Desperate for Help with my Mixer/Webcam popping problem. REWARD

[kilerb]

Originally Posted by BassDuck

Uninstall the driver for the amd audio and the radeon card from device manager and uninstall CCC from the the control panel

Uninstalled the driver. I also uninstalled the amd radeon stuff. For some reason it didn't uninstall the AMD Catalyst installer. But all the components inside it are uninstalled. Screen res went way down. I can't really test now because when I try to run xsplit it says unable to open window please enable 3d acceleration or something. Wouldn't let me install the logitech drivers either to test with all this stuff missing. the hissing and pops surround each sound still though.

[BassDuck]

try to uninstall the USB Audio codec driver, remove the mixer, shut down the computer, start it up, plug the mixer into the usb you want to keep it in and test..

[kilerb]

Originally Posted by BassDuck

try to uninstall the USB Audio codec driver, remove the mixer, shut down the computer, start it up, plug the mixer into the usb you want to keep it in and test..

Uninstalled the usb codec for audio. rebooted to windows. windows said it installed the amd drivers for video. Plugged in the mixer to a usb port. Didn't say anything about it installing it, i went to the device mgr and it was back. Still makes the hissing and pops with sounds. Still says it can't login to xsplit because it's missing some 3d accelration.

[BassDuck]

I'm out of ideas.. I've been searching high and low... only thing I can suggest short of a complete re install is to uninstall the camera drivers, any other device drivers and the mixer again shutdown and plug in the mixer first.. I don't understand why it's making hissing and popping noises...

If you right click on the speaker in the bottom right corner, and go to the play back and recording devices tabs what shows up there?

[kilerb]

I just reinstalled windows. First thing I did was the basic drivers so i can get on the net etc... Had to have video drivers installed for xsplit or anything with the cam to work.... I just plugged in the Mackie mixer and it found the same usb codec driver... It immediately has the hiss/crackling. Think it might have more crackling when sounds are going. Then i hooked up the cam and installed the driver. The latency spiked to red. Mostly between 8000 and 16000. One went over 16000. BUT, there were no pops. So I am thinking that possibly when I thought it was working, it was actually "working" with latency spikes, but since there are no pops at this point, I just kept using it? Not sure, but after a fresh windows 7 install, no software installed AT ALL except for what I mentioned (XSplit and logitech) the latency still shows like this below... BTW, in the logitech program, if I switch from "photo" to "video" it's in the green. Only photo mode causes the spikes. Which is making me want to try XSplit. Doing that now...
OK, just did it... Went to 720p and the pops and latency spikes DID happen. So, does this mean I have either a bad piece of hardware or a conflict of some kind between some pieces? The messed up part is this did work perfectly before.

[BassDuck]

God you must be frustrated, I'm almost about to pull out my hair and it's not even my problem lol..

I can't find anything online relating the webcams to latency spikes or the latency spikes having any affect on camera performance..



I should have suggested this earlier and it's probably not gonna change anything... but do you have an extra usb cable you can try with the mixer?? maybe the cable is faulty??

I know that doesn't explain the Latency spikes..

[BassDuck]

XSplit Forum • View topic - HP HD-2200 webcam not working with xsplit

Take a look at that?? I know its not your webcam but it has something related to the frequency of the mics and the sound or something on the second page.

[kilerb]

Originally Posted by BassDuck

God you must be frustrated, I'm almost about to pull out my hair and it's not even my problem lol..

I can't find anything online relating the webcams to latency spikes or the latency spikes having any affect on camera performance..



I should have suggested this earlier and it's probably not gonna change anything... but do you have an extra usb cable you can try with the mixer?? maybe the cable is faulty??

I know that doesn't explain the Latency spikes..

I have the Behringer mixer and it would probably work with the mackie, but even if it did fix the audio crackle/hiss during sounds it plays, I'm still going to have this cam prob. I guess i'll call CyberPC tomorrow... I hope they don't give me any crap on exchanging it. Its been about a month since I got it.

BTW, just saw your last post, but my issue even happens in the little logitech program when I take a photo of myself. Not just xsplit.

