Sometimes the speaker pops (worryingly loud!) when my Framework 16 running Fedora 39 plays audio. I still need to figure out whether this is a Fedora or a Framework bug and file a bug report accordingly, but I wanted to ask if anyone else was having this issue so that we could help each other figure it out.
Any follow-up details? I am also hearing a similar pop on my external speakers (over usb-c through my monitor) every time the track changes in my music player. But I am not really sure the best approach for debugging the cause.
A couple times now, I have heard a loud pop from the system speakers. I was not playing any music at the time. I’m running Ubuntu 22.04.
I’ve heard pops every so often too. I’m currently on Fedora 40 (release version) and it just popped when I rebooted, which made me do a Google search to find this post.
It happens to me too fairly often, seems like it might me the mainboard sending DC voltages to the speakers, that’s what it sounds like to me at least
I hope it doesn’t cause any damage the speakers in time.
It does have the potential to kill the speakers, I was considering reaching out to support about it but I’ve frankly not had the energy to.
Honestly I haven’t heard mine pop in quite a while. Granted I don’t use mine often, but I do shut it off every time, and I don’t recall hearing pops now. Is it still happening to you? And is it random or reproducible every time you shut down?
As I am not able to repro this here, things to try:
- Surge protector? Try without on a known to be trusted outlet.
- Try another outlet.
- Anything interesting appearing in
sudo dmesg -worjournalctl -fwhen you see the crackling happen? - Have tried this with Fedora 40?
it’s random, and one of those delightful issues that happen rarely enough that it’s nigh impossible to replicate and frequently enough for you to not be able to ignore it
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- I’ve tried on multiple trusted outlets.
- It still happens after updating to Fedora 40.
- As @DRACONIUM says, it’s delightfully impossible to replicate.
I have the same on Ubuntu 24.04, usually noticeable using the built in speakers.
I have a feeling it’s power saving related, since it only happens after a period of audio inactivity, followed by the sudden need for audio, like a notification.
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yeah so one day i was randomly reading the archwiki entry for pipewire and it mentions the issue, and provides a fix. PipeWire - ArchWiki
after applying this change the issue has completely gone away for me. thanks linux, very cool!
Well, this is odd. I’m on Fedora 41 now and I am hearing crackling noise from the speakers every so often, especially when the iGPU or the 7700S is heavily loaded (using Furmark to test).
I am a Linux ALSA developer.
Some coded/amps have anti-pop features but I don’t have the datasheet for the FW audio chips, so fixing this will be hard.
It sounds like it is a pop when the chip is powered on.
This can sometimes be mitigated by filling the audio buffer with a particular value before powering on the amp, but without having the datasheet it is difficult to know what to do in the case.
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@DRACONIUM: That’s not really a fix. It is merely a workaround. You are preventing your audio amplifier from ever powering off, meaning you are burning extra energy during periods of silence.
@James3: It is definitely a pop when the chip powers on. It doesn’t happen unless the audio output has been quiet for a while. Moreover, I have noticed that sometimes, for about one second following the loud pop, the audio will be very faint and tinny, as though the woofer amplifier has not yet reached operational voltages. On very rare occasion, the woofer amp entirely fails to power on, and so the audio remains faint and tinny indefinitely — until there is a long period of silence to cause the chip to go to sleep again, and then the amp seems to recover the next time the chip wakes up.
I have just been living with the loud pops and clinching my teeth at the likely damage to the speaker cones that they are causing. The saving grace of Framework is that the hardware components can fairly easily be replaced, so I can buy new speakers once a year or however often they blow out due to this bug.