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Windows audio stuttering

Tortie

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My Windows 10 computer is driving me nuts. Everytime I launch a web browser app my audio will stutter very badly. For instance I'll have Qobuz playing music and if I open Edge the music will stutter. Same happens when I open Google Chrome or Firefox.

I have a Gigabyte motherboard with onboard Sound blaster audio. My drivers are up to date as I can tell. I even tested to see if it was a driver issue by connecting my DAC directly via USB and still there's stuttering.

I checked for DPC latency issues and installed the LatencyMon app. It gave my PC a clean bill of health.
 
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Tortie

Tortie

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Thanks for the suggestion but I think I identified the problem. It's the Qobuz app. Apparently the Qobuz app has issues on Windows with audio stuttering and freezing.

When I use Foobar2000 my audio is unaffected by launching or using other apps. I even ran OCCT stress test on my system to max out the cores and Foobar handled it without issue.

I guess in order to use Qobuz on multitasking PC it's necessary to use a third-party frontend such as Roon or Audiovarna.
 

BillG

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I had that issue as well after a recent update. However, I allowed Windows to update a number of optional drivers afterwards and that's resolved it for the most part, upping the priority to high or real-time on certain playback applications helped as well.
 
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Tortie

Tortie

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I had that issue as well after a recent update. However, I allowed Windows to update a number of optional drivers afterwards and that's resolved it for the most part, upping the priority to high or real-time on certain playback applications helped as well.

I'll check for optional updates again but I'm sure my drivers are up to snuff.

The Qobuz app lacks a built in priority setting. Foobar has it. Using task control I was able to set Qobuz to High priority. It helped a little bit. Still stutters when Edge is launched.
 
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Tortie

Tortie

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I'm changing the running priority via Task Manager... ;)

Yeah, that's what I meant. I don't think that's full proof. I even had some stuttering with Foobar yesterday. Today I updated my onboard audio driver and it seemed to help (only) with Foobar.

The Qobuz app may not be designed very well. I think it uses and relies heavily on html language and browser web kit stuff. That could explain why it stutters so badly when Edge is launched separately. The stuttering ONLY occurs when I open a web browser app. Other apps don't seem to interfere. Which is weird. But it makes sense if the Qobuz app is sharing system resources with these web browsers. I don't think the stuttering occured with Firefox, which uses a different webkit engine than Edge/Chrome/Brave browsers. That would imply that Qobuz uses a Chromium engine and thus stutters when another Chromium instance is launched in Windows.

I'm just spitballing here. Not sure how any of this really works. But I have used Qobuz for 4 years now and I remember the previous version of their Windows app was simply a customized web browser that was designed to look like an "app". It was so primitive. The current app looks slicker and more polished but it could still be browser window that fetches webpage elements from qobuz.com and renders them in the "app".
 
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Tortie

Tortie

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@BillG hey that Priority hack does seem to really work well. But it's such a pain in the ass because you have to manually set it each time you open up Qobuz and there's three Qobuz.exe instances that have to be individually adjusted.

I installed an app called Prio that is supposed to "permanently" save task manager extensions in-between sessions. Unfortunately it didn't work. Prio must not be compatible with the latest Windows 10 builds
 

trl

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trl

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Nevermind, Qobuz app stutters with Firefox
You're not referring to the Qobuz web-app, right? Is it's about the Qobuz Windows app, then besides giving it Highest prio (not real-time), you could also check as default audio playback and communication device a different one than the one you're using for audiophile playback. If you're stuck with a single audio device in your system, then I'm out of suggestions. :) Thing is to keep all Windows apps to do playback on a different audio device than you're using for music, maybe this will leverage its drivers and the playback of Qobuz app will not stutter anymore.
 
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Tortie

Tortie

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You're not referring to the Qobuz web-app, right? Is it's about the Qobuz Windows app, then besides giving it Highest prio (not real-time), you could also check as default audio playback and communication device a different one than the one you're using for audiophile playback. If you're stuck with a single audio device in your system, then I'm out of suggestions. :) Thing is to keep all Windows apps to do playback on a different audio device than you're using for music, maybe this will leverage its drivers and the playback of Qobuz app will not stutter anymore.

That's good advice. I'm using the standalone Qobuz app. High Priority seems to largely solve the issue.
 
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Tortie

Tortie

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https://www.windowslatest.com/2018/04/20/enable-ultimate-performance-mode-in-windows-10/

This is the best way to stop the parked cores. Less software/programs the better.
Also, have task manager running while you replicate the stuttering issue. I have a feeling your CPU is just choking.
PC specs would help.

Well thank you for this helpful article. I will give this try.

I used to have that little Power Profile icon in the bottom right corner of my taskbar where the time and date is located but it seems to have disappeared. I need to figure out how to add it back so I can switch easily between Balanced and Ultimate profiles.
 

maxxone

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Well thank you for this helpful article. I will give this try.

I used to have that little Power Profile icon in the bottom right corner of my taskbar where the time and date is located but it seems to have disappeared. I need to figure out how to add it back so I can switch easily between Balanced and Ultimate profiles.

No problem.
I also made a tutorial for opening a file at high priority upon startup.
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...am-at-high-priority-upon-startup-win10.20915/
 

JoostE

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I had the same problem discussed here, and for me, setting priority fixed it completely.

The PC was choking indeed, but I never noticed with Tidal before. Both CPU and Memory touched 100% when playing and starting chrome while having some other programs open, which I think caused the stuttering.

Just read here the priority will need to be set each single time, which is going to be a headache for sure, but I guess its worth it. My other option is to use my phone for music to my DAC, but hat is a whole other hasle.
 

JoostE

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Nice thank you, I am going to look into that.

Sadly though, for high res tracks, it still stutters sometimes.... I guess I need a laptop upgrade, but would like to hold that off another year or so.

Currently I have a Dell XPS13 from 5 years old.

Core i5 5200U 2.2 Ghz
8GB DDR3
Some standard onboard GPU chip, that probably shares in memory or something.

So yeah, maybe I just need an upgrade, but seems really dumb I would need to upgrade my pc for a music streaming app....
 
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