Sound crackles, pops, drops, latency issues

[LatencyFix]

I have been hearing static noise and crackles, pops, etc through my headphones, even when not playing any audio. Moreover, when playing audio, the quality is often very bad. I improved the latter issue by updating the drivers, but it keeps reappearing, and the static noise issue always remained. I ran a latency monitor, and there indeed seem to be very high latency levels, bars running way up in the red, and thousands of milliseconds latency. The drivers listed as causing most latency were Wdf01000.sys, ACPI.sys, and HDAudBus.sys.  I already tried the following:

- updating drivers and BIOS

- testing with other headphones

- disabling enhancements, and other standard audio fixes and automated troubleshooters

- set power settings to high performance

None of the above have worked so far. Many others also seem to be having this problem, specifically on HP laptops, but the last posts were already from a while ago, and I hope the issue has been fixed in the meantime. Judging from the many forum posts on this issue, it seems like it has appeared on HP products for years already, and no fixes seem to have taken place. I really like my laptop, it has good specs, and works well for gaming, but if this sound issue persists, I will definitely avoid HP products when buying my next PC, and discourage anyone thinking of doing so. Nobody wants to spend hours trying to troubleshoot the same issue without a clear fix in sight. 

[LatencyFix]

Update: I checked the same headphones on another device, and the sound quality is significantly worse on the laptop, even though the same file was played. Updating or uninstalling drivers doesn't seem to work anymore either. I am afraid I am just stuck with this horrible sound quality and annoying noise on my laptop, and will have to abandon listening to or making music on my laptop altogether. 

[garyfritz]

I have audio problems too:  Spectre x360 15t-ch000, Windows 10 Pro.

At first, with HP's recommended audio driver, I had the 2-second delay.  This is a long-standing and long-known problem, apparently caused by Realtek's lousy drivers.

The recommended fix (see e.g. https://neosmart.net/wiki/fix-realtek-audio-delay-lag/) was to install Microsoft HD audio drivers.  That fixed the delay, but then I picked up mushy distortion in the left channel (speakers plugged into headphone output).

I just discovered HP released a new Realtek driver last month,  (Release 6.0.8940.1 Rev.B, 5/5/2020, https://ftp.hp.com/pub/softpaq/sp103501-104000/sp103860.exe for Spectre, presumably for other models too?)  I installed it, and so far (fingers crossed!) it seems OK.  No delay, and so far no distortion.  (I had previously found that https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQToGcTWSRQ showed the distortion very clearly.  The first 5-10 sec has a guitar arpeggio in the right channel.  With the old driver, no guitar in the right, and the left was total mush.  Sounds great with this new driver.)

[Lynz1]

I have had the same issues - particularly on trebles, the speakers have been incredibly distorted it sounded like nails on a chalkboard.  I have the 13-aw0090ca version with Windows 10 Home.

I have tried what seems like everything under the sun...shut-down and hold the power/F4 key, changing to the Windows audio driver (which worked EXCEPT the volume was very quiet), installing different RealTek drivers, unchecking enhancements, etc. etc.  In some cases it made a slight difference and in others it didn't.  I checked HP for updates for my particular model and there were no RealTek May 2020 updates but there was for the 13-ae000 model when I googled Spectre x360 driver updates so I downloaded and installed it.  I think it has made a difference!  I tried the above poster's YT link and it was previously absolutely unbearable to listen to, particularly the first 5-10 seconds as the poster pointed out but since installing the May update, it no longer sounds like nails on a chalkboard.  There is still some distortion but it is the same with the Mac that I use for work.  I also run everything through FXSound which makes a difference to the quality as well but doesn't fix everything.

Now I have a problem with Spotify and YT (and maybe other stuff ) varying the volume while songs are playing - **bleep**...I've read that this is a Windows 10 issue in particular...

ETA I've just played a different song that I figured might be a problem and it is...that feedback, tinny,. distorted sound....arrrggghhh!!!  (although slightly better when I listen via YT than Spotify so I'm wondering if the quality of the sound itself also plays a role...it is driving me mad especially as I am a music nerd and it is so, so important to get right)

[Lynz1]

OMG i cannot believe this  I was having issues still with crackling of the speakers - especially the right speaker still, after I thought I had fixed it last night (turns out not so much).  I found that it was possible to run through Dolby Atmos for Headphones (Microsoft app store) and.....guess what!??????  My sound crackling issues seem to be fixed!!!!  Of course it does not come free (because why would it?!) but I kid you not...literally all of my sound issues are fixed.  I spent hours trying to install Realtek HD Audio Manager and it would NOT install no matter what I tried and messed around with a bunch of drivers where I thought I was getting somewhere but not so much.

Now my sound is not EXACTLY as I like it but is a million times better without the crackling and random volume variances from the FX enhancer I tried using (I have studied music and quality is very important to me having invested in a proper DAC player, IEMs, and will not download anything other than .flac files [though I will stream music at lower quality for around the house but usually will run through proper speakers - unfortunately those speakers are packed away atm so am just left with my laptop speakers])

For reference, I've been playing and testing using this song - it sounded like nails on a chalkboard without the Dolby Atmos enabled:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTrNsAsjEmY