Inspiron 1420. Audio is choppy. Interruptions.

I think I finally got rid of the problem...

I "downgraded" to Windows XP and turned the audio hardware acceleration off... and no more skipping/popping!

I had to go through all that trouble...

 

Hey, nice, at least you made it work on XP. Is there a place where you can turn off audio hardware acceleration on Vista?

 

Just got my vostro 1400, and yes it's got the choppy sound when playing mp3 and video files as well (not yet tried games), so still NO SOLUTION?

 

No solution yet. My video sounds fine though.

 

The sigmatel audio that comes with these notebooks kinda stink, that or the drivers. I find my audio is slightly choppy as well.

 

"My video sounds fine though" --- that just sounds funny. It kind of reminds me of how SILLY THIS ******* PROBLEM REALLY IS. I have an Inspiron 1520 with enigma hell....I mean.... sigma tel audio. It's a real blast, isn't it? I even checked the Winamp audio buffer, praying that when I heard a skip I would see an underrun of the buffer. NOPE. NO underrun. >.< I've tried everything with no go. Except for the DVD in the drive thing. Maybe something that stupid will fix this stupid a** problem! *hands folded*

 

hah yes its not at all a buffer issue and the DVD in drive didn't help me none. BUT I came back here to report that I've been listening to music tonight for like 6 hours now and NOT ONE skip or blip yet! Just the other day I updated all the hardware drivers and it wasnt fixed after that because I tested after installing all the updates. Somehow suddenly now there is no problem with the audio at all! How strange. I hope the blips never come back! I'm running all the usual apps I run always, msn, skype, onenote, last.fm client, utorrent etc. playing mp3s on iTunes. And withOUT VISTA ANTI-LAG!!

 

I have the same problem ... apart of all the bumps and pops.... is it me or the audio of this laptop really really sucks???

it sound like crap ... really distorted... is there any solution to this???

 

The sound is not bad I think. I compared to iPod and laptop sounded better. iPod had a slightly better midrange clarity though. Thats the only problem. Laptop sounded better to me overall.

Maybe your EQ is set in a bad way. Should check that.

 

Present on my 1420 as well. Looks like it's going back. This *may* just be my last Dell, ever...

 

haha nice. 1420 is my last PC ever. Can you imagine this kind of trouble on a mac? Never.

 

When the choppiness happens, is it only in Windows Media Player? Also, it is only when you have multiple files in a playlist?

 

Nope. I use Itunes exclusively. And this happens in Videos too under WMP. Was watching some Anime and lo and behold *Pop crackle skip*

I just obtained a UPS return label. This thing is going back faster than it came.

 

my 1420 has the default drivers from the Dell disk and it does not skip... Good luck man

 

hah, not to get off topic but I have an acer that is exhibiting the same problems. What interests me is that vista basic came with the computer, never had a problem. Well my atheros b/g card died and I replaced it with a dell wireless 1490 a/b/g mini-pcie card, then I put vista home premium on it... then the choppyness starts, so then I shrink my vista volume and install fedora. SAME *amn thing! Another thing is since reading this thread I went and bumped my minimum processor state up to 100% in windows (since you can't scale proc freq in linux), and it does help somewhat with the choppyness. So what I really want to know is, does dell have a driver for this card for vista, b/c vista shows it as "Broadcom 802.11 Multiband Network Adapter".

 

I do notice some mad skipping when I'm on bluetooth

 

I have been looking around the net and ive found a few remedies, (i hope no one has posted it up.)

The choppy sound and stuttering may be caused by the wireless card trying to connect/look for a network signal. If you let the card connect, or just shut it off while you arnt using it, the stuttering should stop...as i have read.

The next thing is maybe the RAM needs to be reseated. just take it out and put it back in

If these solutions have been posted sorry for wasting your time!

If they work however, can you reply? im interested in getting this notebook but if this problem persists im going to reconsider!

 

I tried shutting off the wifi card before, it doesn't do anything. I haven't tried ram reseating thing though.

BTW, my choppy problems are now quite tolerable. Seemed like it gradually got better over time. Maybe there were some updates that solved part of it? Who knows.

 

I have read many threads on this issue. People have been saying it's a vista issue but it definitely is occuring in XP also. Therefore I have no option to use vista anti-lag. It's definitely an issue of the wireless adapter causing the choppy sound from my testing. Disabling the "a band" on the wireless card has worked for many but this option is not availabe for those of us with the Dell 1390 card. The only thing that works is to disable the wireless adapter but of course that is not practical. If someone from Dell reads this, please please release some new firmware for the wireless cards.

 

I'm on XP on my Vostro 1400, with the standard dell wireless card (no option to disable any bands) and I do experience audio skip problems.

It's just about fed me up enough to install vista and disable the sound option there!

argh!

