audio card noise

[alex reznick]

Hi everyone
Can anybody give a clue to the following problem?
I had a perfectly normal working recording system, and suddenly I
started receiving quite strong humming noise when the PC boots up. The
sound is similar to the hum of the bad cable. However, gradually this
noise becomes softer and softer, and in about 5 minutes it disappears.
Recently the period of humming kept increasing, and the noise does not
disappear completely, it stays about -60 dB.
I opened the computer, cleaned everything, and tried to stir all the
components - no impact on the noise. Tried to ground components - no
impact, too. Switched mixers, channels on the card, disconnected all
other cables except the audio and power; powered the mixer and the PC
from the same outlet; switched the adapter for the sound card
interface - to no avail. It appears that either the Delta 1010
suddenly went bad, or some electrical problem in the PC - which is
strange, Dells have a reputation at least for one thing - power
supply.
Does anybody know if the PC or sound card start suddenly discharge
lots of noise (at the boot up it measures -5dBf on the mixer)?

[Richard Crowley]

"alex reznick" wrote...
> I had a perfectly normal working recording system, and suddenly I
> started receiving quite strong humming noise when the PC boots up. The
> sound is similar to the hum of the bad cable. However, gradually this
> noise becomes softer and softer, and in about 5 minutes it disappears.
> Recently the period of humming kept increasing, and the noise does not
> disappear completely, it stays about -60 dB.
> I opened the computer, cleaned everything, and tried to stir all the
> components - no impact on the noise. Tried to ground components - no
> impact, too. Switched mixers, channels on the card, disconnected all
> other cables except the audio and power;

What about with the audio disconnected? That differential diagnosis
would identify whether it is an internal or an external problem.

Do you have a CRT monitor or LCD? The degaussing coil of CRT
color monitors have a behavior where they start out cold drawing a lot
of current (and frequently audibly buzzing), then gradually die down
to nothing (or nearly nothing).

[philicorda[_7_]]

On Thu, 30 Jul 2009 17:00:04 -0700, alex reznick wrote:

> Hi everyone
> Can anybody give a clue to the following problem? I had a perfectly
> normal working recording system, and suddenly I started receiving quite
> strong humming noise when the PC boots up. The sound is similar to the
> hum of the bad cable. However, gradually this noise becomes softer and
> softer, and in about 5 minutes it disappears. Recently the period of
> humming kept increasing, and the noise does not disappear completely, it
> stays about -60 dB. I opened the computer, cleaned everything, and tried
> to stir all the components - no impact on the noise. Tried to ground
> components - no impact, too. Switched mixers, channels on the card,
> disconnected all other cables except the audio and power; powered the
> mixer and the PC from the same outlet; switched the adapter for the
> sound card interface - to no avail. It appears that either the Delta
> 1010 suddenly went bad, or some electrical problem in the PC - which is
> strange, Dells have a reputation at least for one thing - power supply.
> Does anybody know if the PC or sound card start suddenly discharge lots
> of noise (at the boot up it measures -5dBf on the mixer)?

Some Delta 1010 sound cards were shipped with defective capacitors in the
rack units power supply. I had one that had to be returned as it showed
very similar symptoms to those you describe. When I spoke to the M-Audio
technician, he seemed familiar with the problem.

This was about five years ago, so unless it's an old card it might not be
the same thing. The way the hum changes does suggest a capacitor problem
though.

[Ben Hanson]

Oddly enough, I had almost an identical issue with my old Delta 1010. It had
never given me issues before, but I rebuilt my DAW with beefier kit and
shortly thereafter it started doing the same.

I started trying to narrow it down by disconnecting the external breakout
box and using the SPDIF in/out on the PCI card by itself. No noise on
playback, but it did have the noise on recording input. But, when I put that
exact same card into another DAW, it didn't have any issues at all.
Likewise, when I put a spare 1010LT card in the first DAW, it had no noise
either.