[BassDuck]

does the audio pop and crackle while your using the cam and just the onboard audio??
sorry If I already asked.. lol

Maybe try running all the cam's recording a short clip of video and audio from the cameras simultaneously and check the footage? with the mixer unplugged only using the onboard audio??

[kilerb]

Bass, you are not going to believe this... My buddy actually purchased a computer last week after I had gotten mine. It's a similar PC. 3820 i7 with 8gb of ram. He has a different Asus motherboard than I do and a different video card. I just convinced him to bring his computer over to test this out on his. I installed the logitech drivers and hooked up my usb mixer. Pops and latency spikes... Just like on mine! So, now I'm thinking 1 of a few things... A. For some reason, webcams and USB mixers don't work well together. That seems sort of ridiculous. I haven't seen other people posting about this on Google searches and I can't be the only one that's tried to run cams in high def while using a usb mixer. B. This is too much for the system (This is also ridiculous because i've had successful tests with all 3 cams for 2 hours and recording audio and video simultaneously...) or maybe C. I shouldn't use my USB mixer for recording AND windows audio output? I can't hear any computer sounds while we are recording the podcast if I don't do that though. What do you think after learning all this?? Thanks!

[BassDuck]

still doesn't explain the latency spikes with just the cameras and no mixer installed??... but maybe they're not as sensitive as the audio is which doesn't make sense to me cause video uses way more bandwidth than just audio alone.??

It could be the generic usb audio driver, maybe it doesn't play well with the cameras being installed?? What exactly do you record, how many channels of audio?

[kilerb]

Originally Posted by BassDuck

still doesn't explain the latency spikes with just the cameras and no mixer installed??... but maybe they're not as sensitive as the audio is which doesn't make sense to me cause video uses way more bandwidth than just audio alone.??

It could be the generic usb audio driver, maybe it doesn't play well with the cameras being installed?? What exactly do you record, how many channels of audio?

Hmmmmm, I don't think there is a driver for the Mackie mixer I'm using. Didn't come with any. Didn't see any online. The Behringer did have one, but it happened with that mixer too. Also, this doesn't even need to be recording to happen. I could just pull up the camera in the Logitech "Quick capture" software and look at myself in photo mode. Only at higher megapixel setting and it would start up. Or in XSplit at 720p or higher. Not streaming or recording... Just pulled up the image prior to any of that. I don't remember how bad the latency spikes were when I didn't have the mixer installed. Not sure I removed it from the device mgr either before trying it. Might have but don't remember. I am going to do some tests right now.

[BassDuck]

I didn't see any driver for the behringer mixer online, it just used the standard windows usb audio driver from what I read.

Do you have Windows 7 Service pack 1 installed? aswell as some of the .net framework updates??

[kilerb]

I did every update that was available to me when it came up. I'll look now while I check this stuff out...

[BassDuck]

if you got all the updates you should be good.

Just to be clear n recap

With no cameras, only the mixer, there is a hiss and popping noise around every sound that the computer produces.

When you plug the camera in and set it to high resolution, there's popping noises even when there is no audio playing,

without the mixer installed, headphones plugged into the onboard headphone jack there is no audio popping but the DPC latency checker still shows spikes,

is this all correct?? fill in anything i'm missing

[kilerb]

Originally Posted by BassDuck

if you got all the updates you should be good.

Just to be clear n recap

With no cameras, only the mixer, there is a hiss and popping noise around every sound that the computer produces. - YES FOR SURE.

When you plug the camera in and set it to high resolution, there's popping noises even when there is no audio playing, - Yes a different kind of pop... "Dip dip dip dip... dip................. dip dip........ dip dip dip....... dip ... etc etc"

without the mixer installed, headphones plugged into the onboard headphone jack there is no audio popping but the DPC latency checker still shows spikes,
Pretty sure that is correct... Will check it out as soon as windows is done updating. This is a new install and I'm doing that now. I installed the AMD graphic driver first but for some reason on youtube, the videos are VERY choppy. sound is fine, but the video is skipping frames or something. Maybe the windows update will fix it. It had like 40 important updates and 16 non important and they're going now.
is this all correct?? fill in anything i'm missing

EDIT - youtube looks good after upgrading to windows explorer 9 during windows update. Not sure why it wouldn't on the previous browser... but it's smooth now.

