GPU Interferance in both my Creative Soundcard and USB Topping D50.

[jakevoss96]

Hello everyone,

I am very new to the forums but have used this website for a number of months reading reviews on certain audio products. I have noticed there are some highly knowledgeable individuals here who know much more than I do currently about audio so I am hoping someone will know how I can rectify this issue. For a number of years I have been getting by just fine with a pair of Beyerdynamic DT 990 Premium 600ohms running through a FiiO QOGIR E09k headphone amp running through RCA to 3.5mm to the back of my motherboard sound. I never noticed any GPU Usage interference during this point. About a year ago I purchased a Creative SoundBlasterX AE-5 soundcard to give myself a little bit of boost in audio quality since I was only using Realtek and continued to use my FiiO E09K with the new soundcard without hearing any interference. I then upgraded from my DT 990s to the DT 1990s and still did not hear any GPU interferance. Once I purchased the Class A Amp Schitt Asgard 2 I began to hear the GPU interference. I have tested the amp without anything connected into it other than my headphones to make sure that it wasn't just a bad amp. I went ahead and decided that it must be because my soundcard is connected to the PCI just like my GPU so the electrical current must be too close. I went ahead and purchased a Topping D50 and am currently running it through USB but I still hear the GPU interference just as audibly as the sound card. I am wondering if I should purchase something along the lines as a hum eliminator.

 

[amirm]

This kind of problem is very hard to troubleshoot. The best defense against it is having a sound card/DAC that has balanced XLR outputs that then feed your amplifier.

How are you powering the D50? Through an external power supply or second USB connection?

 

[jakevoss96]

Sadly the SoundBlasterX AE-5 does not have any XLR outputs.

I am powering the D50 with a 12W Insignia charger that I bought from BestBuy. I am using the USB cable that came with the D50.

 

[amirm]

If you have a second spare USB cable, use that to power the D50 and see if the situation improves.

 

[jakevoss96]

If you have a second spare USB cable, use that to power the D50 and see if the situation improves.

Trying a second cable produced the same sound. I also tried switching to my front IO panel USB 3 but it still produced the same interference. It becomes much more profound the higher the GPU usage increases.

 

[amirm]

Yeh, it is noise on the USB ground cable which then travels through all of your gear. There are isolated USB solutions but they are expensive. It is luck of the draw whether some audio gear passes it as audio-band noise or not. The GPU pulls massive amounts of current and pollutes the ground wire that way.

 

[jakevoss96]

Yeh, it is noise on the USB ground cable which then travels through all of your gear. There are isolated USB solutions but they are expensive. It is luck of the draw whether some audio gear passes it as audio-band noise or not. The GPU pulls massive amounts of current and pollutes the ground wire that way.

Understood, I have a substantial overclock on my CPU as well so there is more than average current running through my motherboard at the current moment as well. I will try some things next in that avenue to see if it changes the level the distortion I am hearing. Since I have you here however, do you know how I can get past 192000 Hz on my D50?

Screenshot: https://i.gyazo.com/0bdd18d79f166146ecb236a3e2f2c3a9.png

 

[amirm]

Is your music at higher sample rate?

 

[jakevoss96]

Is your music at higher sample rate?

I do have 320kbps albums

 

[Bamyasi]

I do have 320kbps albums

Audio codec's bitrate (e.g. 320 Kbps MP3) has nothing to do with its sampling rate. Sampling rate like 192 KHz you see displayed on your D50 is frequency at which the signal was recorded. Do not worry, it is high enough even for professional quality audio playback and editing.

 

[jakevoss96]

Audio codec's bitrate (e.g. 320 Kbps MP3) has nothing to do with its sampling rate. Sampling rate like 192 KHz you see displayed on your D50 is frequency at which signal was recorded. Do not worry, it is high enough even for professional quality audio playback and editing.

Thanks for clarifying that for me. I feel like a moron for correlating those two together.

 

[amirm]

I do have 320kbps albums

As noted, this is the *bit rate* not sample rate. All MP3s, AAC, etce. use a sampling rate of 44.1 kHz. So set that in the sound control panel. Don't use higher values as that causes a conversion for no reason.

 

[August]

Understood, I have a substantial overclock on my CPU as well so there is more than average current running through my motherboard at the current moment as well. I will try some things next in that avenue to see if it changes the level the distortion I am hearing. Since I have you here however, do you know how I can get past 192000 Hz on my D50?

Screenshot: https://i.gyazo.com/0bdd18d79f166146ecb236a3e2f2c3a9.png

Installing the driver allows him to support 384K32bit, but adjusting the system sampling rate does not make sense. Using wasapi or asio will automatically adapt to the sample rate of the file.

 

[M00ndancer]

I am wondering if I should purchase something along the lines as a hum eliminator.

I would suggest a simple solution to try out. Use the toslink on your sound card and an optical cable to your D50. Power the D50 the same way as you do now. (5V input).

I had other issues (humming when running GPU and CPU) with my old PC, and it all went away after changing to a optical cable. (Had a motherboard with a toslink on the back plate) My problem was a badly designed sound solution on my MB. The toslink should get rid of the USB ground issues.

 

[jakevoss96]

I would suggest a simple solution to try out. Use the toslink on your sound card and an optical cable to your D50. Power the D50 the same way as you do now. (5V input).

I had other issues (humming when running GPU and CPU) with my old PC, and it all went away after changing to a optical cable. (Had a motherboard with a toslink on the back plate) My problem was a badly designed sound solution on my MB. The toslink should get rid of the USB ground issues.

Thank you for the reply. I went ahead and ordered a toslink cable from Amazon which says it will arrive tomorrow. Will running optically from the soundcard to the D50 possibly conflict in audio quality?

 

[BillG]

Will running optically from the soundcard to the D50 possibly conflict in audio quality?

Unless the TOSlink transceivers on either are poorly implemented, then no. And, it'll definitely get rid of that electrical noise...

 

[jakevoss96]

Unless the TOSlink transceivers on either are poorly implemented, then no. And, it'll definitely get rid of that electrical noise...

Now I am getting excited haha

 

[maxxevv]

Next possible option is the power supply in your PC case. Some better made ones do better when it comes to this sort of "noise". And relatively not that expensive in the scheme of a complete PC.

 

[jakevoss96]

Next possible option is the power supply in your PC case. Some better made ones do better when it comes to this sort of "noise". And relatively not that expensive in the scheme of a complete PC.

I am currently using a Corsair RM850i which is 80+ gold certified. What would you recommend?

 

[sajunky]

I can't give recommendation, but I do know that @maxxevv is right. It may have bulged capacitors or some other fault. You should try another one on loan.