In the end, the only commonality was that it didn't start till I changed the
mobo/processor/RAM out. How, exactly, this could cause that issue, when
another 1010 PCI card, and a 1010LT PCI card, did not exhibit the same
behavior in the same DAW, and the offending 1010 PCI card did not exhibit
that behavior in another DAW, I cannot explain.

Anyway it allowed me to find a legit excuse for ditching it altogether and
getting an RME Fireface 800, so I'm not complaining. The guy that bought it
from me on eBay didn't have any issues with it either, so <shrug>.

-Ben


"alex reznick" > wrote in message
...
> Hi everyone
> Can anybody give a clue to the following problem?
> I had a perfectly normal working recording system, and suddenly I
> started receiving quite strong humming noise when the PC boots up. The
> sound is similar to the hum of the bad cable. However, gradually this
> noise becomes softer and softer, and in about 5 minutes it disappears.
> Recently the period of humming kept increasing, and the noise does not
> disappear completely, it stays about -60 dB.
> I opened the computer, cleaned everything, and tried to stir all the
> components - no impact on the noise. Tried to ground components - no
> impact, too. Switched mixers, channels on the card, disconnected all
> other cables except the audio and power; powered the mixer and the PC
> from the same outlet; switched the adapter for the sound card
> interface - to no avail. It appears that either the Delta 1010
> suddenly went bad, or some electrical problem in the PC - which is
> strange, Dells have a reputation at least for one thing - power
> supply.
> Does anybody know if the PC or sound card start suddenly discharge
> lots of noise (at the boot up it measures -5dBf on the mixer)?

[alex reznick]

Guys! Thanks for your input.

>What about with the audio disconnected? That differential diagnosis
>would identify whether it is an internal or an external problem.

With audio cable out - no noise! The mixer is fine: I tried 3, and
they all have the same noise when connected to the Delta serial cable.

>Do you have a CRT monitor or LCD?

CRT. But the noise was there even when I disconnected the CRT monitor.

>Some Delta 1010 sound cards were shipped with defective capacitors in the
>rack units power supply. I had one that had to be returned as it showed
>very similar symptoms to those you describe.

I bought this one I believe in 2001. Never had an issue with it.

> box and using the SPDIF in/out on the PCI card by itself. No noise on
> playback, but it did have the noise on recording input.

Here too - the same on playback. Only serial output contains noise.
Though I am not sure about the purity of the experiment:
the signal goes to the D/A converter which might have better sheilding
(I do not have a digital mixer). I haven't tried to record yet.

>But, when I put that
> exact same card into another DAW, it didn't have any issues at all.
> Likewise, when I put a spare 1010LT card in the first DAW, it had no noise
> either.

This is really magic! Bad one, of course.

> In the end, the only commonality was that it didn't start till I changed the
> mobo/processor/RAM out.

No. I did not touch the damn thing for the past couple of years!

>
> Anyway it allowed me to find a legit excuse for ditching it altogether and
> getting an RME Fireface 800, so I'm not complaining. The guy that bought it
> from me on eBay didn't have any issues with it either, so <shrug>.

Sounds like happy end.
Maybe I should follow that example - though I am not completely sure
if the problem is not caused by the Dell.

[alex reznick]

On Jul 31, 10:07*pm, "Soundhaspriority" > wrote:
> "alex reznick" > wrote in message
>
> ...
>
>
>
> > Hi everyone
> > Can anybody give a clue to the following problem?
> > I had a perfectly normal working recording system, and suddenly I
> > started receiving quite strong humming noise when the PC boots up. The
> > sound is similar to the hum of the bad cable. However, gradually this
> > noise becomes softer and softer, and in about 5 minutes it disappears.
> > Recently the period of humming kept increasing, and the noise does not
> > disappear completely, it stays about -60 dB.
> > I opened the computer, cleaned everything, and tried to stir all the
> > components - no impact on the noise. Tried to ground components - no
> > impact, too. Switched mixers, channels on the card, disconnected all
> > other cables except the audio and power; powered the mixer and the PC
> > from the same outlet; switched the adapter for the sound card
> > interface - to no avail. It appears that either the Delta 1010
> > suddenly went bad, or some electrical problem in the PC - which is
> > strange, Dells have a reputation at least for one thing - power
> > supply.
> > Does anybody know if the PC or sound card start suddenly discharge
> > lots of noise (at the boot up it measures -5dBf on the mixer)?
>
> Alex, if it's a 120 Hz buzz, the computer is not the source, because the
> noise inside a computer is "hash." Computer noise actually varies according
> to the activity. You can hear the mouse when you move it, disk access, etc.