[BassDuck]

Originally Posted by kilerb

EDIT - youtube looks good after upgrading to windows explorer 9 during windows update. Not sure why it wouldn't on the previous browser... but it's smooth now.

I hate internet explorer lol

What exactly is the purpose of the mixer?? do you have mic's inputed and using that as an interface to record into xsplit and hear the input in the headphones??

[kilerb]

Yeah, I'm going to do a weekly podcast... 3 guests each week. Comedians in LA. I have 4 mics hooked to the mixer and 4 headsets... When we record each week, people can watch on our site live while we do. The XSplit let's me switch from cam to cam while we chat or show things from the net or whatever I want.

I don't usually use IE either btw... Just didn't install chrome yet. Also, I don't know if CyberPower installed every windows update before shipping me the computer, but every time it installs "the available updates" i go back in to windows update and there are more waiting. So I'm doing them all right now. The last one did involve some framework.

[BassDuck]

It would be awesome if a missed update fixes your problem.. lemme know how it goes!!

[kilerb]

Originally Posted by BassDuck

It would be awesome if a missed update fixes your problem.. lemme know how it goes!!

Did updates til there were no more updates to do. I uninstalled the generic USB driver and unplugged the mixer before reboot (which by the way did stop the clicking at the weirdedst time... Was actually going into the audio area of the control panel to see if there were some settings I could change and it just stopped there. Maybe updates were going on in the background after a reboot. I dunno... But that's good.) I did enable the onboard sound card again. I'm assuming the hardware is okay at this point and I wanted to hear what was going on while doing the test. Ran XSplit and went to HD mode on the cam. It did have some red spikes. Might not be as many but they're still there... When you run your latency test, does it ever go into the red if you're doing intensive things? Also, the volume on the front headphones jack, and I believe the back one too from the sound card is WAY softer than the USB. If it's all the way up on the volume bar it's not nearly as loud as USB at the halfway mark. Is that weird?

[BassDuck]

When im loading my daws i some times get spikes or loading software. The headphone jack shouldnt be too quiet but your mixer and any external audio interface will usually be much louder.

[kilerb]

Originally Posted by BassDuck

When im loading my daws i some times get spikes or loading software. The headphone jack shouldnt be too quiet but your mixer and any external audio interface will usually be much louder.

Well I do feel better than my friend's computer produced the same results. Now I don't feel like I have faulty equipment. That's one positive thing. If I don't figure anything else out before our first podcast day (2 weeks from today) I'll just do the streaming video in standard definition. Not sure what else to do. Just seems so ridiculous that a webcam on a pretty powerful computer with USB 2 and USB 3 ports couldn't handle doing this in 720p. I wonder if I was getting latency spikes when I did my initial tests that I thought worked so well. Didn't hear any popping, but I didn't have the latency tester at the time. Now I need to figure out whether to keep the Mackie or the Behringer mixer too.

[BassDuck]

If you cant get them working, maybe try a pro audio interface with 4 mic inputs, may perform better with actual dedicated drivers rather than just generic audio drivers, im sure you can get this sorted within the next 2 weeks.

[kilerb]

Originally Posted by BassDuck

If you cant get them working, maybe try a pro audio interface with 4 mic inputs, may perform better with actual dedicated drivers rather than just generic audio drivers, im sure you can get this sorted within the next 2 weeks.

I agree... But even without the mixer involved the spikes come. So seems like it's not the culprit anyway. You know?

[BassDuck]

Yea, but if there are a few spikes, it should be okay as long as theyre not affecting the audio or video stream. It could be possible that the generic usb audio driver just isint dedicated enough to "ignore" these spikes and isint efficent enough, maybe a friend of yours has an audio interface you can test to see if its any different than the mixers.

[kilerb]

Originally Posted by BassDuck

Yea, but if there are a few spikes, it should be okay as long as theyre not affecting the audio or video stream. It could be possible that the generic usb audio driver just isint dedicated enough to "ignore" these spikes and isint efficent enough, maybe a friend of yours has an audio interface you can test to see if its any different than the mixers.