I doubt shielding the wireless card with electrical tape would work like it works with the headphone jacks. Who knows....

 

Got skipping even on my Vostro 1400 in XP.

* Turned down hardware acceleration in Sound settings = no effect.
* Turned the 'A' spec of 802.11 off = sound glitches reduced by 50%
* Turned off Powermizer in NVIDIA settings = glitches completely gone

So woot!

(Now to fix the constant audio buzzing, electrical tape fix didn't work)

 

So this really is a GPU problem? I installed nTune on Vista but don't know what to do with it yet.

 

I'm happy to report an older version of the Broadcom wireless driver 4.100.15.5 for Dell 1390 minicard fixed the choppy audio in XP.

 

i have that wireless card. can you post a link to the download page for that driver?

 

It's on the the Dell support site for drivers. I think it will work only for XP not Vista.

http://ftp.us.dell.com/network/R151519.EXE

 

i'm on XP, so that's not a problem. however, it turns out that i'm actually already using that driver for my wifi. guess my search for a solution continues.

 

heh... ditto...

 

Sorry it didn't help you guys. It's a maddening problem. I tried lots of stuff earlier this week but none fixed it. I updated to the new BIOS that just came out, switched from ATA to AHCI, reinstalled the Sigmatel sound driver, put electrical tape on the wireless card (which is still on btw), changed power settings but no can do. Only yesterday when I installed that wireless driver version the problem was solved. I hope you guys get it solved because a basic thing like sound has got to work right.

 

I'm gonna try completely removing the Wireless drivers and then reinstalling.

I do have an interesting situation though.

I can play games - mainly LOTRO - for hours on end and get no audio skip.

But as soon as I run firefox I get crazy skippage....

 

UPDATE:

I've discovered the source of MY audio interruptions!!

I was playing through the Dell 1390 Properties, and under the Advanced tab, I changed "BLUETOOTH COLLABORATION" to "disable" because I do not have a BT card installed.... and voila! skip free!!

 

i can confirm that turning off PowerMizer definitely solves the issue - looks like it's the GPU throttling itself that's causing the skips, clicks, and pops. however, doing so increases my GPU temps by about 6-10 degrees and also shaves off a whopping 30 minutes of battery life. definitely a workaround that comes with a hefty price. as for now, i've turned PowerMizer back on in the hopes of finding another way to solve the issue.

 

Powermizer disabling doesn't really do anything for me.

I only tried it because I had some skips pop up on me today...

 

I did not do enough research before I bought this thing.

Haven't seen any posts in a long time.

I too have this problem and have tried XP, Vista and in both. Newest drivers on both.

For some reason on a 7200RPM drive it sounds worse than on a 5400RPM one... weird.

Didn't want to join another forum but I'm here!!! LOL

I'm on XP now and have tried almost all of the things and to no avail.

Only thing I haven't tried is Poweropty (Isn't this for battery only?) and original driver from dell CD... those 2 are next.


My 1st Dell and last. I always tell ppl to avoid Dell... Should have taken my own advice.

 

Well, I tried PowerOptimizer and the newest Driver R181712... nada.

I will try older drivers to see if I can resolve this... This is aggravating.

 

Take a hammer to the lappy, that would solve the problem.

But seriously, I don't think its a solvable problem. This laptop forced me to buy a 80GB iPod, but the laptop was suppose to be my music station! Dell screwed me over like no tomorrow. Now I'm stuck with this $1200 internet browser and a $300 music station.

 

Alright, I have dual booted with XP Pro and Vista, Choppy audio on both OSes! disabling wireless "a" band seems to have worked in Vista. Xp is next, I'll try disabling hardware acceleration.

This issue seemed to pop after I changed my 8600Gt drivers, odd...

 

So far everyhting I have tried has not worked. Everything posted here and a few toher things I tried on my own.

I will NEVER buy another DELL product. First and last. I am calling them to see maybe if SP1 can help. LAst thing I'm willing to try...



Sounds retarded but could this issue be the speakers?

 

awright it came back today so I disabled hardware acceleration we'llsee how it goes.

 

For the people who are having this problem--is this only for MP3 playback in Windows Media Player? Have you tried other applications? Other filetypes? The fact that games and other applications work fine just doesn't fit.

 

I don't use WMP, just Winamp. I'm quite sure some movies I watched had some glitching in it too now that I think about it. And the filetype shouldn't matter, as it's raw samples that are sent to the audio buffers .. the source content shouldn't really matter.

But anyway I haven't had any glitches since I turned powermizer off (also moving to a specific nvidia driver version achieved the same result) months ago.

 

It is usually with music which is weird. Videos are fine. I have tried WMP, KMP, real alternative and anything that is "music" skips from time to time.

