling sound exists that way?

P.S. I thought this thread was going to be about how good your sound system was (cracking system Grommet)