Hi Bass, had to take a bit of time off from this. Was stressing me out! Here's where I am at now... I've tried the various things mentioned above. The fact that my friend's computer didn't work either and his motherboard and video card are different leads me to believe it's not my computer. When the mixer isn't connected I still see the red latency spikes in HD on the cams in XSplit or just the logitech program. As of right now, I'm going live in 6 days... If I can't figure this out, then I am going to just have to settle for what IS working... 640x360 resolution. The crappy part about that is it looks bad at full screen and if I want to show anything from the internet, the text is not legible. I just wish I could go HD. Not sure why it has worked in the past (Although I DID NOT have the latency viewer running when it was working, so it very well may have gone to the red. But it definitely did not make the popping sounds.) The only audio that is enabled in the sound area is the generic USB driver for the Mackie mixer. I returned the Behringer.

[connermcfury]

I don't have any experience with Xsplit, nor am I really a windows guy, but in light of you guys trying everything related to drivers and fresh installs, etc. i had a couple of thoughts on your situation. Apologies if these aren't relevant.

1. Do you have a separate (internal or external) hard drive you can record audio to? Recording audio to your system drive is rarely ideal and i've seen it cause issues like what you're experiencing with latency spikes.

2. This is probably a long shot but are you sure your USB mixer is set at the same sample rate as your recording?

Best of luck, And sorry if this isn't helpful, i know how frustrating crap like this is.

[BassDuck]

At this point if you unplug the mixer and use the on board audio, are there any popping noises??

[kilerb]

Originally Posted by BassDuck

At this point if you unplug the mixer and use the on board audio, are there any popping noises??

@Conner and Bass

I just went back in there, booted it up.... Went to the device manager, disabled every audio device in there. Just pulled up the software. Major latency spikes. USB mixer was not even hooked up to the computer. I don't believe I hear pops through the sound card, but it's in the red the majority of the time, especially when I pull up more than one cam in hd. I actually plugged the USB mixer in while the spikes were happening. They did not get worse and the popping was there. I can just be showing 1 cam in either software program in HD. Not recording, not streaming. Simply showing the cam in high res. If I knew showing high res on a webcam was too much for this computer, I would not have bought it. I mean it seems ridiculous if you think about it... But maybe I'm totally wrong here. Do any of you have high res webcams? Do you every turn on a latency meter while it's running in high res? What happens? I just so don't get this. Should this be fine with my specs? I can't imagine someone going to a computer store and saying "I want to look at myself in high res through my webcam" and the guy saying "Sorry, even our i7 computer's wont do that without going into the red on the latency test." haha

[djmukilteo]

Originally Posted by kilerb

@Conner and Bass

I just went back in there, booted it up.... Went to the device manager, disabled every audio device in there. Just pulled up the software. Major latency spikes. USB mixer was not even hooked up to the computer. I don't believe I hear pops through the sound card, but it's in the red the majority of the time, especially when I pull up more than one cam in hd. I actually plugged the USB mixer in while the spikes were happening. They did not get worse and the popping was there. I can just be showing 1 cam in either software program in HD. Not recording, not streaming. Simply showing the cam in high res. If I knew showing high res on a webcam was too much for this computer, I would not have bought it. I mean it seems ridiculous if you think about it... But maybe I'm totally wrong here. Do any of you have high res webcams? Do you every turn on a latency meter while it's running in high res? What happens? I just so don't get this. Should this be fine with my specs? I can't imagine someone going to a computer store and saying "I want to look at myself in high res through my webcam" and the guy saying "Sorry, even our i7 computer's wont do that without going into the red on the latency test." haha

Not sure which webcam model you had plugged in but that is a clue that it's not the audio section causing the spiking.
So maybe you've isolated it to either the webcam drivers or the Xsplit software app.
HD is a ton of data, and you don't have to be recording or streaming for the data being cached. Just turning the cam on...data is being captured.
Is there any webcam software/drivers installed?
Try uninstalling that and see if it's the cam or the Xsplit app.