I also asked them for an SP1 disk and they told me that they had no Vista with SP1... kind of hard to believe since they are such a large OEM. Whatever. Never again.

The one thing that I also noticed was that, I reinstalled a bunch of times, was that on certian installs it was worse than others. The situation is also a bit worse on my 7200 rpm vs the 5400 rpm.

 

I tried RMclock to see if keeping the multi at 12 would work but no avail.

Ok. I finally called DEll to see if they could send me a replacement but they are giving me the runaround after 2hours of having me on the phone. Now they are telling me that their system is down for 3 hours

I will try in a few hours to see... very disappointed with hem.

 

Hey, guys...

Okay, so I joined this forum JUST to show you what I have discovered... Please, read on!

This has been a very very frustrating thing for MANY owners of Dell laptops, including me! I am on a very tight budget, so I could not get a machine specifically built for what I will be using it for, but one of the reasons I got a laptop was to be able to use my DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) on the go... And with stuttering audio problems, this is completely impossible! With these problems I just have an expensive web browser and word processor!!!

So, needless to say, my heart sank when I was faced with these problems... But I have found a solution--I believe that no one has mentioned it before--that almost COMPLETELY fixed the stuttering. I've had NO stutters in my DAW or with Windows Media Player for many hours thus far.

Okay, so I did a few things that were suggested, which did reduce the severity of this problem. Disabled the 'a' band, disabled bluetooth, disabled audio enhancements, set laptop to high performance, etc. This did help, but doing these things in combination with the fix I am about to give you COMPLETELY fixed this problem for me! I really hope it brings resolution to all of the fustrated owners of this product!

Okay, so those of you who don't know about ASIO sound processing, it is basically a method of processing that certain soundcards are featured with, and it is amazing. It handles audio data roughly twice as efficiently, if not more, than conventional processing. Now, most soundcards do not have this feature, let alone on-board laptop soundcards. Fortunately there is a free program that emulates ASIO on your soundcard. Honestly, it seems like magic, it seems too good to be true. You just install it, and your audio is being processed more than twice as efficiently... With emulation... Wow...

Download ASIO4All here: http://www.asio4all.com/

Once this is installed, open up the ASIO4ALL "Off-Line Settings". Drag the audio buffer slider to the max. This will ensure that any pops or skips will be detected and repared in the buffer zone. You may have to restart your computer after you have installed and changed the settings.

Now, this is sort of strange, because the first few minutes of mp3 playing in WMP (at least today) were filled with minor sporatic popping, but really nothing horrible compared to what was there before. After a while of 'warming up', I have been listening to music non-stop for a few hours, and I have heard NO pops, clicks, pauses, or stutters. I am very happy about this!!!

Please let me know if this is a fix that will work for some of you guys. I hope it helps.

 

Thanks for the tip! I've used ASIO4ALL for MIDI interfaces and such before but didn't think about applying it here!

ASIO4ALL completely alleviated the problem for me (without adjusting any settings). In addition, I've re-enabled Vista's sound enhancements without any problems. Since I don't have Bluetooth, I won't re-enable that setting anyway, but I suspect I could if I wanted to.

Seems like this is the way to go, folks.

UPDATE: ASIO4ALL has not fixed my problem. In fact, it seems that it isn't even able to function for the output of the SigmaTel driver (though it works on the Mic In). I experienced a period of no stuttering immediately after I installed it, though, and prematurely attributed the improvement to ASIO4ALL.

 

i cant imagine that none of the reviews could find this glaring error. It has been active for almost 1 yr now. Is this problem also present in the latest set of laptops??I read about this error only in this thread !!

I have booked an inspiron1420 on the 22nd of this month. Now i am considering cancelling the order for this reason, as music is a big criterion for me. Would this be the correct thing to do ??

 

You can get it. Test it vigorously. And return right away if audio is bad. Learn about how to send it back first, if you don't know.

 

hello guys,

i was of the opinion that this problem is specific onnly to Dell laptops.. but after going through many forums, it seems that this problem is present in HPs,Sony Vaio,Acer,Asus. All have Vista in common and intel wireless card.

check this thread to read posts from owners of laptops of other make

http://forums.microsoft.com/msdn/sh...tid=1196678&sb=0&d=1&at=7&ft=11&tf=0&pageid=6


perhaps we can find a solution by implementing a few of their 'work arounds'

 

i found this interesting solution in the thread whose link i posted in my previous post..

pls check this solution, and inform us whether it works....

 

I would love to get rid of this. Definatly wireless interference with the audio drivers or what not. VR99 sounds like you got something there but your link is dead. I also installed ASIO4ALL and was happy for about a minute until i pressed the IP sniffer button and the skipping was there as always. ARR!

 

I read about this problem just now. I have ordered a Dell 1420. Should i begin to worry? No fixes are yet found?