Questions & Answers

Crackles on playback NOT from CPU overload

+1 vote
1,918 views
asked Jul 10, 2020 in StudioLive Series III by hansbickel (260 points)
edited Jul 13, 2020 by hansbickel
Hi,

this is my setup:

- StudioLive 24R

- iMac i7 (2017) running MacOS Catalina (10.15.5)

- Logic 10.5.1

I get crackles (irregular, about 2 crackles per second) when playing back audio from the iMac, even with one stereo track. Makes no difference if I use the Digital Return (channels 37/38) or any other USB inputs, if I try to playback from Logic or from the system (YouTube for example). Any ideas anyone?

(Recording into Logic works fine, no crackles, not even when recording 20 tracks at once.)

Thanks,

Hans

@normanriley Thanks for your answer. Returned to my trusty Scarlett 6i6 for audio playback. I'm rather sure the crackles are caused by the Presonus USB driver and hope the problem will be fixed in the (near?) future.

6 Answers

0 votes
answered Sep 17, 2020 by jonnydoyle (403,680 points)
 
Best answer
Issues like this are generally Mac related.

Run a clean install of the driver using the uninstall option when you download Universal Control.

Ensure you mixer is up to date.

Review: https://support.presonus.com/hc/en-us/articles/210046163-Optimizing-Your-Computer-for-Audio-Mac-OSX

If the issue remains, then log a support ticket.

https://support.presonus.com/hc/en-us/articles/210050813-How-to-create-a-new-Support-Request-
0 votes
answered Jul 10, 2020 by normanriley (5,530 points)
edited Jul 11, 2020 by normanriley
Try increasing your sample rate, resolution, and/or block size.
+1 vote
answered Sep 16, 2020 by joofigueiredo (370 points)
Same problem here. Asus PC with Windows 10.
Mostly always have random crackling on playback only. Waves get recorded perfectly, and listening directly from the mixer is flawless, but whenever I hear from Cubase, either monitoring or playback, I get random crackling.
Turned off several peripherals like USB camera, bluetooth, LAN and WAN cards, optimized PC for audio, but no matter what I do, whatever my sample rate is, crackling is almost always there.
0 votes
answered Sep 20, 2020 by hansbickel (260 points)
Hi,

updating to the latest firmware did the trick:-)

Thanks,

Hans
0 votes
answered Apr 30, 2021 by martinberube (420 points)
Got the same problem with my StudioLive 16r on Windows 10. Everything is up to date. Just playing MP3 with media player reproduce the problem so not DAW or performance related. A lot better at 44.1khz but there's no way a device of that price couldn't play and record at 48khz. Lets hope a fix is coming soon, I'm quickly loosing fate in Presonus.
0 votes
answered May 12, 2021 by weskrsul (140 points)

I just ran into a similar issue.  16R works fine with one laptop, but output crackles with another.  The 2nd laptop works fine with other USB mixer / recorders.  Both are running Windows 10.

Tried all the suggested suspects and switches to get the 2nd working.  Setting UC to 44.1K seems to resolve the issue to run Reaper and play MP3's from windows media player, but can't record at 48K.  

Oddly, connect back up to 1st laptop and now it won't play MP3's from windows media player.  Reaper seems to work fine though.  Solution was to to reinstall the UC driver, power everything down and reboot.   

Went through the whole process twice... wink 

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