Although the buzz is definitely pitched around 60 Hz (or harmonics), I
cannot really testify that it is "stable" as a tone.
It does vary: becomes much louder about a minute after boot-up and
then varies over channels (L to R) by stiff increments -
altogether maybe once in periods about 3 minutes. It does not change
in response to the mouse movements, but it seems
to be affected by switching from program to program - especially
switching in explorer to any audio program boosts buzzing.
But, again, once the buzzing tone kicked in, it stays the same for at
least few minutes. No gradual fluctuations.

>
> So if you have a constant buzz, it seems to me you might have something
> floating, a lost ground.

Indeed, switches from one kind of buzz to another resembles in sound
bad contact in a snake. After all, the parallel cable must have about
a dozen wires.
If few of them get contaminated with ground, that could have been
responsible for tone modulations.


I suggest, open up the 1010 rack, and look for a
> loose screw, through the circuit board to the case, that would serve as the
> "star ground."

Pardon me, I am not familiar with this term.

*If you don't see anything definite, locate the ground plane,
> or a ground point, such as one of the XLR grounds, and use a clip lead to
> connect it to the chassis.

Do you mean to weld the wire on one end to the the chassis and on
another to the XLR ground, from inside of the box?

>
> Bob Morein
> (310) 237-6511

Thanks for the directions.

[alex reznick]

On Aug 1, 12:00*am, Soundhaspriority > wrote:
> > wrote in message
>
>
> >> "star ground."
>
> > Pardon me, I am not familiar with this term.
>
> How about "a bunch of wires" - are you familiar with THIS term? *If you're
> too ignorant to understand basic electronics, you're too stupid to be poking
> around in there.

What makes you think that I am stupid?
There are lots of things I did not understand before, but understand
now. The way to go about it is to ask questions and learn -
this is exactly what I did. This is true that my background is in
music, and not in electronics. But I am working on catching up.
I am sure that there are things that you do not understand as well.
Nobody is perfect. The point is not to shout out loud that you know
something others do not,
but to help others to learn. Or just pass on it, if it disturbs you so
much.

[John Williamson]

alex reznick wrote:
> On Aug 1, 12:00 am, Soundhaspriority > wrote:
>> > wrote in message
>>
>>
>>>> "star ground."
>>> Pardon me, I am not familiar with this term.
>> How about "a bunch of wires" - are you familiar with THIS term? If you're
>> too ignorant to understand basic electronics, you're too stupid to be poking
>> around in there.
>
> What makes you think that I am stupid?
> There are lots of things I did not understand before, but understand
> now. The way to go about it is to ask questions and learn -
> this is exactly what I did. This is true that my background is in
> music, and not in electronics. But I am working on catching up.
> I am sure that there are things that you do not understand as well.
> Nobody is perfect. The point is not to shout out loud that you know
> something others do not,
> but to help others to learn. Or just pass on it, if it disturbs you so
> much.
>
>
You've been trolled. That was *not* the real soundhaspriority. There are
two posters using the same nick, for more info, check the archives.

The real soundhaspriority does not use the same news provider, and
always makes excellent sense when he posts.

For information, a star ground is name for a common point where all
audio signals in a system are grounded. It's a common configuration to
help avoid ground loops, which can generate noise and hum in an audio
system.
--
Tciao for Now!

