Audio Pops and Crackling Since May Update 1903

Reverting back to 1809 fixes this issue. It's not going to be much viable once more feature updates comes out over the year(s), but for now this is viable if you saw the issue appearing after upgrading to 1903: How to rollback & uninstall Windows 10 May 2019 Update v1903
Hopefully Microsoft can find a solution to this. Please post in this thread if you have similar issues or even solutions, I would love to hear from you.
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Since updating to the latest Windows 10 feature update my audio occasionally cracks and making pop sounds. Doesn't matter when or where and it's completely random. I've tried different ports, DACs, interfaces and converters and it' still there... As a music enthusiast this is really bad and I can't listen or do anything with music in its current condition on Windows. Have anyone else noticed this? It happened right after going from 1809 to 1903. Running latency checks it may be connected to high DPC latency from ntoskrln.exe, as it's the one with the highest marks. How can I can fix this?

Hi, there are precedents in threads on this site where upgrading has led to this. Unfortunately identification and resolution is time consuming and technical.

Did you upgrade manually using an iso or via Windows Update? The former circumvents any MS protective restrictions in offering an upgrade.

It may be that you now have a problematic driver. One person found that using a particular driver from the former build resolved the problem.

If you do a few searches on the forum for e.g.
stutter
or
crackle
you should be able to find some relevant threads and examples of using the relevant tools.

Not for the faint-hearted.

Alternatively, you may prefer to 'Go back to previous' and wait a good while before trying to upgrade again.

I got the update through Wu after a conversation with MS a good (almost) month later. I didn't push it and it just came through. I don't use any bloat or unecessary drivers in this machine and all are updated. Honestly I don't feel like doing a format at this time, especially when there are users reporting the same issue after doing a clean installation. I just looked it up and it seems to be very common on 1903.

I think this is a kernel issue in Windows that I can't do anything about. I've tried pretty much all of the solutions I could find. Other option would be to revert back to 1809... But ugh… Y u do dis Microsoft?

Example of someone who found a way forward... naturally depends what driver you use.
Soundblaster Z crackling sound | Page 6 | TechPowerUp Forums


Different approach - simply changing settings: example based on system using Realtek, but may be appropriate elsewhere:
YouTube

I don't use Realtek nor Soundblaster, and I have tried most of the solutions in that video. I ran letencyMon and it also reported red high µs to ntoskrln.exe. Since it's part of the kernel I can't figure out the cause without doing some time consuming experiments. And there's just so much I can do on this PC because it's very minimalistic in build and installed software, all of which I've updated and changed to best of my abilities. I've used this PC just fine for over 4 years with music and audio, and just now -- on 1903 -- the bees came out… Yeah, I'm calling out Microsoft on this... I will revert back to 1809 soon because this is unacceptable…

Have you tried the audio troubleshooter?

Settings, Update, Troubleshoot, Playing audio

It will probably try to reinstall the existing audio driver on its first pass then, after a reboot, will probably suggest replacing it with an MS audio driver.

Denis

Thank you for keeping us up to date.

Back to 1809 on this particular machine and everything is fine now. The NT kernel doesn's spike. XLR-USB, 6,3mm, 3,5mm all work correctly without any audio pops. I will not mark this as resolved until this issue is addressed by Microsoft, or until we have a solid explanation to this issue. I will keep my eyes close to the release notes for the cumulative updates for 1903 from here on.

Try3 said:

Have you tried the audio troubleshooter?

Settings, Update, Troubleshoot, Playing audio

It will probably try to reinstall the existing audio driver on its first pass then, after a reboot, will probably suggest replacing it with an MS audio driver.

Denis

The driver used is both delivered and signed by Microsoft when I checked. I did search for an updated driver using device manager, and after through Windows Update, but I didn't run the troubleshooter though. It had a contemporary date to it if I remember correctly. I don't really have other options for audio drivers. I have always used the driver from Microsoft for pre-amps or DACs in the past without any issues.

@fireberd Did you link your hits to ntoskrln.exe aswell? 1903 seems like it's not even usable if you do audio recording and production. I went back to 1809 and the abnormal spikes are gone. No pops or crackles.

As you have Home, 17763.557 will protect you from upgrading with the added 'Download and Install' option when a feature update is offered.