Audio dropouts and garbles over time, fine after DAW restart

[exitse7en]

I've been trying to figure this out for ages and It's driving me crazy. It happened on OG Cakewalk too, but to a slightly lesser extent. 

Basically, if I'm working on a project everything will be fine for a while, and then a few dropouts and glitches will begin, then get worse and worse until it's a garbled mess. If I restart the DAW it's fine...until it starts again a while later. It's like a continuous cycle. I've tried every single bit of standard thing you can think of with adjusting the buffer size, checking and unchecking every option under Playback and Recording, raising the Playback and Record I/O buffer size in increments of 128 all the way up to 2048 (I've noticed zero difference with any number I've put here). I have 32 Gigs of ram and the max I've used when this happens is 50%, so it's definitely not a RAM issue. CPU is also around 40-50%. Using Volt 276's proprietary ASIO driver. I've tried WASAPI and it did the same thing, though it seemed like MAYBE it took a few more minutes to get garbled, but I'm honestly not sure on that.

Actually, while writing this, I just noticed that I can make it happen quicker by doing stuff with Sonar playing in the background while I'm doing stuff on other programs, so maybe it's related to the audio driver fighting for control? I know that giving Cakewalk exclusive control is an option, but that would put a serious hamper on things and would be best avoided, but is a valid last resort if nothing else. 

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated!

Edited Friday at 11:00 PM by exitse7en

[Noel Borthwick]

This could very well be a problem with the driver that manifests after long term use. Try leaving Sonar looping and playing for several hours and see if this manifests.

[Bass Guitar]

I have a similar problem with my Motu M4 and it’s not really Sonar causing the problem. It only happens when I first open Sonar and then I also might open a YouTube. 
When I return to Sonar the audio is rough sounding. I have to re boot the interface and it goes away. 
I write it off as even after 30 years of ASIO drivers code being developed they still don’t have it exactly perfect.

The price we pay for using a computer that was ultimately designed for everything else but audio. 

Edited Saturday at 12:34 AM by Bass Guitar

[exitse7en]

33 minutes ago, Noel Borthwick said:

This could very well be a problem with the driver that manifests after long term use. Try leaving Sonar looping and playing for several hours and see if this manifests.

Yeah, that's what i was trying to say. But it's a matter of 30 minutes to a couple of hours, not several hours.

[exitse7en]

It's not the specific driver, though, if that's what you're saying. It happens across any driver. 

[exitse7en]

29 minutes ago, Bass Guitar said:

I have a similar problem with my Motu M4 and it’s not really Sonar causing the problem. It only happens when I first open Sonar and then I also might open a YouTube. 
When I return to Sonar the audio is rough sounding. I have to re boot the interface and it goes away. 
I write it off as even after 30 years of ASIO drivers code being developed they still don’t have it exactly perfect.

The price we pay for using a computer that was ultimately designed for everything else but audio. 

It happens with ASIO or WASAPI, though, so it's definitely not an ASIO-specific issue, whatever it is.

[Amberwolf]

I used to have this happen on a system I used for watching videos / dvds / tv shows, where for constant output volume I used Hermann Seib's VSThost program (which itself doesn't have a problem) to host just hte MDA multiband (which itself doesn't have a problem) using the computer's onboard audio...over time a delay would build up and build up, desyncing vidoe and audio , and crackles would get worse and worse. 

No driver version or method would make a differenc,e neither did buffers, etc.  

HS'VST host has an Engine restart button, and I just learned to use that to resync things. 

Later I used a different host LightHost, problem remained but LH doesn't have an engine restart button, so you have to exit it and restart it.  

Both setups use VBcable audio virtual cable to connect between the host and whateve rprograms were being used, then the onboard audio driver was the direct output of the host.   VBcable has a number of settings, but none of htem made a difference either.  I never used a different VC, so maybe that would've fixed it, but I doubt it--I expect it was just something in the audio driver itself.  

A few different audio interfaces were tried, to no change; a little USB "behringer" thing from goodwill, and the audio of an external display box by Targus (actualy two different ones) 

 

I never figured out for sure what the issue was; just had to use the workarounds.   

 

 

EDIT for clarity:  

That system wasn't used for DAW work, just general use.   

Later I tested on the DAW system, but not with the DAW audio interface, or at the same time as using the DAW itself.  Same results if I used it long enough (hours, days, etc). 

 

Edited 19 hours ago by Amberwolf

[Noel Borthwick]

Ensure that Windows isn’t additionally using the same audio device while Sonar is using it. With some drivers it can cause problems irrespective of whether its ASIO or WASAPI. Focusrite is one example. i.e don’t use the browser to play audio or Youtube etc.

[Jeremy Oakes]

9 hours ago, Noel Borthwick said:

Ensure that Windows isn’t additionally using the same audio device while Sonar is using it. With some drivers it can cause problems irrespective of whether its ASIO or WASAPI. Focusrite is one example. i.e don’t use the browser to play audio or Youtube etc.

I don’t, but good to know !

J

[David Baay]

 

On 8/1/2025 at 4:58 PM, exitse7en said:

I know that giving Cakewalk exclusive control is an option, but that would put a serious hamper on things and would be best avoided, but is a valid last resort if nothing else. 

On the contrary, giving your DAW software exclusive control of the audio interface driver is the first  thing you should do to avoid potential audio performance issues, and that you absolutely must do to avoid actual issues.

For years system tweakers have been advising to disable onboard audio while I've always recommended to keep it active and set it as the default device for Windows, browsers and other generic multimedia apps so they keep their mitts off the ASIO driver. And the DAW should always be using a dedicated audio interface with a native ASIO driver for anything other than casual listening or short-term situations where onboard audio with WASAPI is the only option.

And while I don't think a lot of system tweaks are necessary, disabling CPU-throttling functions like SpeedStep and C-States in BIOS and setting Power Management to Best Performance are essential as well as checking for low and stable DPC (Deferred Procedure Call) latency, and if it doesn't pass muster, additionally disabling Bluetooth and WiFi in BIOS until they're proven to not be contributing.

Beyond that I recommend not doing a lot of system tweaks unless some issue persists, and then trying them one at time to ensure they're effective  - and not actually detrimental - as many can be.

The same goes for Sonar Config File (AUD.INI) tweaks. Don't change anything from default without testing to see the effect over time and in different conditions. And don't automatically change anything as a matter of course on a new machine just because it worked well on a previous one.

[exitse7en]

It actually doesn't matter. Despite it working perfectly fine for years, I changed it yesterday to in a desperate attempt to get through this project because it's getting worse and it's still doing it even with Sonar being the only thing that has access to the driver. 

[exitse7en]

I noticed some odd behavior just now - the option to Suspend Audio Engine When Sonar is Not in Focus does not function. Perhaps a clue?