John.

[Ronald Porter]

"Soundhaspriority" > wrote in message
...

>
> "alex reznick" > wrote in message
> ...
>> It is sad that so many competent and constructive people have to
>> suffer from one menacing jerk.
>> Aren't there ways to blacklist him?
>> After all, forging somebody else correspondence is a federal crime.
>> The Brian seems to get a kick from breaking laws.
>
> I think Brian L. McCarty is currently under house arrest in Australia.
> It is possible that they don't pull his internet connection either due to
> civil rights issues, or to prevent him from going so crazy they have to pay
> for hospitalization.
> Brian L. McCarty was the victim of a tragic childhood accident that left
> his sex organs unable to function. In personal appearance, he is a eunuch, a
> "castrato", an individual who was castrated before puberty. This must have
> caused great suffering when he was growing up. There is a tendency for this
> to result in psychosis, which is eventuallly what happened. Mr. McCarty is
> heterosexual. The lifelong tension of not being able to have sex must have
> been terrible.
> Mr. McCarty successfully lead a double life. He was doing what you see
> here, in secret, before anyone realized. In the 1990's, McCarty was working
> as a sound mixer under the best name in the industry, Jeff Wexler, and, by
> all appearances, he was doing well. I think his downfall came on the movie
> RED CORNER, starring Richard Gere. I have heard that he misbehaved in such a
> serious way, possibly on that film, that he might have been subject to
> criminal charges. He did not receive a credit on that film. A year or two
> later, McCarty left Australia, returning to the U.S. only for occasional
> visits. One individual has told me McCarty left to escape prosecution. I do
> not know if this is literally true. He must have been unhappy to leave,
> because in 2001, he became a client of the Australian mental health care
> system.
> Jeff Wexler, the kindest of people, tried to help McCarty out by
> partnering with him in a project to build a studio in Cairns, Australia.
> Unfortunately, Mr. McCarty's dark side continued to act. He populated his
> ventures with fake people, fake frontmen, fake business alliances. My own
> name, Robert Morein, was used to promote some of these. In fact, if any of
> you have a subscription to IMDBPro, Mr. McCarty listed ME as his manager.
> McCarty obtained some business funding from ABN Amro, but that was quickly
> withdrawn. McCarty then resorted to highly fraudulent claims to lure
> investors. He never got a penny. He's not smart enough
> What you see on usenet is just the tip of the iceberg. When Mr. McCarty
> felt forced to leave the U.S., he seemed to develop a hatred of Americans in
> general. For years, he prowled usenet, selecting victims, which he would
> sometimes call police local to them, with claims they were selling stolen
> goods, etc. He caused serious, material damage to the lives and livelyhoods
> of several people. It appears he hoped to do the same to me. He picked the
> wrong guy.
> Those of you who are curious enough to google for the forgeries may
> find some of them interesting reading. Mr. McCarty is a diagnosed psychopath
> and psychotic, who has been prescribed Risperdal and Clozaril, powerful and
> dangerous drugs. These people project characteristics they cannot accept in
> themselves on others. As I read his forgeries, I picked up some things that
> another person might not. His forgeries are obsessed with sex organs, using
> phrases such as "my lacerated gonads", "my slivered gonads", "my worthless
> pee-pee", "can't procreate", "failed homosexual", "failed parent", etc.
> These are not normal insults, and McCarty is not a creative person. He
> appears to be talking about himself. I had always wondered why his personal
> appearance has the peculiar skeletal pattern of a enunuch, why he has no
> facial hair, and sloping shoulders narrower than his torso. He has provided
> the answer.
> If you want to see the website of a psycho, take a look at
> http://www.coralseastudios.com, and be sure to look at the "Contacts" page,
> where he displays a fake police flyer with my name on it.
>

I'd like to thank Robert Morein for posting such a detailed and
comprehensive description of his "Brian McCarty". It categorically rules
out the sound engineer Brian McCarty that I am friends with, and the Brian
McCarty that is known by people other people you have mentioned.

I don't know who Robert Morein is dealing with, if anyone at all. Given
that I've seen and spoken with Brian McCarty, sound engineer, at several
exhibitions in the last year it would seem an odd kind of "house arrest" as
has been suggested.

[[email protected]]

On Aug 1, 4:39*pm, alex reznick > wrote:

> It is sad that so many competent and constructive people have to
> suffer from one menacing jerk.
> Aren't there ways to blacklist him?
> After all, forging somebody else correspondence is a federal crime.
> The Brian seems to get a kick from breaking laws.


You will notice that all the various Roberts Morein more-or-less share
the same disease and follow each other about. In the one case with
outright garbage that no one above the age of reason would take
seriously or credit, the other with blatantly wild speculation, psuedo-
psychological babble and ignorant quasi-medical diagnoses - but
neither of them any better than the other comes to it.

Keep in mind that this is a newsgroup - Usenet. It takes the hide of a
rhinocerous and a very dry sense of humor to participate in any
meaningful way for any length of time. To take _ANYTHING_ written
herein as personal or to let it affect your life in any way at all is
just stupid. Neither more nor less. The various Roberts Morein have
each other in their focus and I would bet that there is no waking
moment during which they do not think of each other - how very, very
sad.

Ignore the both of them unless they have something useful to
contribute to your discussion. In this particular group (rec.audio-
tubes) neither of them have any place as neither of them has any
interest in tubes one way or the other - so it is a playgound for
their spleen. Ignoring both entirely is the only legitimate response.

Peter Wieck
Melrose Park, PA

[Richard Crowley]

"alex reznick"wrote ...
> It is sad that so many competent and constructive people have to
> suffer from one menacing jerk.

"Suffer" seems overstated. More like one of those pesky flying
bugs that you keep having to shoo away from your face.

> Aren't there ways to blacklist him?

Back when newsserver providers were conscientious individuals
with a sense of their role in the maintenance of Usenet, yes trolls
like McCarty would be blacklisted.

But now that large corps like AOL and Google and medium-size
corps like California Prime Line (parent company of troll-central
BuzzardNews) have got into the act, there is no longer any sort
of control over customers. Indeed this may have been the
congenital defect of Usenet, that it is dependent on conscientious
server/user management.

> After all, forging somebody else correspondence is a federal crime.


Since McCarty is in Australia, he probably feels beyond the reach
of US Federal law. Not that there is any evidence of them going
after home-grown trolls, anyway.

> The Brian seems to get a kick from breaking laws.

I suspect he would get a kick out of it even if it weren't breaking
laws.

[Rich Grise[_2_]]

On Sat, 01 Aug 2009 01:49:27 -0700, alex reznick wrote:
> On Aug 1, 12:00*am, Soundhaspriority > wrote:
>> > wrote in message
>>
>> >> "star ground."
>>
>> > Pardon me, I am not familiar with this term.
>>
>> How about "a bunch of wires" - are you familiar with THIS term? *If you're
>> too ignorant to understand basic electronics, you're too stupid to be poking
>> around in there.
>
> What makes you think that I am stupid?

He sounds like a troll to me.

Cheers!
Rich

[Rich Grise[_2_]]

On Mon, 03 Aug 2009 13:19:06 -0700, Richard Crowley wrote:
> "alex reznick"wrote ...
>> It is sad that so many competent and constructive people have to
>> suffer from one menacing jerk.
>
> "Suffer" seems overstated. More like one of those pesky flying
> bugs that you keep having to shoo away from your face.
>
>> Aren't there ways to blacklist him?

If you have a real news server and a real newsreader, your newsreader
should have a "filter" feature.

If you're using google, then I guess you're SOL, and have to use
the intelligent filter - i.e., your brain. ;-)

Cheers!
Rich